Gerard by Kathi S. Barton Page B

wasn’t going to save him should she turn on him again.
    “I only wanted to scare him some.”
    Susie stopped to glare at him before she started stomping her way across the kitchen floor again. He took the opportunity to look around the room while she worked out her being mad at him for calling her father, and could see that his aunt had made good on her promise to only give them things she didn’t need.
    There was the old tea maker that was dark with age. The plastic was so stained up with tea it was hard to tell if it was empty or not. The dishes in the drainer were the ones that had been used by him and his brothers when they were younger, and he could see chips on the edges from their clumsy hands. The electric mixer hadn’t been new in probably twenty years, and he knew that the skillet on the stove, drying the only way cast iron could, had been his own mother’s. When Mason heard Susie clear her throat, he looked at her.
    “What did you hope to accomplish by talking to him? Did you know that he’s this great leader? And that his word is the only one?” He wasn’t sure if she was serious or not, and one look at Gerard made him think she really believed that, because he looked as shocked as he was. “He could have hurt you. What if he had? What do you think that would have made me feel like?”
    “Right now? I’m thinking you’d be thrilled.” He stood up when she looked like she was going to hurt him. “I’m sorry. I should have told you what I was going to do. But I saw him and I just wanted to…to scare him a little, that’s all. I think I did, to be honest with you. Susie, he’s not as big or as bad as you think he is.”
    “He’s hurt me.” That confession didn’t really say it all, and he was pretty sure that she might not tell them even if he asked. “He’s mean. And my father. I have to do what he says. If I don’t…if I don’t, he’ll hurt me again.”
    “You’re healed.” She looked at him with confusion on her face. “You can’t heal if a leader hurts you. Not if he does it with malice. You didn’t know that either, did you?”
    “He said I belonged to no one but him.” Mason was beginning to see the picture now. Maybe not the entire one, but enough to know that this woman might as well have been newly turned for all she knew about what she was. “I don’t want to have to go back to him. But now, thanks to you, he knows where I am. And he knows where you are too. What if he comes here, Mason? What if he tries to hurt you guys? He will. He’s a terrible person.”
    Mason sat down and reached for his aunt. The women would be better at explaining things than he was, but he’d give it a try until they got there. Holly and Emma were coming as well, his aunt said. They had some shopping to do for the new couple.
    “Look. I’m not just your brother-in-law now that you’re mated to Gerard, but your leader, as you know. But I’m not the kind of…I don’t think anyone is a leader like your father.” When she sat down too, he felt a little better about talking to her. “He’s not a good leader, nor is he a good man. Which I’m sure you know, but he kept things from you. Important information that he should have told you. He can no longer control you like he did when you were a child. He isn’t your leader, nor is he able to control you with compulsion. His power over you was gone the moment you mated and bonded with Gerard and became a member of my leap. But since you said that he hurt you, I’m assuming that it was with his cat.”
    “He can’t come near you again, love. I’d die before I’d let him, and I can tell you, it will never come to that. He isn’t going to come near any of us.” Gerard pulled her into his arms as he continued. “We’re a couple now. Never again will he be able to control or to hurt you. You’re stronger than he is because of the fact that we’re together. Mason is a stronger cat because of his mate; Jace is as well. Not just as a cat