“Don’t they already do that anyway?” Julian laughed out, running his hand through his brown hair in a way that made it look even messier.
“No.”
Determined, I jumped up and patted the dirt off my clothes. Somehow, everything I did made me look like a freaking forest.
“There’s an order that dictates exactly your behavior. Out there, some brutal Alpha who isn’t as patient as Father would have just taken you into his pack. And if you hadn’t wanted that...” I broke off the sentence, not wanting to imagine what the other packs did to those who defied their orders.
Julian must have noticed my concern because he came over to me now and put his hands on my shoulders. His look sent a shiver down my spine.
Up close, I could see his eyes even better. The green was not only dominant, but shimmered through the incoming light. It felt familiar.
“Emely...” he whispered softly. “I’m here, in Blairville... and not out there.”
I fell silent.
He was right. We were safe here. For now.
Slowly he took his hands from me again, and I immediately felt the cold where they had been until just a moment ago. It was the same cold I had felt in the last weeks and months of his absence.
I had been looking for explanations. And the only one who had given them to me had been my twin brother. My stomach tightened painfully at the thoughts of our last conversation, a few days ago in the woods behind our house.
“I have to go,” Julian said, and I just nodded silently.
Julian was here and that was progress. Nash couldn’t always be right. This time, the point would go to Finn.
I looked at Julian, who had already walked a few feet.
“Wait...I’m coming with you!”
My words seemed to surprise him because he turned and looked at me with a searching gaze. But then, very slowly, a grin appeared on his face – the way I used to know him – the way it felt good, and I returned it.
“Let’s see if you’re still this slow, Bardot!”
Then I started to sprint.
Chapter 15
Bayla
“Crazy, there’s literally everything here!” Larissa exclaimed, and I couldn’t help but laugh. This was Larissa as I had always known her.
“You only eat salad anyway.”
“Hello?!” Playfully indignant, she closed the fridge and came walking over to me with a bowl of tomatoes.
She was still wearing her black jeans with holes at the knees, which flattered her slender curves and matched perfectly with the biker jacket.
If it were up to me, she’d be on a catwalk by now. But Larissa didn’t want to hear that.
I, on the other hand, was sitting here in front of my laptop with my somewhat older dark brown knitted sweater and black leggings with cozy socks, frantically searching for the e-mail with the seminar rooms that everyone but me had received.
“Well, not everyone can eat that much. And then also what she wants without gaining weight.”
With this, she looked at me with that look that I knew all too well.
“Very funny,” I replied.
I would be happy if I had a little more on my ribs and didn’t have to look like an emaciated rabbit.
I tried frantically to focus on my stuffed inbox. Most of it was about scholarships and university advertisements.
Remorsefully, I scrolled through the e-mail inbox.
Actually, I would have preferred to be at all these universities now...
Well, at least I still had Larissa here. She had just appeared out of nowhere to tell me that she was going to study here, as well.
Exactly, that was my best friend. What this girl put in her head, she also put into reality, no matter how absurd her ideas were. She dreamed big. And sometimes she reached too far for the stars, and then I had to catch her from falling.
There was an almost tentative knock at the door, and I lifted my head.
“Mady?”
Either I had just mistaken a complete stranger for my neighbor, or I had scared the hell out of her because the girl, who appeared suspiciously to be the beautiful neighbor girl, paused and eyed me for a few seconds before her memorable smile returned.
“Bayla, right?”
I nodded.
