Page 528 of Hate Mates

“Oh, yeah? Then why did you?” I ask as I find a pair of socks stuffed into my favorite pair of boots.Huh. Probably gotta wash these.“Let me guess. Is it because you hate me?”

I pull the socks out of the boots, press them together, then roll them into a ball, tossing them onto the bed. I can’t help but grin at the look on her face. It seems that I’ve taken the words out of her mouth, and she’s pretty pissed off about it.What else is new?

“Why do you always have to do that?” she questions in a softer tone.

“Do what, little wolf?” I ask without looking up. I blow out my breath as I reach for the backpack, pull the zipper down slightly, and shove the socks in before closing it back up again.

“Act like you know it all because you don’t, you know.”

I nod as I glance around my bed, making sure that I have everything I want to take with me, then walk over to the desk in my room and grab the stack of notebooks I’ve spent doodling in for the time I’ve been confined here.

“Sorry. You’re just easy to read.”

“If that’s true, then look at me right now and tell me what I’m going to say next.”

I smile and shake my head as I pick up the notebooks, then turn to look at her. I prop myself against the edge of the desk, look into her dangerously bright blue eyes, and pretend to think. The longer I stand here in silence making inquisitive faces, then shaking my head when I fake deciding against a thought, the more rabid her anger is growing.

“I don’t want you to leave!” she explodes raising her hands wildly in the air.

I arch an eyebrow. I’m confused and intrigued all at the same time. The years we’ve spent here have been rough. Not because of our surroundings, but because of each other. Karter and I have gotten along maybe once or twice at best, but pitted against the time we’ve spent here, it doesn’t really amount more to me than she was probably feeling off those days.

“Okay,” I begin slowly. I set down my notebooks and give her my undivided attention. “I’ll bite. How come?”

Her chin drops to her chest. Her small body shifts as she inhales and then exhales. Finally, after a few moments of what feels like attending a viewing, Karter looks up at me again.

“Because it’s not fair.”

I wait for her to continue without so much as a word of encouragement or moving an inch.

“You shouldn’t have to go just because they say that you’re too old to be here any longer. And okay, fine. Maybe we haven’t been the best of friends; we’ve been the worst of friends, but you have to admit that it’s better than being alone, isn’t it?”

I run both hands down my face, trying to make sense of what she’s saying, when I drop my hands and smile. “Worsties?”

Karter looks damn near faint with relief as she walks over to my bed and pushes my backpack to the side. “Worsties for as long as we can stand it.”

I shake my head in amusement and pick up my notebooks again. “We don’thaveto stay here though, you know? I think we’d have more fun outthere,” I state, nodding toward the window, “than we could ever have in here.”

“But I can’t leave, Harlan. Not for another three years or unless someone wants me.”

I’ve got nothing left to lose, so I may as well just say it.

Clearing my throat nervously, I take a deep breath before I tell her the one thing I’ve been trying to show her for as long as we’ve known each other. My eyes lose focus as the blood rushes to my ears. All I can really hear is the sound of my heart beating frantically, but I let out my breath and finally say it.

“Maybe I want you.”

I’m standing justinside of Karter’s room, glancing up and down the hallway every so often. I don’t know where that confession came from, or how long I had really been holding it in, until I felt the weight of the world drop off my shoulders when I finally said it to her face. To be honest, I had expected her to laugh at me—or get angry, her usual reaction when it comes to me. Instead, the little wolf that I’ve been trying to tame in myown way for God knows how long, lurched off the bed and gave me the best and only hug I’ve ever gotten in my entire life.

At least I was smart enough to leave room for doubt on both our ends,I muse as I glance back at Karter who’s trying to lift a duffle bag strap over her shoulder. With a laugh, I walk over to her and snatch it, then head toward the window. Lifting the pane, I hoist it up on the sill, then give her an incredulous look. “Are you sure you didn’t want to take the bed, too?”

Karter gives me a withering stare as she insists that she needs what’s in the bag.

“Alright, we’ll grab it when we get outside,” I assure her as I shove it out the window, then grab the lift to pull it closed. “Are you sure you wanna leave with me, little wolf? I don’t really have an idea of what to do once I leave, I was just going to wing everything.”

It sucks that I know I can’t give her anything outside of these walls, but in the same token, I haven’t been able to do anything for her inside of them either.Or to her.

“I’m sure. I know where we can go,” she says confidently as she leads the way out of her room.

We walk side by side toward Mr. Thomas’ office, and I pull Karter to the side just outside of his door. “You sure you can sneak out? I don’t know how long I’ll be able to wait for you if you aren’t out there by the time I walk out of here.”

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