Page 49 of Wolf's Providence

Willow

It was sostrange being back.

My house looked exactly the same as it had when I left. Everything was tidy and in its place. It was neat, lifeless, pretty much how it always was. Standing there, I realized that my home looked unlived in. Empty. It wasn’t a perfect picture of how clean a house was before you went on vacation; it looked like this every day.

Had it always looked like this, or was I seeing it differently now thateverythingwas different?

Because everythingwasdifferent.

Glancing at Caleb, who was standing in the kitchen and scanning the room for threats that didn’t exist, I knew he was the reason everything had changed. My home, my sanctuary, felt too small with him in it. His presence filled the space, making it hard to look at anything else.

I could pretend this was normal, but did I even know what normal was anymore?

Caleb hadn’t mentioned sleeping arrangements on our journey back to Whispering Pines, and neither had I. What was I supposed to suggest? The bed? Too forward. The couch? Ouch. The very thought of a six-foot-plus, fiercely protective, intenseshifter crashing on my couch was just a reminder of the world I’d become entangled in.

And now, said shifter was my…what? Roommate?

Unbidden, I started to smile at the thought of it. If someone had told me two months ago that I’d be sharing my living space with Caleb, I would’ve laughed in their face.

Yet here we were.

His intense stare caught mine and we stood a few feet apart, saying nothing. The silence between us wasn’t uncomfortable, but it was filled with things we were holding back. Like the night we slept together in the bunker. We hadn’t had sex again, but Caleb wasn’t shy in offering light kisses when he felt like it.

When he felt like it. Was that harsh?

I never felt like he feltobligatedto kiss me. But I did think we were both trying to figure it all out.

“It was a long drive,” he spoke suddenly. “Do you mind if I shower?”

“Um…no, of course not. Are you using the main bathroom or mine?” Wow. Awkward.

“Which one would you prefer me to use?”

Loaded question, and I floundered as to what the right response was.

“Whichever one you want. The pressure’s good in both of them.”Pressure? That’s what you’re going with? Water pressure?

He didn’t say anything, and only moments later, I heard the bathroom door in the hall close.

“Right, the main one, then.”Did it mean anything that he picked that one?

Why did I feel that his choice of bathroom added to the tension? But yet I also felt relaxed knowing the door was closed and I could breathe in my own space without his eyes on me.

What was I doing?

How was I going tolivewith him if this was how I felt after one hour of being in the house together?

What the heck did I tell Lily? I wasn’t sure I could explain Caleb tomyself, so how could I tell my friends? And expect them to believe me? The fact he was staying here, in my house, was out of character for me, and where did he sleep?

I could hear the questions now, and I knew I had no answer for them.

I had heard him in Cannon’s study…library? Shaking my head at being so easily distracted, I thought back to what he said in the whatever-it-was room. When he asked me if this was my “ever after,” I hadn’t expected the question, and I’d frozen when he asked it. Because all I could think of was,was I his?

What was I to him? Someone he needed to save?

Why was he really here? To find the ones who were pursuing me to get tohim?

Were we together? Or were we two people who slept together?

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