“Unless that first person is planning to drag the second person back into captivity.”

I started to argue with her characterization of the situation—until I realized how accurate it was. But that wasn’t my fault. “Let’s go.”

“I’ll get in your car because I promised I would,” Robyn whispered as we walked toward my SUV. “But you’re not taking me back to Atlanta.”

I laughed, but the sound held no humor. “Where is it we’re going, according to your delusion?”

“You’re taking me home—that’s the new plan. To your home. So I can talk to Abby.”

Yes. Back to my home, where she really could roll around in my bed for hours.

I wish...

“This isn’t a game, Robyn.” I stopped and shoved my hands into my pocket, to make sure no one still watching would think I was threatening her. “Helping you escape into the free zone would ruin any chance I have of getting my Pride recognized,” I hissed. “Any chance my men have of gaining rights and privileges you clearly take for granted.”

Irritation flashed over her features. “Prison is not a privilege. And anyway, I’m already in the free zone.”

“They don’t have to know that.” Shit. My forehead furrowed as the realization fell into place. “Except Teddy saw me cross the territorial line. You have no idea what you’ve done, do you?” I demanded. “A stray removing one of the council’s tabbies from her territory will be considered an act of war. They will invade my territory and attack my men to get you back.”

“You can’t be serious,” she insisted, blue eyes wide.

“Of course I’m serious. That’s why Abby formally defected, instead of just running away. She did it in front of the entire council so that Jace couldn’t be blamed. But you can’t even do that, because you made a deal with them, didn’t you?” A plea deal, according to Abby. “You have to go back.” I reached for her arm again, and again she pulled away.

“No. I don’t belong there.” Her gaze landed on my mouth and seemed snagged there. “I want to stay with you.”

A possessive rumble began deep inside me at her declaration, and it took every bit of self-control I had not to pull her closer and kiss her. The ache to touch her, as she stood there bathed in my scent, was almost more than I could resist.

What the hell is happening to me? It couldn’t be the normal reaction to meeting a tabby. My body had never reacted like that to Faythe or Abby.

“I want to stay with Abby, I mean.” She gave her head a little shake, as if to wake herself up. “At your house. She’s the only friend I have.”

“I’m sorry. I truly am.” More than she would ever know. “But this isn’t up to me.”

Robyn’s eyes widened, and the lights from the parking lot highlighted her impending panic. “I’m not going back. You’re trying to make things better for strays, right? Well, I’m a stray, and I need help. They’re trying to make me get married. They’re negotiating with one another about whose son gets to knock me up.”

That growl began again at the very thought of someone else touching her, and I swallowed hard, shoving it down. She is not yours, Titus.

“If you mean everything you said about making things better, you have to help me.” She took a deep breath and held my gaze with an impressive strength. “I demand sanctuary. As a stray.”

My eyes fell closed, and I groaned as the predicament she’d put me in suddenly zoomed into crystal-clear focus.

I am so screwed.

THREE

Robyn

“Get in the car,” Titus growled, pulling his phone from his pocket. “We’re not going to have this argument in public.”

I glanced across the welcome center, past a dark, empty playground and a bank of vending machines, at his SUV. “How do I know you won’t drive me back to Atlanta?”

His scowl deepened. “You’re the stowaway threatening to start a war in my territory. I’m the one who has a reason to distrust.”

“I’m not threatening to start a war,” I insisted as I headed toward his car. Slowly, in spite of the cold and the fact that I snuck out of the territory without my jacket.

His frown lingered on me as some battle I couldn’t quite make sense of raged behind his steely gray eyes. “Yet that’s exactly what will happen if they find out I have you and I refuse to return you.”

“Look, I’m not trying to make life hard for you. I just want—”

“You can keep saying you don’t want to start trouble.” Titus clicked a button on his key fob as we drew closer to the parking lot, and his SUV’s locks disengaged with a solid-sounding thump. “But as long as what you’re actually doing is starting trouble, it’s a little hard for me to believe you.”

Okay, that’s fair. “I admit I didn’t think this through. I saw an opportunity and I took it. I couldn’t stay in that house for one more second.”

Titus pulled the passenger’s side door open for me, frowning. “They lock you in the house?”

“Well, no,” I admitted as I slid onto the gray leather seat, setting his briefcase in my lap. He rolled his eyes and tried to close the door, but I held it open. “But they never let me leave the property, and they confiscated my phone, cutting off my access to the outside world. I’m under guard at all times. I’m a prisoner there.”

“Yet somehow, you managed to sneak into my car without being seen.”

“That was only possible because they trust you even less than they trust me,” I insisted. “While they were watching you, I slipped through the cracks.”

“And into my car.” Titus slammed the door.

He rounded the front of the vehicle, then stopped suddenly, and I could practically see some new realization smack him on the forehead. Then he stomped to the driver’s side and pulled his door open. “I already told them you weren’t with me!”

“I heard. And I’m sorry. But your empty SUV was the only shot at freedom I’ve had in more than two months.” If four hours spent hiding under a stranger’s change of clothes didn’t prove how desperate I’d been to get out of there, I wasn’t sure what would. “Titus, if I’d stayed in that house, they would have turned me into some kind of feline Stepford wife and mother.”