here, and you’re not coming with me.”
“Baby…”
“Don’t.” She held out a hand. “Don’t say another word. You have no right. You have to let me go.”
“Where? You don’t have a car or even a purse with you.”
“I don’t care. The town isn’t that big. I’ll walk.” She snagged her phone off the coffee table and stuck it in her back pocket. The letters could stay where they were. She’d deal with them later. Right now she needed to breathe.
She headed for the front door and yanked it open.
“Elena, please. I don’t like the thought of you wandering around town alone.”
She twisted her head over her shoulder. “Why? Is it unsafe? I was under the impression it was the safest place on earth. You said everyone in town knows who I am and what I am to you. Surely they will give me a wide birth and look the other way when they see the fury on my face.”
“No one will bother you,” he murmured.
“Right. Because you’re going to place one call and the Canyon Springs phone tree will spread like wildfire before I hit the sidewalk.” She couldn’t help being snarky.
He shook his head. “I won’t tell a soul. Promise. I can’t know if your sister knows all this yet. I’d rather let Hunter tell her than a stranger.”
Elena blinked at him. She hadn’t thought about Layla yet. Had Hunter told her they were half shifters yet? Had they had sex? Would he have told her before sleeping with her like Caleb insinuated?
It was too much to ponder at the moment, and besides, Elena didn’t feel like confronting Layla. She just wanted to be alone. She could speak to Layla later but not while she was so furious.
Caleb wasn’t the only person she was angry with either. He simply made the top of the immediate list. A lot of people had their hands in this insanity. Her grandmother, her grandfather, her great aunt. Her mother. And perhaps even her father, though that was less likely. “Let me go, Caleb,” she muttered as she stepped outside and slammed the door.
She could practically feel his gaze on her back through the front window. She didn’t care what he did as long as he didn’t follow her.
How dare he keep this important detail from her. He hadn’t been playing fairly. He should have told her the first night when he sat down at the bar next to her.
“Hey, baby. What’s a half shifter like yourself doing in a place like this?”
Okay, maybe that was cheesy, but the point was the opportunities had existed. Two days now. He’d known she wasn’t fully human for two days. She’d never been so infuriated.
As she stomped down the sidewalk, no particular destination in mind, she focused on the hurt, the anger, and the pain.
It was impossible to grasp that she had shifter blood in her body. Not that she minded. The idea was pretty cool in and of itself. But not knowing until today…
And what was Caleb thinking keeping that from her? She was furious with him. How would she be able to forgive him?
She needed to talk to Layla. Her sister deserved to know. It seemed important to reconnect with her. They’d been apart for too long. After reading about the deep sorrow that Marge felt for over fifty years because of her severed ties with Mabel, Elena absorbed that grief. She didn’t want that to happen between her and Layla. She wouldn’t let it happen.
There were so many unanswered questions. It seemed like the more answers she got, the more questions she had.
Her feet took her back to Marge’s house. Luckily, it was only a few miles. She didn’t mind. She needed the fresh air. It helped her clear her head a bit. Loosened some of the frustration. She was also acutely aware of the fact that the farther she got from Caleb, the more her anxiety rose.
If she was part shifter, that would explain several things, starting with the intensity of the draw to him. Sure, most people would think the entire mating concept was foreign and difficult to swallow, but on some level, Elena knew he was right. She was already connected to him.
She was also pissed with him. And she needed to milk that for a while. Let everything from the last two days simmer a bit. When she was with him, she couldn’t focus on anything but him and how badly she wanted to be closer. Always closer. Naked closer. Him-inside-her