“It wasn’t even a difficult piece, that poem,” Catarina said, her voice devoid of all emotion. “A child could have read it.”

Eli’s heart bled for her. “Let’s go home, baby. It’s been a long day. We’ve still got a ways to run this evening before we’re done.”

She turned away immediately, not looking again at Elijah or the other two men. As soon as they were away from the fence, she stepped away from him and began to jog back in the direction of the ranch house.

Eli stared after her for a moment and then turned to wave at the three men. Elijah lifted his hand in salute. All three men wore somber expressions. Eli couldn’t blame them. It was impossible not to feel the pain radiating off of Catarina. She’d been cut deep more than once. How many cuts like that could a person take before their soul was ripped away?

He fell into step behind her, jogging easily, covering the ground with his longer legs to catch up to her. She’d never had a chance. Not a single chance. She was beautiful and intelligent and so sweet he wanted to eat her up like candy, but never once had she had any real choices. If he were any kind of man at all, he’d let her go and hope she came back to him, but the Han Vol Dan was too close and his leopard would never allow its mate out of his sight. Did that make him every bit as bad as Cordeau? What the hell did that make him?

It took a good half hour to get home, and that was with them making good time. Catarina set herself a grueling pace. Twice he’d tried to slow her down, but she didn’t even acknowledge his warnings. He let it go when ordinarily he would have forced her to stop. Yeah. He was that kind of a man. He controlled things. He got his way. He looked after his own. Was he just like Cordeau? Did she see him that way?

He cursed with every step he took. Darkness streaked the orange sky in long layers, stacking one on top of the other, first sandwiching the orange and then squeezing slowly until all that color was gone. He thought he had a kitten on his hands, and he’d actually acquired a little tiger. Because Cordeau had essentially taught her she was nothing, she didn’t recognize that she was a tiger, not a kitten.

The house was dark when they arrived, but neither switched on any lights. Catarina held herself away from him, averting her face as he reached past her to open the kitchen door. He stepped back to allow her inside.

“I’m going to take a bath,” she announced.