Matt tightened his hold on me, his face still pressed into the top of my head. I’d stopped crying a few minutes ago but made no move to pull away. I felt so safe in his arms.“I need to know what happened,” he said, his voice a soft caress. “Did someone hurt you?”I shook my head.“Please talk to me,” he murmured, and the raw edge to his voice made me pull away and look up at him. His expression looked pained. He reached out and wiped the tears from my face, his fingers trembling slightly.“No one hurt me,” I answered, my voice rough from all the crying. “Not physically.”“Someone hurt your feelings?”I bit my lip and nodded.He trailed his fingers through my hair, and a shiver went down my spine. He kissed my cheeks, taking his time with each one. I squeezed my eyes shut, so unused to all the tenderness. No one had ever been like this with me.“Your brother?” he asked as he pulled away.I nodded, my eyes still closed.“What did he say?” His voice had an edge to it, and I opened my ey
Jack was waiting for me when I got home. I walked through the front door, not even bothering to sneak back in. He was sitting in the living room alone, the blue light from the TV screen washing across his tense face. It wasn’t tense with anger, though, but fear. His eyes were blown wide, and he jumped up the minute the door closed behind me. “Celeste,” he said, his voice nearly panicked. I gave him a wide-eyed stare in return. I was expecting a lecture, not this. “Jack? Did something happen?” He took a few steps toward me and grabbed my arm. His grip wasn’t too hard, but just enough that it had me uneasy. “Where were you? What happened?” He seemed to take in my disheveled hair and tear-streaked face. “I went out with Matt.” “What happened?” he demanded, his voice wavering a little. The look on his face was still one of panic rather than anger. It made my muscles instantly tense. Why was he acting like this? It was so out of character for him. “I was upset. We just went some
I took a bite of my salad, my gaze trained on Matt’s animated face as he described his favorite movie to me. He’d been going on about it since we first sat down, more than a little affronted when he found out that I’d never seen Predator. Not that I minded. I could listen to him talk for hours. Especially about the things he loved. He got this light in his eyes, and I couldn’t look away.“I’m sorry,” he said, putting down his fork. “I’m rambling.”I smiled. “Don’t apologize. I like listening to you. You’re really making me want to see this movie.”
MattA rustle in the nearby underbrush had the three of us halting in our paths. We’d been scouring the woods for hours, looking for another rogue. There’d been talk of another one being spotted near here by a few drunk kids, and we were desperate to find it before sunrise. We couldn’t let it hang around here where it could potentially hurt someone.I looked sideways at Enzo and Nina. We were all still in our human forms, but in an instant the three of us shifted. Power moved through me, and I readied himself to fight.Nina pricked her ears toward the trees, and I
JackJack waited, hidden between the trees. He’d been following Matt for almost an hour when his patience finally paid off. Enzo and Nina stepped out from between the trees, dressed in matching cargo pants and tank tops.“Are you sure about this?” Enzo asked.“Definitely,” Matt replied. “Those kids said they saw it out here.”“We’ve got to find it tonight,” Nina said, her eyes roving through the trees. Jack tucked himself further behind the t
I thought maybe Matt was just late, but after an hour passed, I started to worry that something else was up. Jack eyed me as I paced near the front window.“Guess he’s not coming,” he said, sounding a bit smug. He’d come home fifteen minutes earlier, covered in mud. After a quick shower, he joined me in the living room to wait.I shot him a look but didn’t comment. Jack said it like he saw this coming, but I knew Matt wouldn’t just stand me up. Something else had to be going on. I tried his number, but his phone went right to voicemail. I sent him a few more texts but staring at my phone didn’t make any answers materialize
Fiona met me at the door, a wide smile on her face. “Thank God,” she said, dragging me into the room. Her roommate was out with her girlfriend for the night, and we had the place all to ourselves. “We need some girl time!”“I know,” I said, with as much enthusiasm. Things with Matt and my brother had made it difficult for me to see Fiona. Sure, we had classes together, but that wasn’t the same as having one-on-one time. Fiona meant a lot to me, and I didn’t want to let our friendship fall between the cracks. I wasn’t lying when I told Jack that I didn’t want to be one of those girls who forgot about their friends just because they had a boyfriend.
I hadn’t given up on my plan to get Jack and Matt together, and the minute Matt’s concussion was healed, I decided I needed to stop putting it off. He still had a couple of bruises where he’d bashed his head, and a sore arm, but he was mostly okay. It was a relief to walk out of class a few days later to find him leaning against the far wall with an easy smile on his face–headache mostly gone, and his broken bone well on the way to healing completely.No one really spared his bruises a second look, and he didn’t wear a sling. Hockey players were often getting injured, and Matt’s friends seemed to take it all in stride. He still hadn’t told me what really happened, but I planned to ask him about it when w