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We’d gone along ways together—a long way, in fact. But that was back when I had the money to spare for things like meals out and nights on the town; now all my energy seemed going toward keeping this place afloat…not counting workin’ on new stuff for shows around Lander’s Lake.
So why did she seem so different than the Beth of our past? We were a lot older but somehow, with her hair shorter than ever (I could see gray roots showing) and skin darker ’cause the sun had finally gotten to her too, she still looked exactly who she was: young and cute as heck. And despite what I’d told the cop who brought us here, he was still hot as hell just lookin’ at her.
He also managed to keep his cool once we got up front and apologized, though I noticed him keep an eye open every few seconds for anything suspicious in or outta the place. When no more hoodlums showed up during dinner, he let it go. “How about you folks have some pie before callin’ it a day?”
“You guys need any help cleanupin’? My dad used to do that for me when I worked here.” She waggled those adorable dimples again. If they didn’t get her free right then, he wouldn’t hear nothin’. “Even if I’m makin’ another apple cobbler instead o’ pie tonight.” Her eyes went big over one of them before she turned and walked away. All businesslike ’bout it!
Her voice followed from across the yard as she answered her phone. “Yup, it’ll be nice and fresh!”
I snorted out loud. “Not quite as funny as you think,” I muttered under my breath.
Then it made sense. Only someone like Becca would try to pull somethin’ like that. That girl really needed her head examined. Probably because I’d been talkin’ so much smack about how perfect and wonderful her boyfriend was—and we both knew I meant Tyler Riggs.
The boy would drive anyone batty after ten years stuck in high school, and we weren’t even there yet. Maybe if Bethie kept looking for men that cared enough to chase after her, she might find one eventually. Though it definitely wasn’t gonna happen between her and Becca’s jerk-off ex.
She actually shot me a quick glare by the time she hit her door and shut it behind herself. Right down to bein’ jealous of a couple o’ girls who wouldn’t know good lovin’ if it hit ’em upside the head. While I bet she had tons o’ fun dancin’, that doesn’t mean I wanted her prancing off into another night without thinkin’ twice…or maybe just once. Like me, she hadn’t done so bad since that last stint as a single woman.
Since Tyler turned himself from Mr. Assface into Mr. Studypants, he’d done nothing but putter around and give her plenty of attention for showing while basically livin’ at his place. Becca tried every trick in the book to turn it all on me, but she’d always had it easy between us since we first met when she decided to play with toys.
Too bad his job was here. Not to mention what everyone said. He liked her okay but she wasn’t pretty enough for him to break the rules. Now that he was working harder to look out for Becca, he hardly ever thought of anyone else anymore. Good thing ’cause I’m not ready to hand it back over for her to try and rip the handle off!
But I won’t hesitate to take care o’ this other piece o’ her ass tonight if I’ve gotta. If only she’d stand up on her own two feet already and prove otherwise… Oh, wait… That’s exactly what I’m trying to tell myself right now…
What she heard when I called later is up to her imagination, which usually involves a little bit of both me and Tyler on some beach somewhere…until she finally admitted how stupid that sounded and moved on.
But you can forget her and everything they say ’round the lake. Ain’t none of that true. In case ya missed it, there isn’t anybody here who gives less of a damn about where you go than me. Like she and her friends call themselves, “Lake Monsters,” well guess what, yer ma knows I ain’t the half monster, even if I’m tired and achy all the damn time.
My friends just wanna throw mud at your face because you’ve managed to hurt their precious ones and yourselves as hard as anyone…after they taught you how. Take a chill pill and quit cryin’. It makes ya sound helpless and weak…
Though I’ll be damned if I let either one of those kids see how much of a sucker I am for making up with them, especially now that the cops were involved. Shit, she could walk straight onto the stage naked as hell if she promised to wear some paint on her hands next time.
You watch: Just like her folks did, she’s just gotta show me off to everybody around town! She can stop kissin’ Tyler’s ass for another ten minutes now. So I kinda eased into what I was cookin’ up for dinner and asked him.
What? People can change too, especially when it means finally standing on our own feet…that have grown apart these past few years. For instance, how many nights in a row are y’all planning on being ‘alone’ anyway? One? Two tops… When one of you has been sleepin’ down here ever since that boy-toy you’re leavin’ here for came in and knocked his teeth out?
So yeah, I figured out my mistake when he started getting angry. Until then, it seemed obvious things weren’t exactly how they’d first appeared to be ’cause that poor man was spent, exhausted and even nauseous!
His eyes flashed gold in that last flash before he grabbed the collar of his shirt, pulled it down above his belt, and gave me this… Look, a fight may erupt any minute between them, no thanks to ya. Yer better get the hell outta here! With this wild animal standin’ behind me, ready to do whatever it takes to make sure ya know yer wrong again…
And I swear, I will tear out all the hair on your face one piece at a time…
“Let’s go,” I said quietly as the younger wolf puffed up beneath Tyler’s control until he almost looked ready to tear through the bars, at least physically speaking. The other one was holding back for whatever reason as a single tear trickled down the side of her jaw.
Though we had argued during the ride back home and right here at the front entrance, the last thing either of us wanted was for Becca or her friends to interrupt the calm atmosphere inside the house with outside noise.
Nothing about us going up the stairs together was suggestive; at the rate I moved, I would end up taking the steps three at a time by accident to speeding along ahead of Tyler who still looked more like someone locked in a cage than anything.
Yet every muscle across him tensed and tightened, as he stared into the mirror in my room where I sat waiting on them. But never took the blinders off… I couldn’t help staring at the two different sets of golden eyes while wondering where this was leading and what made it more difficult for me to accept him being Alpha today. Did he have some kind of mind control thing going?
No sooner had we arrived downstairs than Tyler lost the fight to keep his eyes closed once more after nearly passing out as soon as I set foot into the foyer. He started talking faster than a speeding bullet without seeming to realize it. He didn’t mean any harm, not intentionally anyways, but from the expression on his face, neither did I anymore.
There was so much more here that both of us were hiding now instead of letting it all spill over between us and giving each other space as necessary.
Tyler wasn’t surprised when I snatched him up around the middle and carried him upstairs, not giving him chance to tell me I could stop. We arrived at his room and somehow fell forward until we hit his bed. By the time I realized where we were going, he’d already thrown himself under the covers as though trying to hide forever.
All he needed to do was crawl right in with me and there wouldn’t be anything left for him to find. Well… that’s probably what I thought until he shut me down before I even got halfway to the edge of the bed.
He tried to scoot away when his legs folded under his knees automatically, causing both sets of crossed arms to fall, followed by his elbows after. What in the world is this guy’s problem!? I’ve done nothing! After rolling over to face the wall and holding myself close against it, I whispered my next words. “I’m sorry.”
***
At three o’clock, Tyler and I worked to finish cooking the breakfast dishes. It felt like we hadn’t been doing anything other than working for the entire morning and that it had barely been half a day since he brought me back to the ranch last night.
The hours we’d slept through seemed to make less sense with an extra twelve and a half hours in between, as we carefully cooked the scrambled eggs with bits of ham in them, fried up bacon slices and toast before spreading some thick cream cheese onto the hot pieces.
By the way, both wolves ate and drank everything, you could hardly notice Becca and Jordan having breakfast below us. That is… until Becca waved at us through the kitchen windows when we were collecting the last of their dirty dishes, not giving them a glance before Tyler turned to me, still watching her from where he leaned casually against one of the large oven doors.
I won’t lie, I did a little wave too. When I peeked at him in the process, I saw something new flash over his eyes briefly before we went back to washing the remaining plates before putting everything in the dishwasher, only adding the ingredients for dessert, which he promised was really easy to make later, into separate bowls to take downstairs with us.
By now, Becca and Jordan would definitely be awake after taking a shower. We finished up just as it got dark enough outside to see Becca and Jordan sitting at the dinner table while watching TV after we descended. Becca glared hard at Tyler all morning as she walked around in little groups with her best friend, sometimes glaring and saying ‘leave her alone, Tyler’ or calling him ‘Bane’. For once, I agreed with them.
My heart sank lower within the hour than I ever could have imagined if we kept pretending these two had come willingly to stay with us for a while, despite everything. Either way, they weren’t part of the equation anymore, especially now.
Becca wasn’t supposed to meet anyone yet after turning eighteen and neither boy had any say in the matter. No reason either of them should have shown up at our doorstep unannounced today in the first place.
While cleaning up the kitchen, Tyler suddenly stopped me midway, smirking softly at something on his phone. Even though he didn’t bring it out until he called over for a bottle of water, he almost laughed aloud when I refused to go anywhere near the dining area. “What happened?” He asked in confusion, scanning quickly through his messages on Facebook. “You’re getting friend requests? It has been quiet for months!”
“Just don’t leave your phone anywhere she can get to it,” I advised immediately, keeping my mouth shut until I gave him back his bottle when he was finished drinking. Then I sent Jordan a message asking where Becca wanted us to put the breakfast dishes in the kitchen before quietly reminding Tyler again that he shouldn’t use his phone near me for longer than a minute if possible.
He didn’t argue, but he took special care not to let anything else show how uncomfortable the whole thing made him feel when he kept his attention glued to the floor while telling me about the videos, the pictures, the chat with Brandon… and Becca.
He acted like the others must have told him this stuff multiple times already and while his annoyance towards the guys could be heard underneath his sentences, it faded somewhat every time he mentioned me being inside.
Only twice did he frown, maybe, when he talked about the different things he read. In one instance, I decided not to correct it. The rest, though… he said far more than I cared to hear, which he would most likely regret soon enough.
His sighs and irritation slowly grew quieter toward the end and his fingers moved faster over the screen until he handed me the phone back. There were no more updates besides the normal ‘is everything alright? replies after that, so I knew they wouldn’t give him trouble unless he actively provoked them.
Instead, he focused on talking about what we planned to do throughout the night, eventually agreeing that it would be much easier to clean up once everyone’s stuff was packed, including the mattress upstairs, since both of those kids couldn’t move without grunting a bit each time.
While he had my phone, I played with one of the faucets in the kitchen sink, trying not to listen to him. Not even looking away, he ordered Jordan to call Riko in order to have her help moving the mattresses and all the boxes tonight.
That conversation made me glance upwards towards the ceiling as if the angels who sat above had changed positions ever since he started mentioning them. Or maybe it was simply the idea that I might finally be able to sit down again for longer than five minutes instead of just standing here trying to act calm while feeling nervous inside.
After returning the phone to me and using the remote control for the vacuum cleaner next to the oven doors, Tyler only briefly glanced at me before speaking loud enough for Becca and Jordan to hear, “Alright, you two, finish your food first and then let’s get packing.”
I pretended to continue wiping countertops when they snickered, his brow raised in question when it looked like I’d somehow sensed their whispers a few moments before. Picking up the bowl in front of me from the drying rack, I pushed open the dishwasher door right behind them and stepped into the tiny space to wait there while it filled up.
Taking it out last, I didn’t want it sliding off onto the floor in case I knocked it out accidentally and caused an awful crash sound in the middle of the house. Placing it carefully in its designated spot, I tried not to smile too big at the small victory when they started picking things up to follow suit. It helped that neither of them reacted at all to what I’d overheard.
Walking out first while he still held a glass of juice, Jordan handed a trash bag full of clothes over to me, holding a second smaller bag for personal belongings while also wearing headphones. Thankfully, there was plenty of room for me to slide between them after Becca came walking out carrying most of the same type of bags in her arms.
Her hands didn’t hold a single electronic device or any other unneeded things anymore. So much for taking some photos in my new outfit today, then.
Maybe she’d forgotten all about it. Before exiting through the hall and down the stairs towards their car parked by the fence, I shook off my guilty thoughts of wishing she’d dropped her camera somewhere, forgetting the possibility she never really brought one here in the first place.
With just the two people ahead of me and only three cars left, I rushed past their bedroom doors in search of something I felt should’ve been simple but somehow managed to overlook: my own backpack.
But since there wasn’t anything remotely resembling a hanger lying around, it took forever to find the garment bag containing my everyday clothes in one of the closets. Luckily, the plan hadn’t included my lingerie, though, leaving only dresses and casual shirts hanging inside.
The backpack lay nestled comfortably amongst folded sweaters and pants until I zipped it closed and slung it over one shoulder, wondering what the heck I was going to wear anyway.
The End