She laughed, but before she could say anything, a horn tooted outside. “That would be Monty.”
“What, he’s too lazy to get out of the car now?”
Her smile flashed. “He was given a friendly warning to stop parking in no-standing zones, so now he just keeps the engine running.”
“He could go a little further down the road where parking is allowed and come get you like a gentleman, rather than just tooting the damn horn.”
She laughed. “This is Monty, remember.”
I smiled. “Is he in the Mustang?”
“From the sound of that rumble, yes.”
“That explains it then.” Monty wouldn’t dare leave his precious pony parked out in the street where uncaring strangers could fling open their doors and dent it. Not unless he absolutely had to.
“Yes, I think he cares about that Mustang more than he will ever care about me.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t go that far.”
A wry smile tugged at her lips. “I would. You haven’t witnessed him polishing her. He croons at her. It’s seriously disturbing.”
“Only if he doesn’t croon at you as well.”
“Also true.”
She waggled a goodbye with her fingers, then disappeared down the stairs. A few seconds later, the front door slammed and thick silence fell. It was the sort of silence where bad thoughts lurked, ready to be picked and amplified. I’d already had one crying bout. I was not going to have another. Not until the end, and that wasn’t here yet.
Enjoy what you have, while you can, I told myself fiercely. And then move on.
Except there was no moving on. Not for me. Not now.
I frowned at the thought, but whatever precognitive insight it had come from fled before I could pin it. I swore softly, put on some happy music, and then picked up the top book from the stack Belle had collected from our storage unit and read through it while munching on my ginormous bit of cake.
Time drifted, and the late afternoon moved on to night. The only thing I found in the book was a vague mention of something called a Baigujing, which was apparently a shape-shifting demoness with a fondness for eating flesh. It wasn’t our spirit, but could have been related, if the side notes were to be believed. There was nothing on how to kill it, however, which was annoying.
I put the book down, then picked up my empty plate and walked over to the small kitchenette to wash it. As I filled up the kettle, my phone rang.
Aiden.
My heart leapt into my throat and, just for a second, I couldn’t breathe. I dragged the phone out of my pocket and hit the answer button. “I wasn’t expecting to hear from you tonight—is everything okay?”
“No. Where are you?”
The words were little more than a deep growl. He was angry. Truly angry. Obviously, the meeting with Mia had not gone well. And while a part of me wanted to dance in utter delight, I knew it was far too soon for that. Karleen had extended the invitation to Mia, which meant only she could rescind it.
“I’m at the café—”
“I’ll be over to pick you up in five,” he cut in brusquely.
“Where are we going?”
“Home.”
With that, he hung up.
I stared at the phone and wondered just how far awry things had gone. And whether in the long run it would make any damn difference. If it wasn’t Mia who broke us up, it would be someone else.
I shoved my phone back into my pocket, then turned and raced down the stairs to grab my coat and purse. I was waiting out the front when his truck pulled up.
He leaned across the seat to open the door for me, but didn’t say anything. His aura was a turbulent mix of red and black—the former centered around his heart and the latter representing unresolved emotions and grief. It was the black that was dangerous—not physically, because there was no way in this world that Aiden would ever lash out at me with his fists, but rather emotionally. Hurt people hurt people, an old psychic had once told me. If I didn’t step carefully, all that anger might unintentionally be unleashed on me.
He waited until I pulled on the seat belt and then took off, taking the corner so fast the tires squealed. For too many minutes, heavy silence reigned, but the wash of his anger continued to burn across my senses and my skin.
We were well out of Castle Rock when he finally slowed down. After a deep breath, he looked across to me, his blue eyes bright in the shadows of the night.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to be such an uncommunicative bastard, but my mother sprang a rather unexpected surprise on me this evening.”
“I know.”
His gaze sharpened. “You do? How?”
I half smiled, though tension rose, twisting my stomach into knots. “Remember the confrontation I had with her at your birthday party?”
He nodded but didn’t say anything.
“Well, she told me then that she’d invited Mia—”
“Why the fuck didn’t you say anything? I could have stopped her—”
“No, you couldn’t have, and we both know it.”
His breath hissed through clenched teeth. An admission I was right, even if he didn’t come out and say it. “At least I would have been forewarned. Walking in there tonight and seeing her again … well, it was a shock.”
I couldn’t help but note he hadn’t said it was an unpleasant shock. He might be utterly furious about being caught so off guard, but all those unresolved feelings still swirled through his aura, and no doubt his mind, and who knew exactly where they would lead.
“I take it you walked out of the dinner?”
“Yes.”
I hesitated. “You can’t leave it there, Aiden.”
He glanced at me sharply again. “Are you advising me to talk to her?”
“Oh, trust me, it’s really the last thing I actually want you to do.”
“Then why say something like that?”
“Because you’ve never really confronted what she did and what you felt for her, and you need to do both if you’re to have any future—be it with her or with another wolf.”
“I don’t want that future. I want you.”
My heart twisted. Ached. “Through sickness and in health, kids and old age?”
Silence.
He knew, like I knew, that he was thinking only about the present. His future lay with his pack, as their alpha, and he couldn’t—wouldn’t—jeopardize that.
We rode in silence for a while. As we swept into the outskirts of Argyle, I said softly, “Why didn’t you tell me you’d taken time off work?”
He slowed for the roundabout. “It just slipped my mind. It doesn’t mean anything.”
“Would you have mentioned it if I had been a wolf?”
Again, silence.
Again, we both knew that the answer would have been yes. And no matter how much he cared for or wanted me, he would continue to compartmentalize our relationship as separate to his “wolf” life.
He drew in a deep breath and released it slowly. “I’m sorry. I should have said something.”
“Yes. We did agree to the whole ‘no more secrets’ thing, remember?”
“We did—and yet you kept the whole Mia thing secret.”
“Guilty as charged, but I just … didn’t want to upset your already strained relationship with your mother.” Which was true enough, even if cowardice was in fact the real reason.