[48] They're Weird, Rude, Confusing, And Clingy. Not To Mention They're Werewolves

“Yeah, of course,” I agreed to Jasmine and Zoey at my locker before school. I shut my locker as they talked.

“Hey,” Wes greeted. The bell rang and Wes stayed with me as the girls left.

“What’s up?” I asked cheerfully. He gave me a questioning look.

“You’re awfully cheerful,” he noticed.

“Do I have a reason not to be?” I asked, confused.

“Wait. What happened last night?” he asked.

“Um I had dinner with my newly combined family and then went to bed…” I answered. What did he expect to happen on a Monday night?

“Wait. He didn’t see you, or talk to you?” he asked.

“Who?”

“Chase,” he answered in a “well duh” kind of way.

“No? Why would he?” It wasn’t surprising that he didn’t talk to me.

“Uh…nothing. Never mind,” Wes replied. Before I could deny that lie, he just walked off. Why do I think something’s going on that they’re not telling me?

***

“How was your day?” I asked Jackson as we walked out of school.

“Sitting in a quiet classroom all day doing nothing but work? Just peachy,” he replied. I laughed. “Yours?”

“Pretty swell, actually,” I answered.

“Well that’s good,” Jackson shrugged. I smiled and then felt someone brush against my hand. I looked up to see Wes.

“I need you to come with me,” he said.

“What for?” I asked. His eyes flickered and I got confused.

“Hey, I’ll see you at home…” Jackson said before leaving us alone.

“What’s up?” I asked Wes as we walked to his car.

“Something is wrong with you and Chase,” he said.

“Well duh. I mean, we’re not even together—”

“Not as a couple; as two individuals,” he interrupted. What? He scoffed and rolled his eyes as he grabbed my hand to haul me into his car.

He drove into an old lot with dead grass and nothing else but broken down pieces of something that might’ve been an old drive-in movie theater. What were we doing here?

Wes wrapped his arm around the back of my passenger side seat before I looked over to him. He looked down to my lips before leaning in.

Chase.

Once I thought that, I backed away. I don’t know what it was. I mean, I guess it’s the fact that I don’t want him to find out about it…or get jealous. Something called to me to back off.

“Why’d you back off?” Wes asked.

“Chase…” I mumbled in a gasp. I looked into Wes’ dark blue eyes. “I can’t, Wes. I can’t.”

“Alicia—”

“I’m sorry. I can’t. It’s not right and he’ll…he’ll—”

“I was testing you,” he muttered.

“Wait what?” I asked.

“It’s a test. You reacted as if you’d be cheating on him,” Wes said in a calm voice. He was right…

“Hey,” Wes said with his phone pressed against his ear. “Well yeah right now…okay…”

And then I felt an excruciating pain in my side. As if someone punched me. I started gasping in pain as it traveled to my rib cage.

“Alicia!” Wes yelled, unbuckling his seat belt and took me into his arms.

“Wes, what’s happening?” I thought it, but someone over the phone said it. I growled in pain as if something pierced my skin and traveled down to beneath the thick muscle.

“Where’s Chase?!” Wes yelled.

“I don’t know?! He just left here!” the girl over the phone yelled.

“Go find him!” Wes yelled at her. My hand clutched my side as I tossed and turn as if the motion would eliminate the pain. It traveled up my front and to my heart. I clamped a hand over my heart and started coughing for air. My chest was tightening. This is five times worse than an asthma attack, I bet.

And then I blacked out with an overwhelming of pain.

***

My eyes fluttered open into a familiar room at the pack’s house. My abs felt sore as if I’d done nothing but crunches for the past everyday of the year. I was the only one in the room and I sat up despite the pain.

There was a light bump on the door and I questioned the sound.

“Where is she?!” I heard a muffled voice yell.

“She’s resting!” Wes’ familiar voice yelled loud enough for it not to be muffled.

“I don’t care!” the first voice said before there was a grunt and then the door was flung open. I saw Chase break out of Wes’ grasp and then he rushed over to me to engulf me in a hug.

“I’m sorry. I’m so so sorry, Ali. I never should’ve done that. I’m just so…sorry,” Chase cried as his wolf strength squeezed me tightly. I pushed him off as he was hurting me. Once I did that, I searched him. He had bruises and cuts around his face. I reached my hand up to his cheek.

“What happened to you?” I asked, looking into both of his eyes.

“It’s not important,” he answered. “You’re important and…and I screwed up.”

“Fu** yeah you did. Now get out,” Wes said from behind. Chase started to get up and leave.

“Wait,” I called. “What happened?”

“I can’t—”

“He has to go,” Wes said.

“I don’t care!” I shouted. “I want answers, godd4mnit!”

“I…” Chase whispered. “I can’t do this anymore.”

Do what?

“I can’t keep getting you hurt. I gotta get outta here,” Chase whispered.

“No. Chase—”

I was cut off when he left the room. I felt my heart literally breaking.

Wes sat on the bed and hugged me as I was silent.

“He had a spell put on you and him,” Wes informed in a whisper as my arms were around his waist. “Full moon screwed that up and now it’s the opposite effect.”

The opposite of this would be safer…better…loving from both of us…and you get the point. But what was this about a spell?

“What spell?” I asked Wes in a whisper.

“I can’t tell you,” Wes said.

“Just like Chase couldn’t?”

“It’s different,” he said. “I’m not even supposed to know. I found out and he’s forcing me to not give you any information about it.”

“I don’t care. When you looked into it, you should’ve told me then,” I said.

“I didn’t know what I was getting into,” he reasoned.

“Then why do you care!?!” I yelled angrily at him.

“Because I love you,” he yelled. “I don’t like the fact that my Alpha is your soul mate and he’s treating you like crap. I’m trying to look out for you because I love you more than he ever will. I show you my love. Never have I ever hurt you as much as him! It’s not my fu**ing fault that Chase is acting like a douche and I have to obey everything he says!”

He was probably right about him loving me more than Chase ever will…even as soul mates. I stayed quiet with my mouth slightly open.

“I want what’s best for you, and that’s Chase, but he needs to sort all of his own sh!t out first,” he added. Yeah right. Like Chase Cane is best for me… “Trust me, I’m trying to help him. If I help him, I help you.”

“How?” I whispered, looking up at him. “What is there to even help with?”

He sighed.

“Chase’s family is royalty in the immortal world. Now that his parents died and Dane resigned completely from everything, Chase is the heir,” he informed.

“What does that even mean?”

“Chase is a werewolf Prince.”

What the h3ll?

***

Chase was an undercover prince to the immortal world, along with other direct family members. He doesn’t wanna be. He just discovered it apparently. Not only that, but he was Alpha of one of the biggest packs. He was only eighteen. That’s a lot of pressure for a teenager. It’s not like Billy could be there much because now Rebecca was pregnant and they were enjoying their newly wedded life. And even though Dane had three years on Chase, he was never the Alpha like Chase was. But Wes also said that Chase hasn’t phased in forever…he was gonna snap…and it was me he was gonna snap at…

Apparently werewolves can get sick by not phasing for long amounts of time. With the addition to the fact that he was trying to break his requested spell for us. That’s why I was in pain. He wasn’t supposed to kiss me at all on the full moon, but for some reason, I felt more attached to him since then. But according to Wes, that’s a negative effect. Along with Chase being conflicted on everything. That’s why Chase was trying to break it, but he failed.

“Where’s Chase?” I asked Wes as I was sitting in the comfy sheets of his bed, eating with him. He didn’t answer me. “Wes.”

“He’s gone,” he shrugged.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked.

“I don’t know. He’s gone. He needs to be alone and settle all this sh!t out,” Wes answered.

“Well I wanna talk to him.”

“Alicia. You can’t—”

“Well I want to,” I reasoned.

“It’s the error talking. You really shouldn’t mess with him any more,” Wes said. “He’s probably out trying to break the spell.”

“How hard is it to break a fu**ing spell?!” I yelled. It required me getting hurt without doing anything, I know that much.

“Pretty hard,” Wes answered. “It’s a tough spell.”

“You act like it’s a mark or something,” I snorted. He kept quiet. “Right?”

“Well…it’s like a miniature opposite version of it, but breaking it is five times easier than if he actually did mark you,” Wes explained. Fu**ing fantastic…

“So he got a spell to prevent anything that would lead to him marking me, yet it’s the same result as breaking a bond like a mark,” I rambled.

“That’s why I don’t like stupid fu**ing imprints,” Wes moaned before plopping onto his pillows behind me. I turned down to him as his hair covered his face. “Then I would be with you; no questions asked. We wouldn’t have to go through this sh!t.”

“Tell me about it,” I agreed before laying down with him. He threw his arm over the front of my waist and my head rested in the crook of his neck.

“Can I ask you a question?” Wes whispered. I nodded. “What would you do if Chase ever marked you?”

I gulped.

“I don’t know,” I choked out. Chase marking me? That would mean I’d have to spend the rest of my life with him. Would I even want that? Sh!t. Now I was starting to think about it...

“I don’t want him to,” Wes whispered. I looked up at him.

“I thought you wanted me and him to be together,” I recalled.

“Yeah, but being bonded is different,” he shook his head. “As mates, you can think about him as much as you want, but find the will power to stay away, but when you’re marked, you’re…limited.”

Limited how? I remember Chase saying that he rarely thinks about marking his own soul mate…of course this was when I didn’t know I was his mate and he was with Kayla. He didn’t even want us together, so why would he dare think about marking me?

“You know he doesn’t want that,” I muttered.

“He’ll come around,” Wes promised, pursing his lips.

“Doubt it.”

“In a few years, he will,” Wes assured.

“A few years?!” Years?! “What the h3ll makes you think I’ll stick around that long!?”

“Because you’re soul mates?” he answered. “In a few years, he’s gonna mature and then when he decides to settle down, he’ll be there for you.”

“What do you mean by settling down?”

“When he’s done with school and has all the Alpha stuff done for the most part, he’s gonna want you and a family—”

“Family say what?” A family? I know Chase loves his sister and brother to death, but have a family with me? YEAH RIGHT.

“Alicia, don’t play dumb,” Wes said. “You and I both know that if Chase walked through that door right this second and asked you out, you’d say yes.”

Maybe…

“But either way, him and his conflictions wouldn’t wanna spend forever with me due to the fact that we have so much sh!t—”

“Stop it,” Wes whined. He eased up from the bed. “I gotta go.”

“What. Why?” I asked.

“Don’t worry about it,” he dismissed. “Jackson’s gonna be here soon.”

“Okay,” I mumbled. He kissed my forehead and left. I sighed and threw myself onto the pillows. The thoughts going through my head could be summed in one word:

Chase.