Page 38

ELLIETTE

B y the time I arrived at Charlie’s Coffee, the troops were rallied.

Jen stood at the counter with her back to me.

She was still wearing her waitress uniform: a tight-black T-shirt, which I knew had the words Heidi’s Hideaway emblazoned across her ample chest, a short black skirt, and thigh-high black boots.

Knowing her, she was probably trying to flirt her way into convincing the cute barista to give us free dessert.

Amy, Parvati, and Kiera sat at a small round table, facing the door I’d just walked through.

Amy’s glossy black hair was pulled up into a messy bun, and she wore a sweatshirt featuring a cartoon character from a children’s TV show.

Parvati hadn’t changed out of her gray business suit.

Kiera’s curly auburn hair was pulled up on one side, and she wore one of the “Perfect ‘Fits for Autumn” she’d posted on her fashion blog earlier that day.

The three of them stared at me with open mouths, halting my advance. It took me a second to understand they were reacting to my face. Shit, shit, shit . How on earth did I forget about that?

Oh, I don’t know , I snarked at myself. Maybe because your life is turned totally upside down?

“It’s nothing,” I said, dismissing their concern with a flick of my hand. I’d asked them there so we could talk about Lukas , not my brother and how he’d pulled me into his shit.

Hearing my voice, Jen glanced over with a swoosh of her thick blond hair. Half a second later, her welcoming smile dropped off her face, and she gripped the edge of the counter. “What…the… fuck , Elli?”

I opened my mouth to say—I don’t know— something , but the second barista at the end of the counter announced our drinks were ready, and Jen held up one finger to mean there’d be hell to pay if I started without her. We’d been friends since kindergarten; a finger communicated a lot.

I snapped my mouth shut, then slid onto one of the two empty chairs left at the table and let my arms hang toward the floor. It was a posture of weary defeat, and my friends read it immediately. All three of them leaned in.

“What happened?” Amy whispered.

“Crazy nightmare,” I lied, though it was kind of the truth. “I got so freaked I flipped myself out of bed. Smacked my cheekbone on the nightstand.”

They all three looked at me, then at each other, with varying expressions of surprise mixed with doubt.

“You’re lying,” Parvati said.

“I wish I were,” I replied, feigning embarrassment. There was no need to worry them, and I didn’t want them to think badly of Evan. He’d fucked up, but he was my brother, and it was behind us now. At least, I hoped it was .

“Chickie,” Kiera said, “if you didn’t call us here because of whatever happened to your face?—”

“It’s because of Lukas,” I said, and the very mention of his name made my heart squeeze.

How had I fucked things up so badly? Again . I wish I knew where I’d gone wrong.

“What happened to Lukas?” Amy whispered.

At that moment, Jen showed up, balancing four coffees on a cardboard tray. She carried the fifth cup in her free hand, and her face was worried.

“I got you an oat-milk decaf latté.” She handed me the tall paper cup. “You like that, right? Now, what happened? Please, tell me Lukas didn’t do that to you.”

“What? No !” I exclaimed. Why did people keep assuming that? “He would never hurt me.”

At least not like that .

“Elli said she rolled out of bed,” Amy explained. “But we’re here because of Lukas.”

“You rolled out of bed?” Jen asked, sounding as skeptical as everyone else had moments ago.

I took a deep breath and claimed my coffee. I was going to give my friends the play-by-play and hope they could tell me what to do.

Everyone stared at me, waiting.

I took a big sip of my coffee, then set my cup on the table. “Lukas and I had sex.”

Amy made an eep! sound and slapped her hand over her mouth.

Parvati, who’d been taking a sip of her tea, nearly choked.

Kiera leaned away from the table as if she’d been blown back by a strong wind .

“And.. um …” I bit down on my lip, then let it go. “He didn’t hurt my face, but…he wasn’t exactly gentle either.”

Jen whispered, “Fuck… me . ‘Not exactly gentle’ in a good way or a bad way?”

“In a very good way,” I said meaningfully.

Jen grinned.

Amy pulled her hand away from her mouth and asked in her pre-school teacher voice, “I’m glad, but…was that smart? You work together.”

“It was definitely stupid,” I said, my stomach turning. “I shouldn’t have done it.”

“Why?” Jen asked, leaning forward. “Was it terrible?”

“No,” I said on a miserable laugh. It was the opposite of terrible. Right up until the end.

“So, he lived up to expectations?” Jen asked cautiously. “Please, tell me he did, because—face it, girl—you’ve been nursing that fantasy for- ev -er.”

“Better than I imagined,” I admitted shyly.

“ Oooo ,” Kiera said, tapping her hands excitedly against the table. “I am so glad I got out of my jammies for this! Tell us all about it.”

“Uh-uh,” Amy said, placing her hand over Kiera’s to curb her enthusiasm. “First, she tells us the bad part, because something is obviously bothering her. Once that’s out of the way, we can move on to the good.”

I filled my cheeks with air, blew it out, and started at the beginning. “This isn’t public information yet, but…I mean it will be eventually, so…”

“Just spit it out,” Parvati said. “If it’s that important, we’ll keep it to ourselves.”

I nodded. My friends were trustworthy. We had a lot of secrets between us. “Okay. Here it is. Lukas is about to be promoted to alpha of his clan. ”

Kiera’s eyes widened, and she sat back in her chair.

I pressed on. “And once he’s promoted, he’ll leave for Montana and won’t be back. Probably ever.”

“That is bad,” Parvati said. “For you.”

I bit down on my bottom lip.

“Wait,” Jen said, sounding suspicious. “You’re not saying he fucked you once and now you’re thinking about leaving us and following him to Montana to be his… what? …queen or something. His Mrs. Alpha? Is there even a name for that?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said. “A human would never be welcomed into a berserker den. Only other berserkers. Only other wolves.”

“And that’s why you’re sad,” Parvati surmised. “Because he’s leaving and, someday, some berserker she-wolf is going to be his mate.”

“ Mate ,” Jen said. “That’s the word I was looking for.”

“Of course not,” I said, answering Parvati’s question. The thought of Lukas leaving was upsetting, of course, and I always knew he’d find a mate. But that wasn’t why I felt so sick.

My friends sat in silence, waiting for me to explain the purpose for our conclave without them having to play Twenty Questions.

I took a big gulp of my coffee and burned the roof of my mouth. “After Lukas and I did it…um…the second time…”

Jen grinned.

Kiera pressed her lips together as if she were holding her breath.

“…I made a stupid comment about him being alpha soon, and he got really pissed. I don’t know why exactly. He’d already told me about being alpha, so it wasn’t a secret. ”

I glanced around at all their faces. I had their rapt attention, and Kiera’s eyes widened, urging me to continue.

I took a breath. “But as soon as I brought it up, the mood changed like I’d flipped a switch. He kicked me out of his apartment.”

“Yikes,” Parvati said sympathetically. “Think back. What exactly did you say to set him off?”

“Everything was sweet,” I said, meeting their eyes. They all looked curious, except for Kiera who seemed more concerned. “Earlier in the day, he told me he’d been in love with me for years.”

“Shit,” Jen whispered. “Really?”

“Did you say it back?” Amy asked.

I shook my head.

“Why the hell not?” Kiera asked.

“You think I should have?” I didn’t think I needed to. He already knew how I felt. He’d known it since I was eighteen years old. Even earlier probably.

Kiera, Amy, and Parvati all lifted their eyebrows, as if that was the stupidest question they’d ever heard. Jen, on the other hand, shook her head in solidarity.

“Okay, then…what did you say?” Amy asked.

I thought back. “I said it wouldn’t be easy for me, thinking about him after he became alpha and was mated.”

I glanced around the table again, assessing whether their expressions would change, if they’d think I was wrong to say that, or if they’d be equally confused by his reaction to my honesty.

“ Well… ” Amy said tentatively. “Even if you didn’t tell him you loved him, he’s gotta know how you feel.”

“Exactly!” I said. Amy got it.

“I mean,” she continued, “it’s not like you’d be happy about his future mating, and you’re so good with words, I’m sure you phrased it just right.”

“Oh,” I said as something occurred to me. “That might not have been exactly how I put it.”

“How did you put it?” Jen asked.

“Well…” My little finger trembled against the table, and I wrapped my hand around my cup. “I don’t think Lukas is super excited about the whole being-mated business. The other day, he called it being ‘whored out,’ so that’s the expression I used.”

“Whored out?” Parvati asked.

I nodded. “I said it wasn’t going to be easy for me, after his father passed the baton and whored him out.”

“You said that?” Kiera asked, looking horrified.

“In my defense,” I pleaded, “ Lukas said that. I just repeated it. I didn’t mean anything bad. I thought he’d see it as me being on his side.”

“That’s what he calls being mated?” Amy asked, and her tone said she was not impressed with Lukas’s sense of humor. “Being whored out?”

“No,” Kiera said. “That’s not what he meant.”

We all turned toward Kiera, who shifted uncomfortably in her chair when she realized she’d inadvertently grabbed the spotlight.

“What do you know?” I asked her, not sure I wanted the answer.

Kiera looked contrite. “Something I’m not supposed to know.”

“Spill,” Jen demanded.

“Yeah,” Amy said. “You’ve got to tell us now.”

Kiera looked over her shoulder at the few other people in the coffee shop—a surreptitious act that gave me a very bad feeling.

“Okay,” she said, leaning forward, “but this goes no further than this table.”