Dark Side Of The Moon (BBW Paranormal Were-Bear Shifter Sci-Fi Romance) by Catherine Vale Page A

was quiet for
a long time, sitting with his hands on his knees. She wondered if that was the real
fight between them, him prying this confession out of her. Considering himself
the winner, he’d shut her out. She was on the verge of getting up, walking away
from him—as far as she could—working the kinks out of her limbs when he reached
out, taking her hand.
    “I
have no one either. There...” He pointed at the little window. “In all of that
blackness, among all of those planets and stars, we are alone. You and me.
But...”
    He
turned to her so suddenly she shrank back, expecting another friendly slap on
the cheek or amicable punch in the solar plexus, but he only held her hand,
looking at her with bright eyes.
    “We
could have each other, Max. If you could see my world through my eyes, you’d
understand. You would be a part of that world, help me fight for something
worth fighting for. Be something more than you were on Earth. Could you think
about that?”
    She
stared at him. “I was something on Earth.” Of course she was. She’d
been...someone. She’d been loved by...Gus? Her father, surely. But he’d been
dead for almost five years.
    “I
was someone...” Some of the resolution had gone out of her voice.
    “Who?”
Taso’s voice had gone quiet, so soft she thought she imagined the word. “Who
were you, that you’d be missed? Who is left that loves you for who you are?”
    Hearing
it said like that made her feel small and alone. Something small, but vital
broke inside her, like a tiny mirror shattering. Barely heard, but it changed
how she saw herself.
    “My
parents are dead. Killed when I was a junior in college. They loved me.” She
found herself sniffling, a tear running down her cheek. Swiping at it angrily
as the memories crowded in. This wasn’t fair; she didn’t know how to fight
against this kind of attack. There was nothing to hit. She felt confused,
unmoored. It was impossible to look at Taso, so she looked at his hand over
hers.
    “My
father loved me, always. From the start.” Thinking of him, how the cowlick of
black hair always fell in his eyes as he clapped wildly for her at one of her
competitions. Always alone; her mother never came along.
    “It
was his idea that I start training in martial arts.” She could almost see the
quirk in Taso’s eyebrow. “Lessons in how to fight in different ways.
Anyway...the lessons were his idea. It was my mother’s idea that I do something
because I was...” The word came to her, but she’d never said it out loud
before. But now, it hardly mattered.
    “My
mother thought I was fat. She wanted a pretty daughter, a thin daughter she
could take shopping, buy matching clothes for. But that’s not the daughter she
got.”
    She
looked like her father, from the unruly black hair to the thick, muscular legs,
that had the tendency to carry a few more pounds for their height.
    “So
they made me take these classes...” There had been karate, taekwondo, Brazilian
Jiu-Jitsu. And somewhere along the way, a boxing class. That had solidified
everything for her, gave her fulfillment like none of the other disciplines
had. And it had horrified her mother.
    “And
I loved them. That’s where I learned how to fight. And that’s where I
discovered that guys don’t always like girls who fight.” She gave a bitter
laugh. “You know; they don’t want to ask me out. They just want to beat me up.”
    While
she’d been talking, Taso had wound his fingers through hers, tightening them as
she’d finished. He was quiet for a moment.
    “Your
father was a wise man. Your mother...” He shrugged. “Perhaps foolish to not see
the value in you. And the boys…they were probably just afraid of you.”
    “She
was who she was.” It was hard to hold bad feelings toward the woman, now that
she was gone. She had loved Veronica, in her own way.
    “But
they are gone.” Her voice was quiet.
    “Yes,
they were killed in a car accident when I was in college. I ended up