Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
I was prepared for hurt feelings, anger, confused admission—everything but the calm reply he gave me.
“No, Clarity. I’m not gay.”
Full stop.
Nothing else.
I studied his face, my heart beating faster by the second.
“So that day you offered me a ride home at school, when you said you were stalking your cute neighbor, you meant it?”
“Stalking is a harsh word.”
“The cute part.”
He smiled.
“I meant it.”
Sam wasn’t gay. He thought I was cute, and he liked spending time with me.
Did this mean he’d liked kissing me?
My gaze dipped to his mouth, and my stomach twisted with nerves and…anticipation.
The urge to kiss him exploded in my chest, consuming my thoughts just as dangerously as it had at the haunted house.
“You’re not making it easy to stay away, Clarity,” he said, his voice low.
“Then don’t,” I said, shuffling half a step closer to him.
He shoved his hands into his pockets.
“Your mom’s watching from the window, and I don’t want her to send me home yet. You left without saying anything, and I wanted to apologize for taking the kiss too far.”
He thought he’d taken it too far? I’d started it. He’d been the one to stop it. If he hadn’t, we would probably still be there, making out in the dark.
Heat bloomed in my stomach.
“You didn’t take it too far,” I said quietly so our conversation wouldn’t carry. “I thought I did.”
“You didn’t.”
Thoughts of kissing him some more made it hard to focus on the present. I wanted to close the distance between us so badly.
“Does this mean you’re not mad?” he asked.
“I’m not mad, but I am confused. Do you like me, Sam?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
His tortured laugh was punctuated by him fisting his hands in his pockets and leaning against Mom’s car door.
“I don’t think your mom is going to give us the time I need to list everything.
So I’ll summarize. When I look at you, I can’t see anything else, Clarity.
There’s only you. Your smile. Your laugh.
The sound of your voice. The way you smell.
From the second I open my eyes in the morning, I’m thinking of you.
And thoughts of you keep me awake at night. ”
“Sounds uncomfortable,” I said absently, thinking of how it sounded similar to my obsessive thoughts since I’d met him.
He swallowed hard and studied me for a moment.
“How do you feel about me, Clarity?”
“Still confused. I’m the same person I’ve been for the last two years. Same hair. Same eyes. Same clothes. Same weight. Why would two guys tell me they like me the same night after no one gave me a second glance for two years?”
He went still in a way that sent a tingle of apprehension running through me.
I instinctively shuffled back half a step.
Sam pushed away from the car and wrapped his arms around me. One hand went to the back of my head, and the other to the center of my back, pinning me to his hard chest. I breathed in his scent as he spoke close to my ear.
“I don’t know why it took someone else so long to notice you, but I’m glad. Please don’t pay attention to anyone who didn’t see your value from the start.”
The only thing I wanted to pay attention to was the pectoral pressed against my cheek and the way he smelled. I could live in his arms forever.
“Your mom is moving toward the door,” he warned.
He tightened his hold on the back of my head, tilting it so his lips could briefly brush mine. I melted into him and immediately tried to follow as he pulled back.
“Clarity,” he said, pleading. “She’s almost to the door, and I want to see you tomorrow.”
Uncaring, I tipped my head in a way to offer my lips again.
He groaned, darted in for another chaste brush of lips, and returned to his spot leaning against the car before Mom opened the door.
“Time to call it a night,” she called.
I lifted my hand in acknowledgment.
“What are your plans tomorrow?” I asked.
“I’m heading back to the farm early, but should be back by lunch. I’ll return your books then. You should go in.”
I gave him one last long look and went inside. Mom was waiting by the door.
“Can I ask you a question out of real curiosity and no judgment?” I asked before she could say anything.
“Of course,” she said, watching me hang my jacket.
“Why Dad? I’m sure there were other guys around. What made you pick him at that moment?”
She smiled sadly and moved to the couch, motioning for me to join her.
“I was around your age when I realized marriage was a cage for my mom—one she’d helped build through each boundary she never maintained.
The thought of ending up like that repelled me.
So when everyone was hooking up because the world was in chaos and they didn’t want to be alone, I wasn’t interested in the boys who had a long-term look in their eyes. ”
She took my hand in hers, holding it.
“I’m sorry you grew up without a dad because of my choice.”
“Not yours,” I said. “It was his. He could have been a part of it, even if it was just once a year on my birthday. I don’t blame you or him. I’m just asking because—”
She looked so clear-minded right now, and I really wanted to talk to her, but I didn’t want to make things worse.
“He kissed you, didn’t he?” Mom said. No accusation. Just calm understanding.
“Actually, I kissed him.” I pulled my hand from hers to bury my face in my hands.
“It was so embarrassing. We were in the haunted house. I was scared. He knew it, picked me up, and hid us. I don’t know what I was thinking.
I suddenly just had this urge to kiss him and did.
” I lifted my head to look at her. “If roles were reversed, I would have been so mad.”
“Was he mad?” she asked.
“I didn’t hang around to find out.”
“I’m surprised he let you go.”
“Mom, I said I had to go to the bathroom, grabbed my friend, and left.”
“That explains why he was pacing our driveway for fifteen minutes, waiting for you. What did he say?”
“That he’s not mad and not gay like I thought. I don’t understand what’s going on.”
“Yes, you do. Bound mates can feel each other’s emotions.”
The urge to cry hit me so hard that I didn’t stand a chance. Tears welled up and spilled over.
“Oh, baby, it’s okay,” she said, hugging me, oblivious to the fact that she was the reason for my tears. “I’ve been so afraid of the danger that I was ignoring the good parts. Sam will be devoted to you. He’ll never mistreat you. He’ll—”
“Mom, just stop,” I said, pulling out of her hold. “Please. I asked why you picked Dad because two guys said they liked me on the same night, and I’m confused and needed Mom-advice, not another delusional talk about werewolves.”
I stood angrily and wiped at my face. She caught my hand when I would have left.
“He’s going to feel you’re upset and want to see you,” she said.
I jerked my hand free and walked toward my room.
“Should I let him in or tell him you need time?” she asked.
Shaking my head in disbelief, I closed my door and sank to the floor in front of it.
I was so locked in on my miserable thoughts—my mom was crazy, and I’d need to move in with grandma—that I wasn’t expecting a knock on my window. I jolted at the sound and at the sight of Sam’s face in the darkness.
“Sorry,” he mouthed.
Stunned, I stared at him. At any other time, it would have been romantic to see him tapping at my window. Now, right after Mom’s warning that he would feel I was upset and show up, I didn’t find it romantic. It was scary.
As my fear bloomed, so did worry.
But worry wasn’t right. At least, not for me.
I was afraid. Afraid Mom was right, not worried.
Bound mates can feel each other’s emotions.
She couldn’t be right. It was impossible.
Sam couldn’t feel my emotions.
I couldn’t feel his.
He motioned for me to come to the window.
Thoughts spiraling, I didn’t move. If Mom was right… If those old videos weren’t fake… then werewolves were real. They existed. They lived among us, blending in just like any other human.
Sam’s expression grew more worried, and the worry I felt increased. His attention shifted from me to the window, trying to figure out how to open it, before he motioned that he was going to the front door.
That broke through my paralysis.
Heart pounding, I got up. My hands were shaking so badly I fumbled with the latch twice before sliding the window open an inch.
“What’s happened?” he asked. “Did you fight with your mom?”
I didn’t want to admit I was in the middle of a freak-out due to a world-altering revelation, because part of me still doubted. So, I nodded even though we hadn’t fought.
The worry in Sam’s gaze faded, and as he tilted his head at me, I remembered a tidbit from one of the non-fiction werewolf books.
Werewolves can sense a lie.
My pulse spiked again. Was this more proof?
It couldn’t be. Could it?
My thoughts whirled chaotically. Nothing made sense.
“I really just need to be alone for a while to process,” I said honestly. “We’ll talk tomorrow, okay?”
He slowly nodded and watched me close the window, his expression carefully blank.
I yanked the curtains together and sat heavily on my bed.
Fisting my hands on my knees, I took some deep breaths and tried to think rationally.
I, like so many others, doubted the existence of werewolves because there was no evidence. If werewolves existed, where were they?
Yet, so many people did believe they were real, citing an incident from almost twenty years ago. Mom was one of them.
She’d been pointing out the evidence from the start, but I hadn’t been listening.
And now?
Now I was seeing the patterns.
I realized this wasn’t the first time Sam had shown up when I was upset. After school. After arguments. He always knew.
Bound mates can feel each other’s emotions.
It couldn’t be real.
Except there were too many coincidences for Mom to be wrong. And if she was right about this, what else had she been right about?
The Timblys “winning” a condo just so he could conveniently move in next door? The chance meeting at the pumpkin farm? His “running errands nearby” when I’d needed a ride after school?
…stalking my cute neighbor…
Had it all been on purpose?
Was Sam really a werewolf?