He cupped my face in his hands and wiped away our mingled tears with his thumbs.
‘I won’t let anyone hurt you, not the pack, not Astrid, not anyone. I don’t know how, not yet, but I swear it on my soul. They lied to me my whole life, they held me captive when I wouldn’t listen. But if they won’t listen to me, I don’t have to listen to them. The pack may be my family but you are my life, Emily, without you, everything else is meaningless.’
‘This kind of feels like a conversation you could be having in private,’ Ashley said, turning away awkwardly in her seat. ‘But I do like the energy.’
‘We will figure it out,’ I agreed, forcing a smile that hurt more than slicing myself open with a knife. Scars I’d thought healed tore open, raw and red and real, on display for all to see. ‘I love you, Wyn Evans.’
‘I love you, Emily James.’
Words were never supposed to hurt so much.
We were always on a clock but it ran down early this month and I wasn’t ready. Would I ever really be ready? Would I ever get used to the pain of watching him leave and hoping he’dcome back only so we could do this to each other all over again?
He kissed me one more time, deep and strong, and for a beautiful, fleeting moment, I believed everything was going to work out. Then, without another word, he stood up, walked out of the parlour and through the bloody front door.
‘Seems as though the two of you are always saying goodbye,’ Ashley said, joining me on the couch and stroking my hair. ‘Call me crazy but I’m starting to think love ain’t all it’s cracked up to be.’
‘You’re crazy,’ I whispered, tears enough to drown an ocean finally falling free when I heard his truck door slam and the engine roar into life.
Chapter Thirty-Five
The Wyn-shaped hole in my life was a chasm, too wide to bridge, impossible to fill. If I looked directly at it, the despair that consumed me was overwhelming, but there wasn’t any time to indulge in my own pain. We messaged constantly but didn’t dare speak on the phone, not with so many sharp ears around him. The pack had accepted his story and welcomed him home, too anxious and eager to get their newest member completely up to speed before the trial to poke holes in his narrative, not that they were forthcoming with the details. All he could tell me was he’d never seen his mother more focused or his grandfather quite so sad. Not many of the pack had lived through the last trial, he said, but his grandfather had and did not appear to relish the thought of doing so again.
Since he left, I’d barely slept but as long as I didn’t look directly at the scar Wyn’s absence left on my soul, I could keep moving. The Powells moved into our guest quarters the same day Wyn left town, taking over the three downstairs bedrooms that opened directly out into the garden, their own apartment within Bell House. It made sense. I needed everyone where I could see them and keep them safe, and Lydia needed all thehelp she could get to hone her magic as best she could before the Becoming. She was already faster and stronger, her senses sharpening every day, but her control over the weather was erratic at best and every time I walked into a room without correcting my permanent scowl, I heard a distant rumble of thunder.
My craft room had become my sanctuary and, once inside, I lost all track of time. It felt like Thursday. Day or night, today, tomorrow or yesterday, I wasn’t sure, hours spent poring over the journal that filled itself with all the accumulated knowledge my ancestors had gathered on the Weres. There wasn’t much. When I yawned for the third time in a row, I closed the book, admitting defeat for the day and looked up to the impossible skylight in the ceiling. The room was bright with daylight but the sky was dark. Barely any stars, too close to the full moon for the furthest away to break through.
The door to the craft room opened quietly and the lights along the hallway turned themselves half on, guiding me to the kitchen and muffling my footsteps so as not to wake our guests. It was late, although I had no idea how late. The energy of the house was peaceful and at rest, except for one spot in the kitchen. Virginia Powell sat at the kitchen table surrounded by dozens of open glass jars and wielding a stone pestle, the bowl in front of her full of a vivid chartreuse paste.
‘Emily,’ she said kindly. ‘Whatever are you doing out of bed at this hour?’
‘I don’t actually know what this hour is but I’m extremely hungry,’ I replied, heading for the fridge only to be beaten by Virginia. ‘I didn’t eat dinner. Or lunch. I think I had breakfast?’
‘Sit,’ she ordered. ‘I’ll fix you a plate.’
It was nice, to do as I was told for once. Taking a chair at the table, I silently reviewed her poultice. Slippery elm, honey,turmeric and ginger, to treat inflammation and sore muscles. Much of the morning had been spent strengthening the wards around Bell House, burying chunks of black tourmaline and labradorite around the perimeter of our garden. My body ached with the effort. A quick slather of the funky-looking paste would help no end.
‘How does it look to you?’ Virginia asked, busy assembling a turkey sandwich behind me. ‘Your aunt refuses to let me write anything down and I’m having a devil of a time trying to get the measurements right.’
‘It looks amazing,’ I said. ‘Perfect, in fact.’
Brandishing a butter knife, she gave me a look. ‘You must be honest with me. It’s the only way I’ll learn.’
‘There’s a tad bit too much honey.’ I reached across the table to adjust the measurements by adding another pinch of each herb. ‘This consistency will stick to the skin better.’
‘Marvellous. Just marvellous.’
In companionable quiet, she finished constructing my late-night lunch while I poked a finger in her various concoctions. She would never have access to her magic, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t be of service to her family’s magic.
‘Eat,’ she said, placing the sandwich in front of me, complete with a radish rosette. ‘Can’t have you wasting away now, not when there’s so much work to do – and your aunt Ashley tells me there is much work on the horizon.’
From the lift of her eyebrows and the prim tightening of her lips that wasn’t all Ashley had told her.
‘Such a weight to place on young shoulders,’ Virginia lamented as she began closing up the open glass jars dotted around the table. ‘It really isn’t fair.’
‘Fair doesn’t seem to have much to do with anything these days. If things were fair, a lot of people would still be alive.’ I took a bite of the sandwich, sinking my teeth into herfresh-baked, pillowy bread. ‘If things were fair, you would have your magic.’
‘I don’t know about that.’
