I took a deep breath.
I dialed the utterly familiar phone number.
“What? What’s matter, Lettie?” Griffin sounded like he was trying to get his wits together. I looked at the clock and realized that it was 2AM. I cringed. I shouldn’t have called him. I shouldn’t have done this impulsively. It was the first time we had talked since I left.
“Sorry…um, it’s nothing. I’ll, uh, I’ll talk to you soon…” I started to hang up the phone when I heard Griffin call out my name.
“What’s up, Lettie?”
I bit my lip.
“Thunderstorm,” I whispered.
“You near a window?”
“Yes,” I said looking out said window.
“Kay, here is what I need you to do. Grab your comforter, and run as fast as you can to the closet.”
He sounded much more awake now and I did as he asked. Once inside the closet I closed it and wrapped the blanket around myself.
“You there?”
“Yeah,” I whisper feeling like the world was suddenly smaller.
“Kay, I am going to talk to you until you fall asleep. Alright. What do you want me to talk about?”
I smiled, a yawn followed, and I curled up.
“I don’t know, tell me about your day. How are Liam and Nick doing?”
“I don’t know how I’ll manage without you, Lettie. Liam is acting really annoying. Plus he doesn’t cuddle as well as you do.”
Griffin kept going on like that. A few times, I let out a sleepy little laugh. His voice was soothing, and it sent me right to sleep. But before I disappeared into slumber, I thought I heard the floor outside of the closet creek.
Chapter 15 — One Huge Step Back for Hunter
The door to my room slammed open.
I jolted awake, confused. Where was I? I rolled over.
What in the…hangers?
I rubbed my hand over my eyes, pushing them back into my throbbing skull. It eased for a moment. I sat up, fumbling for the doorknob. It twisted before I could get a grip. An imposing silhouette filled the doorway.
I had been laying on my back with my head just a foot from the door. It wasn’t an overly large closet and I had fit in pretty snugly. I was looking up at Hunter, and I turned so I was sitting up.
“Hunter?”
“Give me your phone,” he said.
“Huh?”
“The phone, Colette.”
I looked up at him still half asleep. I was too confused to argue with him. I handed him my phone, shaking my head, trying to wake up fast as I watched him. He crushed the device in his hands and snarled at it like it was a vicious creature. He looked down at me and I could see the purity of his anger. His eyes were gold.
Maybe a hint of disappointment, as well.
I jumped up and grabbed at the shattered remnants. There was no way to save it, yet something in me screamed out for it, to grab it from him and hide it. I made a move to snatch it away from him. He pulled back, his wolf still at the surface.
“What did you do?” I asked in disbelief. I looked at Hunter. His fists were clenched tight, his face was turned to the side. The muscles in his cheek rolled as he held back the shift.
“I came in here last night to see if you were okay.”
He could barely get the words out. They were gritty and barely recognizable.
“So you destroyed my phone?”
“You called him. You are still relying on him,” his voice quieted.
I bit my lip and looked down.
“I waited for you last night. At dinner, you never showed. What did you expect me to do?”
“You lied to me first, Colette,” Hunter bit out.
“When?”
“I asked if anything was wrong. You lied to me. I needed to get out. I needed to run. When I came in here last night you were in there, hiding, talking to him. Fuck!” Hunter pushed off from the door frame and paced the room. I untangled myself from my comforter.
“So you’re punishing me?” I shoved him to a stop, not knowing what else to do with the rage flooding my system. My wolf protested all the while. She didn’t understand the anger that I was feeling. She only knew that Hunter belonged to her.
“No,” Hunter snarled, “I am going to punish him. You’re mine. You should have come to me.”
“No! Don’t blame this on me. I could not have ‘come to you’ I don’t even know where you are half the time. And I’m stuck here in a place I don’t know anyone. Dammit, Hunter, what do you expect me to do?” I asked pissed off.
“I want you to try to trust me. To treat me like I’m you’re mate,” Hunter said.
“If you want me to come find you, maybe you should start acting more like a mate,” I glared up at him.
Hunter didn’t move. I didn’t know what he was planning, but fur was beginning to sprout from his pores. He shook off the shift for a second, but I knew it wouldn’t last. He turned on his heel and left my room, slamming the door shut behind him.
I felt exhausted and moved to sit on the bed. I couldn’t get the sound of my phone breaking out of my head. Plastic crinkling and crackling.
I sat there for a while letting my heartbeat slow to its natural tempo. I knew that during our entire fight he was fighting his wolf. I had lived with weres my entire life, yet when it came to someone I could love, I seemed to be throwing everything I knew about them out the window.
He had smelled my lie last night. I had done this.
No, I shook my head. Hunter could have handled it better. We were both to blame. I could hear the wolf in me whine at the thoughts running through my head. She wasn’t happy last night when I called Griffin instead of searching out Hunter, but this was an old fear and I wanted someone who understood it.
Sometimes the comfort of home is a need.
****
Two weeks passed. Hunter and I were still giving each other one word responses. We made an effort to have dinner together, but that was the extent of our trying. I spent more time with Jen. The more I did, the more comfortable I felt. I felt safe in the knowledge that my powers were bound, and there was no way any in this pack would find out unless I told them. And fat chance of that happening. I had felt the need to tell Hunter before our fight, but not anymore.
I was sitting in my room I thought that any day Hunter would come in and tell me that we were moving out of the house. He seemed pretty intent on doing so when I we arrived. Instead, we stayed at Damien’s.
Damien was around sometimes, but mostly he would disappear into his office for the day. Or he would go out and spend time with the pack. The full moon was in a couple days, and I was getting jittery. We all were. It was the first full moon with my wolf so close to the surface. For regular weres, the full moon was a time of celebration. She had been on edge since Hunter and I fought.
“What in the world are you watching?” Jen asked as she came into my room.
She was my constant companion lately, and I didn’t mind. I needed a friend, and it seemed like Hunter was even more sparse than usual. As much as I tried to hold onto my anger, it had faded and I was growing desperate to talk to him again. Really talk to him.
It had been a week since I spoke to him. Naturally, I had held him at arm’s length. I had been pissed. But then my anger started to fade. I still wasn’t ready to forgive him. A part of me really wanted him to come to me. I knew it was selfish and childish, but I wanted him to say he was sorry. I wanted him to acknowledge that I was upset.
“The Hallmark channel.”
She looked at me like I was mad.
“Okay that’s it, you and Hunter are making up and this,” she pointed that the TV with an arched brow, “Is going to stop. Immediately.”
I rolled my head in her direction.
“And why should I do that?”
“Because you two need to get over yourselves. Hunter has been over at our house training with my brothers almost every single day for the past week. They’re about to go insane and kill him,
I’m pretty sure. I know I want to. He is more broody since you and him started this stupid argument.”
“It’s not that simple,” I muttered.
“Things rarely are, but there is so much you don’t know about each other. Give Hunter a chance,” Jen asked moving onto the bed with me. I shrugged my shoulders.
“It’s strange with him. I feel, well, I should say my body likes him. My wolf loves him. All she wants to do is snuggle close and be playful. I guess I spent so many years thinking it wouldn’t happen and then he shows up. Things are complicated.”
“That’s true. But love is complicated,” Jen said, playfully bumping her shoulder into mine.
Jen stayed with me for a little longer, watching the movie with me, but left soon after that. While she was there, the movie was only background noise. I thought about what she had said. We were mates. Essentially we were all that each other could want for a promising future. Each wolf has their own mate, and I had Hunter. Plus, in this brief time, I had truly glimpsed my wolf, and I knew that she would never love any other.
I thought back to the night that Griffin and I visited the witch who bound my powers. She had said the spell hadn’t been a curse, but right now it seemed like it. If I were to lose Hunter, I knew my wolf would eventually die without him. I had only really connected with her through him, and I didn’t want to lose her. I didn’t want to lose my chance or make him lose his. Jen was right. I decided that night I needed to apologize to Hunter for my part in this. I wanted to make an effort with him.
****
I arrived to the kitchen before Hunter. We didn’t speak often when we were in the kitchen making dinner together the past week. It was like our safety zone. I kept wringing my hands nervously under the counter waiting for Hunter to show up. It would be in line with my luck that he wouldn’t show up. I waited a little bit longer. I hoped that he wouldn’t bail on me. This was our one constant.
“Colette.”
Hunter stood in the backdoor entrance. His brow was furrowed. He moved forward and stepped in front of me. His cheek had a yellowing bruise. But wolves healed fast, and it would disappear by the end of the night. I bit my lip. My head naturally tilted down.
“I’m sorry,” I said. I looked down, still not that brave to look in him in the eyes as I apologized.
“I had made a promise to you that I wouldn’t call Griffin. I didn’t mean to break that promise, but I was scared. I was looking for a piece of home,” I whispered the last word. It felt harsh in my mouth. I knew immediately that I was failing Hunter.
“Colette,” Hunter forced me to look up at him. He pressed a finger under my chin. “Why can’t you consider this home?”
“I would like to try. But Hunter, you have to be willing to try, too.” Hunter turned his head away, ashamed.
I watched him and tried my best not to falter. I was nervous, my heart racing. Knots had filled my stomach like ribbons. Hunter took a deep breath and did something I had never had seen him do.
“I’m sorry.”
I smiled. I had learned a little about Hunter since moving here with him. And I knew that this was difficult for him. He was going against his wolf’s instincts, and he had been driven to do things by his wolf. Werewolves had to struggle with animal instincts on top of their own. And though Hunter wasn’t a man of many words, I knew these things to be true.
Trusting my instincts, I leaned in. His cheek was scratchy from his scruff, but my lips touched the warm flesh underneath. I shut my eyes. Just his cheek, but it felt very close to paradise. I didn’t realize how starved I was for his touch, how much my wolf craved him.
I pulled back and watched as his yellow eyes darkened slightly at my touch. I smiled shyly.
“What would you like to make for dinner?” I asked feeling lighter than I had in weeks.
It was strange to think that this might have been what we needed in order to move forward. I needed to remember that Hunter didn’t have someone to fall back on and I didn’t either. Griffin wasn’t mine. He would never be mine. Hunter could be mine though. He could be mine one day.
The rest of the night we worked on dinner together. It was better than when we first started to do dinners together. Things seemed to be easier for us. We moved together and talked a little. I did most of the talking. Hunter would reply everyone once in a while. I asked him what he had been up to during our ‘fight.’
“I trained.”
“Okay, so what did you do during this training?” I asked as we cleared the table.
“Sparring in wolf and human forms.”
“So you wrestle?”
“No, we spar,” Hunter answered.
“What’s the difference?”
Hunter didn’t answer for a minute.
“Wrestling is different. I’ll have to show you sometime.”
We both quieted after that. I bit my lip as I hid behind the curtain of my hair, suppressing a small giggle. I peeked through to look at Hunter and noticed the blush that stole across the back of his neck.
We started the dishes.
Hunter’s hands disappeared into the soapy water. I watched his strong forearms as they rippled and danced at his underwater movements. I felt stupid being so entranced by simple movements, but when I felt my tongue poke out onto my dry lips. Hunter kept me interested.
I shifted my weight and tried to keep my focus on the dishes I was drying. Round in circles. The faint rustle of towel on dishware. None of it proved as exciting as Hunter’s forearm.
I was day dreaming about those arms wrapped around me from behind. My hands against his silky smooth skin, feeling the steel of his muscles underneath. I let out a small sigh wishing.
Hunter touched my wrist, stopping my motions and pulling me from my day dreams. I looked up at him through my eyelashes, wondering what he was up to. An erratic dance butterflies jarred my stomach as his yellow eyes darkened. He started to lift my wrist up to his mouth. I was captivated by his movements. My breath caught in my throat. His eyelids drooped. His eyes kept wandering over me. My wrist met its destination his attention turned to the fragile skin.
My heart raced. Hunter’s hot breath touched my wrist. My eyelids closed at the sensation that tingled through me at his small movement. I let out a breathy moan as I moved a little closer to Hunter’s groin. He pressed a gentle kiss against my skin.
I felt hopeful.
“Hunter, tomorrow, do you think maybe we can have, like, an actual dinner date. The food already made and, maybe, we can just talk?”
“Of course. I’ll cook,” Hunter answered.
Hunter traced his hand down to capture mine. He reluctantly pulled his body away. We headed upstairs. He never once let go of my hand. We arrived at my door. When he made no move to open it, I moved forward. He kept his hold on my hand. His gaze dropped to my lips and back again. Before he made his move he let go of my hand.
“Tomorrow.”
Chapter 16 — Homey
The next night, I debated the clothes I was going to wear. In the end I decided it was best not to dress up or down too much. I wanted to be causal, but classy. But Rose wasn’t here to help and I wasn’t exactly a fashionable person. I usually wore what I liked and was comfortable. I pulled out a short-sleeved sweater-dress, and airing it out with my best jeans. I didn’t think Hunter would care that much. Most of the time I saw him in ragged jeans and old t-shirts.
I entered the kitchen and saw the counter where we usually ate at was empty. I twisted my lips and wondered where he was. I had figured that we would have eaten in here like usual. Maybe I was just early?
Someone cleared their throat behind me. I turned around. Hunter stood there wearing a nice, solid color button down shirt, with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair which usually windblown, was combed.
“I figured we’d eat outside.”
Hunter shifted his weight as he watched me. I smiled and started toward him.
“You look really nice.”
I felt a bl
ush steal across my cheeks. I wasn’t use to getting compliments, and felt a little nervous. Especially from him. He moved so that I could walk in front of him and he with a small amount of pressure Hunter touched the small of my back, lightly urging me through the front room to outside.
I stopped short of the doorway. Through it I saw a porch transformed. There were lights strung all around. They were wrapped around the poles and railings. A table, although not exactly elegantly set, stood amidst the scene. There were two place settings across from one another. The food between was simple, but its surroundings gave it an elegance it wouldn’t have otherwise.
The night was in its early stages, and the sky was still bleeding out the colors of the day. The black-blue of evening was yet to come. A light purple tinged the edges, and deep reds mixed. The stars were just waking, and soon it would all come together.
I looked at Hunter who stood near the table and looked adorably uncomfortable. His back was a little too straight.
I smiled at him. I noticed how the tension in his shoulders eased and the painful, uncertain frown on his face relaxed considerably.
“This is amazing, Hunter.” I said moving closer.
He was dressed in jeans, free of holes and scuff marks. Newer and better taken care of jeans. My eyes followed upwards to the button up black shirt he wore. He had trimmed down his scruff. What a relief he didn’t shave it off! I had grown very attached to it on his face in the time that I had known him.
Hunter pulled out my chair for me, looking expectedly. I raised my eyebrows and moved into the seat. He was being surprisingly gentlemanly. Hunter sat down and served the steak he made. First, to me, then himself.
“This steak is huge!” I said trying to joke, but it was the truth. I couldn’t eat like a werewolf could. Wolves have bottomless holes for stomachs. Me, not so much.
“It’s alright, I’ll eat your leftovers,” Hunter said looking up at me. With that, we both started to eat. At first it was silent. Not an awkward silence, but the whole purpose of this was to learn more about him, so the silence would have to end.
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