I paused for a deep breath, and to gather my thoughts. The words weren’t coming quickly or easily, but they were the truth, and that seemed to be more important to Marc than my apology. Even if it didn’t make things any better.

“I went to check on him.” I couldn’t make myself say Jace’s name. Not then. Not to Marc. “He’d gotten hurt in the fight, and he’d closed himself up in the guesthouse, all alone. He was already drinking, and I had some, too. I wanted to make the pain go away, just for a little while.” Silent tears pooled in my eyes and I wiped them away, hoping Marc hadn’t seen.

“So, he gets you drunk, and you just lie down for him?” Marc spat, and I flinched at the venom in his voice, though I knew I deserved it. “Better not let that little secret out, or every tom in the country will show up on the doorstep with a bottle and a condom.”

I shook my head slowly, sniffling. “It wasn’t like that, I swear. He said he loved me. He said he needed me, and I…I made a mistake. Sleeping with Jace was a mistake. I know that, and I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I wish I could take it back. But I’d be lying if I said it didn’t mean anything. It did. It does. It changed both of us and made me face the truth about…about how I feel about him.”

“You love him.” That time it wasn’t a question. That time his voice sounded dead, like I’d killed the part of him that supplied emotional resonance for Marc’s voice.

I could only nod miserably.

“Do you still love me?”

“Yes! Desperately,” I said, hoping the truth of my statement shined in my eyes. Hoping he could see it in the near dark. Or at least hear it in my voice. “I know I’ve messed this up, and I honestly don’t know where to go from here. But I don’t want to lose you.”

His eyes glazed over in anger. “Then you have to choose. It’s me or him, Faythe. Once this is over, he and I can’t exist in the same Pride. Not with you. We’d kill each other.”

“I know.” I’d known that all along, but that didn’t make the choice any easier.

“Don’t make this a political decision,” Marc said, and even in the dim light from the parking lot, I could see what it cost him to say that. “I’m the better choice to help you run the Pride, when that time comes, but I’d be lying if I said that mattered. The truth is that you’ve learned a lot this year. With the rest of the guys at your back and your father as an adviser, you can run things just fine on your own. So you owe it to yourself to listen to your heart on this one.”

I gaped at Marc. “You’re serious?” I’d expected him to try to beat the shit out of Jace, or at least lobby harder to have him expelled.