Page 59 of Found by the Pack
“Sit. Drink.”
I sink into the chair, the steam rising to curl against my face. My fingers wrap around the mug because it’s something to hold onto. The warmth seeps into my hands, but it doesn’t melt the knot in my chest.
I take a sip. The tea is sweet, a hint of honey on my tongue.
I’m angry. I’m pissed.
And under that, deeper—something worse.
Betrayal sits in my gut like a stone. Boone didn’t just share something I told him; he shared something I showed him, something I hadn’t intended for anyone else to see.
This is why. This is why you keep things locked down. This is why you don’t trust anyone. Because the second you let your guard down, someone takes that piece and hands it to someone else like it’s theirs to give away.
I stare into the tea.
I can’t handle this anymore.
The knot behind my breastbone is sharp enough to make me feel restless in my own skin. My knee bounces under the table. My fingers tap the mug.
I take another sip, just to have something to do, when my phone rings.
A number I don’t recognize flashes on the screen. Probably the taxi.
I swipe to answer. “Hello?”
“Where the fuck are you?”
The voice is like ice and gravel all at once, low and cold and unmistakable. My breath snags in my throat.
Scott.
My fingers tighten around the phone until it creaks. “How did you?—”
“Why are you screening my calls?” His tone sharpens, each word clipped.
Heat rushes up the back of my neck. My heartbeat thuds against my ribs in a way that feels too loud for this little back room. I glance at the doorway, half-expecting Cora to appear.
No. No. Not here. Not now.
The air feels thinner suddenly, my mind clawing through the fact that his voice is here, in my ear, in this small safe space that doesn’t feel safe anymore.
His voice is the same as it always was—low, gravel-thick, and coiled with a kind of ownership that makes my skin crawl.
“Why are you screening my calls?” Scott repeats, slower this time, like I’m too stupid to understand the first time around.
I swallow, my mouth gone dry. “I—” My throat feels scraped raw.Don’t stammer. Don’t give him the satisfaction.“I’ve been busy.”
“Busy?” The word drips with mockery. “Too busy to answer me? Too busy to let me know where the hell you’ve run off to?”
A deep, old ache starts in my chest, radiating outward. It’s the same one I used to get in the pit of my stomach whenever he’d come into a room back in the old pack house. That slow, suffocating dread.
My fingers tighten around the phone until my knuckles ache. “I’m not?—”
“You’re not what? Mine anymore?” A short, humorless laugh rattles through the line. “You and I both know it doesn’t work like that, Sadie. You think you can just disappear and I’ll… what? Forget about you?”
God, I hate how my pulse spikes when he says my name.
“You don’t get to—” I start, but the words die when his voice drops, low enough to make my gut clench.
