But this was Callie, and everything in me screamed that I could trust her. I just hoped my insides were right because I was betting my mom’s life on them.
“Okay, I’ll see you guys tomorrow. Let me know when you figure out a time,” Callie said as she hugged Mom goodbye.
“Callie, why don’t you give Wyatt your number so he can call you when we figure it out?”
Callie spun around slowly and gave me a narrow-eyed glare before turning to my mom with a smile. “Sure,” she said through gritted teeth. “Give me your phone, Wyatt.”
I gave her my cell gladly and watched as she typed in her number and hit dial. When she handed it back, our fingers brushed, and a chill raced down my spine. I met her eyes again, and it was clear she’d felt what I’d felt.
Which meant if I was going to keep up this friends stuff, all physical contact was officially off the table.
“We’ll see you tomorrow, Callie. Have a good day,” Mom said as she walked her to the door.
Callie slipped through and Mom locked the deadbolt behind her. She turned to me with a sly smile on her face. “You’re welcome.”
I frowned. “For what?”
She sauntered past me, the smile still on her face. “For Callie’s number. Now, put it to good use.”
My mouth fell open as I watched her sashay down the hall and into her room, entirely too pleased with herself.
“Well, shit,” I muttered, my phone clutched in my hand. “I guess I owe her one.”
Chapter 18
Wyatt
“Call Callie.”
“I just texted her.”
Mom scoffed. “I said to call her, not send her a text. I swear, you kids are going to forget what real communication is like. All you want to do these days is text and DM and BM and whatever else there is. When I was your age–”
“First of all, BM stands for bowel movement. And second of all, I’ll call her right now if it’ll make you settle down.” I needed to cut off her kids these days rant before I had to sit through it for the hundredth time.
She tipped her chin up and sat on the couch with a huff. “Okay. Fine. Call her.”
I sighed and pulled out my cell, my stomach knotting in anticipation of talking to her. Which was stupid. She was just my friend. I had no reason to be nervous about calling her.
Now, if only my stomach would agree.
The phone only rang twice before she picked up.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Callie. It’s me. Wyatt.” I winced at how stupid that sounded.
Callie laughed. “I know. I saved your number in my phone.”
“Oh,” was my brilliant answer. I glanced at my mom, giving myself the much-needed reminder about why I’d called. “Mom wanted to go to the nursery around two. Does that work for you?”
“Um,” she hummed. “Yeah, I can be back by then. Should I meet you at your house?”
“Yeah, that’ll be fine.” The line went quiet as I wracked my brain for something intelligent to say. When that failed, I settled on, “Okay, I guess we’ll see you then.”
“Okay! Bye.”
I waited until her end of the line went dead and checked the screen for good measure before stuffing it in my pocket. With a shake of my head, I gave myself a silent but scathing pep talk.
It had been my idea to be friends with Callie, and now I was being a bumbling idiot. I needed to pull it together and start acting normal or this wasn’t going to work. And if it didn’t work, I guess that meant I’d have to let go of her completely. Since I wasn’t ready or willing to do that, it left me with one option.
To pull my head out of my ass.
“What did she say?” Mom asked, breaking me out of my twisted thoughts.
“She’ll be here by two.”
Mom’s face broke into a huge smile, reminding me I needed to keep Callie around for her sake too. I didn’t know how, but in the course of only one night, Callie McCoy had wormed her way into my mother’s heart. She hadn’t stopped talking about her since she woke up, and believe me, I wasn’t complaining. I could talk about Callie all day.
The afternoon dragged even though I spent most of it patrolling the pack lands perimeter. Every mile I ran seemed like an eternity, and I was probably a little too excited when my relief showed up, but I was past caring. I got to see Callie without feeling guilty about it and nothing was going to bring me down from that high.
I made it home with enough time to shower and change, but just barely. The knock came on our door just as I was sliding my arms into my flannel. I tried to get it before Mom could in case it wasn’t Callie, but that woman could really move when she wanted to.
“Callie! Thanks so much for coming!” Mom crowed as soon as she opened the door.
I sighed in relief that it was her and not someone else in the pack. “Ma, you should have waited for me to get the door. What if it hadn’t been her?”
She waved a hand in my direction as she ushered Callie inside. “Of course it was her. Who else were you expecting?”
I sighed again. “No one, but that’s not the point.”
“Next time I’ll announce myself,” Callie piped up.
I turned to her and our eyes met, effectively erasing everything else in the room. As we stood there, our gazes locked, my chest bloomed with a warmth that was so unexpected, it knocked me back a step. Nothing like that had ever happened before and I didn’t know what to do with it.
Thankfully, she broke eye contact first, giving me an opportunity to look elsewhere. Unfortunately for me, my gaze was still trained on her and that made other parts of my body start to heat up.
I shook my head and said the first thing that came to me. “We match.”
Callie looked down at her own flannel and jeans before raking her pale gaze up and down my body. I did my best to hold still, but that was almost impossible when it felt like it was her hands caressing me from head to toe and not her eyes.
“I think you fill it out a little better than I do,” she said softly.
I couldn’t help the stupid smirk that spread across my face. “Are you talking about my muscles again, Callie? You seem to do that a lot.”
She rolled her eyes, but I could still hear her heart pounding, and her breathing was more shallow than it was a minute ago. “Get over yourself, Carter.”
“You first,” I shot back.
She pinned me with a narrow-eyed glare, but I just smiled. Getting under her skin was as fun as ever.
Mom came bustling over, already talking a mile a minute, fortunately breaking the spell between us. I shook my head as she grabbed Callie’s elbow and led her to the door, chatting her ear off the whole way.
I needed to get it under control.
I had no business flirting with Callie, no matter how much fun it was. We were friends now, and that meant I needed to keep things platonic.
But was it my fault her tight jeans hugged her ass like a dream?
I rushed to catch up with them before they left the house. “Ma, let me make sure no one’s out there first.”
She sighed, but I ignored her. I’d kept her safe this long by being cautious, and I wasn’t throwing that away today. Taking her out of the house and off pack lands was already hard enough on me. I wasn’t going to make matters worse by letting her be seen by someone here.