“No, no, it’s nothing like that.” I didn’t want them thinking I’d met some amazing guy, because, yes, okay, I had, but it wasn’t like I got to keep him. “It’s just…”
I couldn’t bring myself to say it was nothing. It hadn’t been nothing. The connection I’d felt between us, that had been real, and amazing, and there was a good chance that I was never going to see him again.
And then I was blinking hard, trying not to cry. But then I’d just feel pathetic and sad, and I didn’t want to be both. “Why did you ask? How did you even know?”
“The claiming mark.” Charlize dropped her voice to a whisper, like she was telling me some secret. “We have them too. Who was it? One of the guys from the team?”
I blinked at her like she’d grown a second head. “The what mark?”
They exchanged worried looks.
“Did he not explain it to you?” Hunter bit her lower lip, looking nervous.
My complete lack of sleep last night meant my brain didn’t even begin to work out what the heck they were talking about. But whatever it was they were talking around, it seemed like it was maybe a bigger deal than they were trying to let on.
“I actually have no idea what you’re talking about. What mark?”
They exchanged another look. Charlize did a little half shrug with one shoulder. “She’s going to notice eventually.”
Now they were just freaking me out. “Notice what?”
Charlize picked up her phone. “Can you just tug your shirt to the side for a sec? Perfect.”
She took a picture and then spun the phone around for me to see.
The skin of my shoulder and neck, which had been bare when I got up yesterday, was suddenly a swirl of ink. A black wolf,howling to the moon and surrounded by a crown, covered the space like the most intricate tattoo I’d ever seen.
“What the hell,” I whispered to myself. I yanked at my shirt, craning my head to the side trying to see it for myself. “Where did that even come from?”
Charlize and Hunter stared at each other and then at me. They looked almost as lost as I did.
I hadn’t even had anything to drink last night. There was no way I just didn’t notice getting a tattoo. I vaguely remembered Bash biting me there, and just the memory of his teeth touching my skin had a warm little shiver running all the way down to my toes.
Okay, cool, cool. New kink unlocked. I hadn’t known biting was a turn on. Something to think about when I wasn’t freaking out.
Charlize got a look on her face like she was thinking really hard about something. Her brows pinched together, and her gaze was unfocused. I was the one having a mentie B. Maybe it was contagious. Because that was my only explanation for what she breaking her brain over.
Hunter took my arm and tugged me to my feet. “Okay,” she said, way too brightly with way too many teeth in her smile. “Let’s go for a walk. We can chat on the way to the library.”
I let myself get towed out of the Moon Bean, because why not. What was even my life anymore? Hidden princes, whirlwind romances, and magic tattoos. Whatever.
I barely heard Hunter hiss to Charlize. “What is going on?”
“I don’t know,” Charlize muttered back. “I’m asking Eli.”
I kind of wanted to snap at them that I was having a panic attack, not deaf. But really, yes, my heart was doing a techno impression, and I was confused, and sad, and mad. I was confusmad.
On top of everything, I missed Bash already.
Stacia.
And great. Now I was hallucinating. Because the day wasn’t quite trash enough.
Stacia, where are you? Please, I can explain. Just tell me where you are.
Sure. Why not? I was hearing voices. Because that might as well happen.
Stacia?
