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He quickly caught up to me.

“Seen the video then?”

I didn’t reply. Instead, I kept my head forward and pretended he wasn’t there. All I wanted was a run, by myself. And out of all people I just happened to run into him. Well, he launched himself at me.

“You’ve got dirt on your back.”

“I wonder whose fault that would be,” I shot back at him, “Aren’t you meant to be annoying someone else?” My silence failed epically as why he wasn’t on his date got the best of me.

“Jealous?” he replied and I could hear the smirk in his voice.

“Right,” I scoffed at him. I was surprised that no other wolf was out running tonight, though I was slightly pleased. I didn’t want everyone hearing our conversation.

‘Hey, Chloe?’

I stopped, too consumed by my thoughts to have noticed that Alec had stopped running beside me. Turning around, I looked at him. Amusement was dashing through his eyes.

‘Alec?’

‘You stepped in animal feces.’

***

“It’s starting to become a habit of yours. Laughing at me,” I grunted, walking out of my bathroom, towel-drying my hair. Alec was lying on my bed like he owned the joint.

“Maybe you shouldn’t be so amusing.” Alec grinned at me. “Your phone keeps going off.” He tossed the phone in my direction and I only just caught it.

I shot him a dirty look. Alec looked at me with mock innocence. I unlocked my phone and dread flooded through me.

Xavier’s name flashed and I selected his message, reading his words “we need to talk.”

We need to talk? That’s what he thinks? I wanted to hurl the phone at his stupid head. No, Xavier, we needed to never speak again. Fueled by anger, I replied, “we’re done.” It was simple and summed up everything. We were done. What had he expected? A girl could only take so much.

“You ok?”

I glanced at Alec, though when the phone buzzed my attention was back on it.

“we are far from it, Chloe. I’m not letting you go.”

“don’t contact me again.” I quickly hit the button and watched the phone dim and switch off. I had to cut all ties with him and it was already killing me.

I walked over to the bed and sat on the edge next to Alec. For a few moments I actually didn’t hear him calling my name, until he nudged me.

“You ok, buttercup?”

I nodded my head, not being able to pull my eyes away from staring into nothingness. “I just want the pain to go away.” I wasn’t emotional. I was matter of fact.

“It will.”

“I just don’t understand how this could happen? Xavier and I weren’t meant to be like this. We were meant to be together. It was nature’s plan.”

“Maybe it wasn’t.”

I looked at Alec. I wasn’t emotional. I was just curious as to what he meant. “Explain.”

“If Xavier had met you earlier, before he met Emily, he wouldn’t have had those two boys. The same two boys who are unique and give other wolves with human mates hope that they can have children too. Couples like Dan and Maddison. If you were with Xavier, you wouldn’t have been with Dan and because Dan was with you, you encouraged him to go to Maddison. If you hadn’t, he wouldn’t have went through with the process. Which would of meant he wouldn’t have a mate right now. And then there’s me.”

“Who?” I frowned.