45. KATIE
Chapter forty-five
KATIE
I text Norah, since she’s the only one of my sisters who has been interested in my research. Honestly, if they want to get home before we’ve been missing for too long, then they really should be helping me find a portal back.
But it’s fine. This is how it’s always been–I take the lead, and Layla and Maddie wait for directions. Molly Beth is usually too sick, or still recovering from being sick, to help much, and Norah was always too little.
I shoot Norah a quick message.
Katie: I think I’ve found a stable portal–and it’s near Halvassa.
She’s quick to reply.
Norah: Really? Where? It seems like the stable portals are all in the mountains on the border with Kharawyn.
Katie: Blowing Rock– there’s an excavation site there that suggests the portals are created by magnetism. It’s possible we could use them to return home.
Norah: That assumes the magnetism would work both ways, and that it would take us to Earth and not somewhere else. There are other worlds that Travelers have come from. Have you read all of the folktales? At least a dozen different planets have been confirmed.
I huff at the screen. Norah has a point, but we won’t know until we try. And shouldn't we be trying? Shouldn't we be doing everything we can to get home?
A voice in the back of my mind that I don’t want to listen to whispers, why are you trying so hard ? What do you have on Earth that is so much better than here ?
Katie: I still want to check them out. If there is a chance we can go home, we need to take it. Molly Beth needs to be seen by her doctors. Layla has a business she was running, Maddie was training for her first big kickboxing tournament, and you will be starting college in a few weeks. The longer we’re gone, the harder it will be to pick up what we left.
Norah: Not all of us mind leaving it. Besides, we can’t go anywhere without chaperones.
I gape at the screen. Of course they mind! Of course, we need to find a way home. We don’t belong here, in this world of Alphas, Betas, and Omegas. We need to go home.
Katie: I mind and I am going to find a way home for all of us. I promise.
I run my lower lip between my teeth. I am doing what’s right for them. I know it. Before I have time to unpack more of these thoughts, Loren walks in, pausing just beyond the doorway. He looks pale, like he's missed several nights of sleep.
“What’s wrong?” I say, spilling the books from my lap as I jump up. I need to touch him, to make sure he isn’t injured.
It takes all of my self control not to jump on him. Instead, I wait for him to move to me, to tell me what’s wrong.
“I had a call from my sister.” He doesn't elaborate, just stands there looking like an anxious boy, not sure how to ask a girl to dance.
My body reacts immediately; I can feel the way my own jittery pulse relaxes as the need to calm Loren also calms me. There’s lust mixed in too, but more than sex is the desire for closeness, to touch him and feel his body next to me. To wash away the hurt until we are both resting and peaceful.
I’ve always been a problem solver. My love language is fixing things. This is like that – the drive to fix , only instead of making a ten-step action plan, this is simply about being .
It’s strange, but not unpleasant.
I open my arms, and Loren slowly approaches.
“I’m not going to run,” I say, a light laugh on my lips. “Unless you want to chase me?” I raise an eyebrow. My knee aches, but I would push through for him.
Loren shakes his head, before scooping me up into his embrace.
“Not right now, Love. Right now I just need…I just need this.” He gently kisses me, a tender brush of lips.
Heat rolls through me, like opening the door to an oven and getting blasted by that initial shock of hot air. My body burns, but only for a moment.
Loren pulls back, enough to cup my face.
“Are you feeling okay?” He asks, all of his anxiety suddenly shifting to focus on me.
“I’m fine,” I say, gently patting his arm.
“Your heat should still be several weeks away,” he says. “But that felt like a temperature spike. Should I call Aurelia? There’s a twenty-four-hour clinic at the Conservatory.”
I glare at him. “I’m fine . Now come cuddle me before I change my mind.”
Loren bundles me into his arms, moving me from my chair to the couch, where we stretch out together.
I should not allow this. Not allow him to get so comfortable with me. Or to touch me with such tenderness.
There should be no more kisses. No more games. No more feelings.
Because I have to leave him. All of them. And if I’m not careful, their hearts won’t be the only ones breaking.