Emmalyn didn’t respond right away. When she finally did, there had been a noticeable pause. “You alright?”
“No different than usual. Seems my need to be self-sufficient drove him away. I was right all along. I’m better off alone.”
“Was there a big blowup?” Emmalyn asked.
“No. I got home and he was gone. He’s obviously decided that it’s not worth the trouble.”
“I’m sorry, Hell.”
“Yeah, me, too.”
“Any chance he’ll come back?” Emmalyn asked.
“I don’t know. I didn’t think he’d leave. Obviously I pushed too much.”
“Maybe he just needs some time to calm down. Barron said he was livid.”
“Yeah, Havoc said when they got back he barely even told them goodbye. He was angry. It’s fine. I get it. I hurt him.”
“What did you do? I mean, other than the obvious about lying and leaving a note that was, well, lying.”
“Gee, thanks, Em. Didn’t know you could make me look even worse in my own eyes.”
“Sorry.”
“I think it’s harder to make him trust than me. But he really tried and he eventually stopped fighting it and accepted us. But I still hadn’t given in.”
“Why not? He’s hotttttttt,” Emmalyn said, repeating the ‘t’ in hot over and over again for effect.
“Because it’s really hard for me to depend on anybody. That’s all I got, okay. Then you factor in that one of the firstthings he told me was that he’d be here until he got me out of his system, and I was afraid to trust. Turns out I was right.”
“You’re dead fucking wrong. And if you were right, it would be all your own fault,” a deep, velvety voice said from behind her.
Hellen spun around quickly to find Lucien standing in her living room dripping river mud and grass onto her floor. Her eyes filled with tears as she demanded tearfully, “Where have you been?”
“Swimming. Where have you been?” he answered matter-of-factly.
“Since last night?” she asked incredulously.
“Kinda. Didn’t really want to see you, or talk to you. So, I stayed in the water.”
“Ask him why I got his clothes!” Emmalyn yelled from her end of the phone Hellen still held in her hand.
Hellen looked down at the phone in her hand and slid her thumb across its screen to end the call. She tossed the phone that immediately started ringing again onto the kitchen counter and took a step toward him. “I’m sorry. Whatever it was I was thinking, it wasn’t to lie to you or to disrespect you.”
“Came to you naturally, then? I’m not sure that’s making it any better. What were you thinking, Hellen?”
“I like it better when you call me Hell.”
“What were you thinking, Hellen?” he repeated.
Hellen nodded, as though reminding herself she deserved this. “I was thinking that I’d handle it alone. I’d go, take care of business, come home. You’d be a little perturbed, but not too much and life would go on.”
“Because that’s what you do. You go all mercenary on whatever situation arises, and if you have to you invent some kind of mediocre bullshit to put people off your trail when you get back.”
Hellen nodded.
“I can’t do this, Hellen. I’m not going to live my life never knowing what my mate is really out there doing. I’m not going to wonder each minute that you’re out of my sight if you’re really working limits during hunting season or if you’re tracking drug traffickers that even I wouldn’t approach without back up.”
