Chapter Four #2
“No! Look, even after I was bitten, Gia still said she loved me, all right? That we could make everything work. She loved me, and it didn’t matter and—” He stopped.
Swallowed. And I still left. Fuck. Was this some message that Cael was trying to teach him?
More freaking verbalization? For self-realization?
The angel was trickier than he’d thought.
And the guy was looking all smug. Oliver narrowed his eyes. “I left to protect her,” he said again.
“Uh, huh. Whatever you need to tell yourself.”
“I was dangerous! I was shifting when we were about to have sex! I could have hurt her!”
“You’ve learned lots about werewolves in the last year. Surely, you’ve come across the fact that werewolves cannot hurt their own mates.”
He had discovered that, yes, but…
“So why not go back to her when you learned that fun fact? Or don’t you believe she’s your true mate?”
He believed she was his everything. “I’m still a monster. She’s still a human.”
“You are stuck on that M word.” Cael clicked his tongue. “But, moving on, because the problem has been solved. You aren’t a monster any longer. Thanks to me.”
“She doesn’t know me.”
Cael glanced upward. Stared hard at the peeling ceiling. “Do you see what I am working with here?” he mumbled.
Oliver clenched his back teeth.
Cael finally flicked his gaze back to Oliver. “Of course, Gia doesn’t know you. Why would she?”
“Uh, because we met before I was a werewolf. Because I thought she’d remember that!”
Cael winced. “Oooohh. Yes, I can see where you might need a little bit more of an explanation. I will take the hit on this one. My apologies.”
Oliver waited.
“I suppose,” Cael mused, “I should start by telling you the occupation you have in this reality.”
This reality? “What is it?” he gritted out.
“You’re a tax attorney. You specialize in IRS tax audits.”
“What?”
“You love math. Love it. Mad, bad love. Love audits, too. They really get your blood going.”
“My blood is going plenty now, trust me.” He pinched the bridge of his nose.
“That’s not me,” he muttered. “Wearing some suit, crunching numbers all day, arguing with people from the IRS…” To him, that was hell.
“I was a SEAL. Worked damn hard with my team until a bloody attack benched me.” But he’d recovered from those wounds, with the aid of one hell of a lot of physical therapy.
“I love being outdoors. That’s why I wanted to start my outdoor adventure business after my rehab time. ”
“The rehab time never happened. Your time as a SEAL never happened. Thus, the injuries…never happened. And you don’t like the outdoors in this reality.
You prefer to stay inside. To work at your computer.
To drink fine wine on the weekend and to have the best coffee in the world waiting on you in the mornings. ”
Oliver pinched the bridge of his nose harder.
“And you usually wear suits. You love your fancy suits.”
He did not. “That’s not me.”
“Sure, it is. It’s you—”
“In this reality, yes, I get that. But why did I change so much? I just asked not to be a werewolf! Everything else should have stayed the same.”
“But that’s not how life works.” Cael’s round jaw hardened. “Did you ever wonder why you were drawn to battle? Why you loved the rush of being a SEAL so much? Why you were willing to risk yourself over and over?”
No, he hadn’t wondered. It had just been who he was.
“Ever wonder why the old you loved the outdoors? Enjoyed racing through the woods as often as possible?”
“I’m getting a bad feeling about why,” Oliver rasped.
“It was because the wolf was in you back then. Latent, yes, but still there. The problem that you had is that you always thought the wolf was some separate being from you. He wasn’t.
You were still the same, your body was just different.
Everything that you did in that old life, all the things you wanted, all the experiences you loved—they came from you when you carried your wolf deep inside.
But to grant your wish, I had to remove him completely.
So that changed everything. Ripple effect. I toss a stone and—”
“I know what a damn ripple effect is!”
A sigh. “Then why are we having this conversation?”
“Why doesn’t Gia know me?”
“Because you weren’t an outdoor adventure guy. You didn’t own that business. Therefore, you never lived in Jasper, Colorado. Since you were not in Jasper, you were never at that Christmas tree lot one snowy night in order to collide with Gia Donato.”
Oliver’s heart hammered in his chest. “I never met her.”
“You never met her.” A pause. “Which is very unfortunate for her. The last year has been exceedingly difficult for Gia. She could have used someone strong at her side.”
His heart hammered ever harder. “What in the hell does that mean?”
“You’ll find out. When you go talk to her again. You are going to talk with her again, yes?”
“Hell, yes, I am.” This time, he wouldn’t come across as crazy. Hopefully. “Now that I know what’s going on, I can play things differently.”
Cael turned away to seemingly stare at the line of tequila bottles behind the bar. “Ah, yes. Try playing differently. Let’s see how that works for you.”
A shiver darted down his spine. “It’s going to work perfectly. I got her to fall in love with me before.” Determination had him lifting his chin and squaring his shoulders. “I can do it again.”
Cael threw a glance over his shoulder. “Good luck with that.”
Dammit. Oliver spun away and hurried for the door. When he shoved it open—
The bell jingled. He automatically shot a hard stare back at Cael.
“Not yet.” Cael smiled at him. “But don’t worry. I have faith in you.”
Shit. Just what he needed. Oliver stormed out.