Page 12 of Baiting the Werewolf

Because he was all that and more to me. He was everything to me.

Maybe that’s what Marissa meant. I was so obsessed with him, I didn’t stop to think maybe he didn’t like me all that much. He just hung out with me… out of pity? A charitable act for the weird loner guy. His way of giving back to the world.

The thought doesn’t make me angry. It just makes me grieve.

The decades I’ve known him. Loved him.

My eyes sting with unshed tears. I swallow them.

“You’re cold. Let’s go find your car,” he murmurs.

I look down to find I’m hugging myself. I drop my hands and nod, unable to meet his eyes.

He doesn’t say anything. Just starts walking determinately.

I have no idea how far we are from my car or if we’re going in the right direction. I don’t even care anymore. I follow him a few steps behind with my eyes trained down. Wet leaves and tree roots spread across the forest bed. Everything looks the same as it was a few hours ago.

No visible signs of the explosion that just tore my world apart.

Years and years of memories play through my mind, and I try to see them through his eyes.

Everything feels different between us. Like I’d been wearing the wrong glasses all my life, and removing them made me see everything clearly.

He must really hate driving at night. That’s why he chose to spend all those nights on my uncomfortable couch. The fancy Saturday morning breakfast must be something he liked for himself and decided to make extra just because I was around.

He must have done a lot of things for me just because I was around. I was always around. He clearly didn’t want that.

I still don’t know how to interpret every time he showed up at my door after all my breakups. Maybe he just happened to be in the neighborhood all those times.

Tears start flowing then. How could this happen? How could I have read my entire life so wrong?

I’d give anything right now to go back to the day Logan returned that summer. When he pulled me into that hug, not realizing how much stronger he’d become. I don’t know why my mind went to that exact day.

My feet skid to a halt. Logan stops too and turns to look at me. “We’re very close. Are you—”

“You wanted to tell me,” I murmur. Because he was there. The wolf. He was at my door that night. It was the first time I saw him, and I… screamed. He wanted to tell me, and I ran away scared.

Logan walks towards me, clutching my shoulders. “Wes, are you okay? I could carry you if you’re too tired.”

My gaze finds his, and he suddenly looks the same. My Logan. The warmth from his palms clears the haze in my mind. “You visited me as a wolf. If you didn’t want to tell me, why would you do that?”

Logan looks confused for a fraction of a second before guilt takes over his face. He takes a step back. “We should really find the car. It’s not safe to be here. We don’t know if we got all of them.”

No, we’re not doing this again. “You showed me the truth, and I ran away from you. You were going to tell me, and I never gave you the chance to.”

Chapter Six

Logan

His words threaten to claw at the long-buried hurt. I close my eyes and sigh, grounding myself. I’ve already made Wes’s life more complicated than he deserves. I can’t dump my emotions on him too. Especially when the hurt lingers right under the surface. “Can we talk about this later?”

“You came the day I lost her too,” he whispers, his eyes more watery than before.

I reach out to him, but stop myself before I can touch him. “You weren’t answering my calls. I had to see… I needed to be there.”

“I thought I was going crazy. A giant wolf sat with me in my tiny backyard for hours. You didn’t stop coming, though,” he says.

“I should have.” I really should have. It wasn’t safe for either of us.