You don't want to hate me...

**BLANCA**
"Alpha?" I say carefully. He's touching me, I know he is. It can't be anything else. The sparkling current of warmth that is riding up my spine tells me so. What it doesn't tell me, is *why* he's doing it. It must have been the whip that I heard drop next to my feet, but I don't dare look. I don't dare *move.* Not at all.
"I just had them in my office," Max says quietly, splaying his fingers widely over the expanse of my lower back. "Both of them. I thought there was *something* they might be lying about, but I couldn't be sure. Talbot was so nervous. It was like there was something he *wanted* to admit to." His hand lowers a bit, skirting the edge of my fallen dress. "And now you're telling me that you were"-his hand tightens-"only *sixteen.* And... that you didn't want it." He sighs and I could swear I hear a shudder in it as one of his fingers begins to stroke the base of my spine.
I gasp, pressing my face into the back of the couch and wiping my eyes. Now that he's so close to me, I don't want him to see how scared I am. The flesh of my back is quickly heating and I can only hope he can't tell how affected I am by his touch. Because I'm sure once he realizes how much I'm enjoying his hand on me, he'll stop, and I don't want him to. Not ever.
Pouring as much strength as I can muster behind my voice, I ask, "Are you still going to whip me, Alpha?"
"You didn't give yourself to them," he answers quietly, opening and closing his fingers to caress my bare back almost sensually. *His hands are larger than I realized.* "But they touched you all the same. They put their..." his voice bites off in a violent whisper, his fingertips dipping so far below the waistline of my dress that they outline my tailbone. A shiver ricochets through me and I pray that he can't feel it. Then his hand strokes lower caressing the globes of my rear *beneath* my panties and I feel the blood rush up my neck to my face. The way he's touching me is so intimate, I start to wonder what he might do if I turned around and threw myself in his arms. His fingers drag across my skin and my body shudders with a response that I can't hide. That's when he stops, removing his hand and stepping away from me. I almost moan out loud at the loss of contact.
"Put your dress back on," he says coldly.
"Yes Alpha," I answer, straightening my body and doing as told. When I've finished with the top button, I turn around to find him staring at me with empty eyes. Every trace of the gentle Max that had his hand on my back is now gone and I know at *this* moment, once again I am his brother's killer. It's almost like he forgets at certain times and treats me like I'm precious. Then... he reminds himself of who I am, what I represent, and he becomes angry again. Hateful.
His handsome face twists into a scowl as he glares down at me. "When I asked you last night who you'd been with, why didn't you tell me they forced you? Or this morning? You could have said something then. How about when I threatened to *whip* you? That would have been a good time, too!"
Lowering my gaze from his, I wipe at a stray tear dangling from my chin and then take a deep breath. "You didn't believe what I told you about my sister, so I didn't think you'd believe that either."
"I didn't say I didn't believe you!" he snaps. "I said you might have been *confused*. You were ten!"
"And I told you I was not confused, that I was ten, *not* five! You called me a liar, Alpha," I remind him, fully aware that I shouldn't argue, but helpless to do anything else.
Max chuckles, crossing his arms and making his muscles pop and ripple gloriously. "Okay, fine. But that was her and *this* is you! You're different."
"How am I different?" I can't help but ask, smirking because I know he won't say it.
His jaw clenches as he watches me, then he supplies, "You were locked away in your innocence. She was a border patrol agent on her own from the age of fourteen. That's five years playing as an adult. She was probably a seasoned lover by then."
"You didn't *know* my sister," I say with a shake of my head. "So you can't say that."
"How do you know I didn't? Maybe I did."
"No," I say coolly. "You didn't. Because if you had, you would have known she wasn't a *slut* - as you like to call her."
"Well my *brother* wasn't a rapist!" Max says softly, a twinkle of menace in his eyes.
"There, you see? I'm a liar again," I reply flatly.
"You know," Max begins carefully, "you could have easily blamed my brother's death on your sister. Had you told them *she* killed him, you would have been spared. Why didn't you?"
For a moment I'm caught off guard. The thought had never occurred to me. I suppose it might have worked, and it may have also made it clear that she'd been raped, but it would have been a lie. Then again, I have a feeling Alpha Robert would have made me the scapegoat anyway just to cover up the rape. "I'm not a liar," I reply. "I was protecting my sister. I didn't give any thought to anything else."
"Kind of the way you just protected a couple of rapists that I *might* have been able to punish if you hadn't *lied* about it," Max accuses.
My eyes flash upward and I take a dangerous step closer to him, poking him in the steel of his chest like a fool. He stares at my finger on his chest as I speak. "I *never* lied about that either. I told you I didn't have a lover! *You* are the one who insisted. I didn't tell you what happened to me because if I had, and you had called me a liar, I would have-" I cut off sharply, yanking my offending hand back and clamping my mouth shut.
Max's eyes twinkle with liquid fire. "You would have what, Blanca? Slapped me, hit me?" He scoffs, "Killed me? What?"
Shaking my head, I avert my eyes so that he can't see the sudden moisture collecting. Battling it back, I draw in a shaky breath and face him once more. "I would have never forgiven you," I whisper. "I might have even hated you."
His brow furrows. "Do you think your forgiveness matters to me?"
I shrug. "It matters to *me*."
He's half smiling when he asks, "Because you don't want to hate me?"
Meeting his sparkling gold gaze shyly, I shake my head, no.
His pupils expand for a moment, nearly swallowing the gold of his irises as he studies me. "That's too bad, Blanca. Because I'm pretty sure you are going to soon enough."
I try not to let that bother me, but it does. The way he's looking at me now is different. Almost, disappointed. He looks... guilty.
It's out before I can stop it. "You want me to hate you?"
He flinches as if my question bothers him, then he says, "You killed my brother."
"Right," I acknowledge. "I took his life and they took..." I can't say it, so I shake myself instead. "Maybe I deserved what happened to me in the prison. As part of my punishment."
To my surprise, that appears to anger him. "What? No! You becoming my slave is your punishment. What *they* did, they-"
"They did it because they knew no one would care," I supply. "I was a Shiftless murderer sentenced to die. In eight years, no one has cared what happens to me. There was no one for them to answer to, so they took what they wanted. They knew they could get away with it and... they did."
"Oh, I see," Max snarls, shocking me. "So this is my fault then?" Max chuckles sarcastically. "Is that what you're telling me? That they got away with it, because I let them?" His chest is fairly heaving with anger as he glares down at me, clenching his fists like he might punch something.
Now, *I am* confused and he's so mad that I *almost* reach for him. But I stop myself, *knowing* that such a move won't go well for me. "That's not what I said. I-I don't understand why you're so angry with me." Honestly, I don't. *How can it be his fault? He didn't even know me until yesterday.* Searching his eyes, I ask, "Why would it be *your* fault?"
"Because!" he snaps harshly. "I'm the one who-" he clamps his mouth and eyes shut, turning away from me as a growl rumbles deep within his chest. When he turns back around, he's calmer, subdued, but something flickers there in the golden depths of his gaze. Something like sorrow, or remorse. "Forget it. Never mind. Just tell me one thing."
I nod carefully, doing my best to keep my eyes from straying toward the beautiful, mechanical harmony of his muscles as they expand and contract with his every movement. *I think I could watch this man all day and just be perfectly happy. He wouldn't even have to be doing anything except breathing.*
"When they approached you in the prison," Max pauses, pulling in a slow breath, "and it was clear to you what they wanted... did you actually *say* no to them? Or did you just figure that you didn't really have a choice, and decide to go along with it?"
*Is he serious?*