Rhyannon Byrd - Dark Wolf Returning

“What the hell, Eli? Are you—”

“Don’t! Don’t touch me!” he snarled, stumbling back from her when she started to reach for him. His gaze darted from side to side, reminding her of a trapped wolf desperate for escape.

She crossed her arms over her middle, determined to hold herself together. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he scraped out, sounding as if a brutal set of hands was crushing his throat. “Just...just go to bed, Carla. It’s late.”

“No. I want to know—”

“Just get in the damn bed!” he barked, brushing her aside so he could rip the door open. “And lock this damn thing behind me!”

He slammed out of the room then, and she reached out and slid the lock into place with a shaking hand, her thoughts reeling, and her body... Oh, God. Her body was vibrating...awakened. Misery crashed over her like a cold rain, and she shivered even harder, somehow making it to the bed. For the second night in a row, she crawled onto a lumpy mattress and curled into a ball, trying to block out everything until she was nothing more than molecules of air. Weightless. Floating. No pain or fear or emotions.

Carla tried to reach that feeling of nothingness with every ounce of her will, but it never came. As she lay there in the cold, depressing room, she just kept wanting and longing and aching...for things she would never have.

Chapter 4

Her life since setting off in search of Eli Drake had been the worst kind of hell, and Carla had never been so eager to return to the Alley as she was now.

She’d skipped breakfast that morning because, well, rejection apparently killed her appetite. Exhaustion weighed heavily on her shoulders, and while she knew it was unforgivably stupid to have let her body do the thinking instead of her head, she was simply too tired to beat herself up over what had happened with Eli. Learn, regroup, and move on. That needed to be her motto, because if it wasn’t, she’d still be curled up in that crappy motel room bed, wishing for things that were useless. And oh so obviously bad for her.

As far as wake up calls went, the way Eli had walked out on her again had been a bruiser. But she was tough. She could take the hit and keep on going.

What she couldn’t do was let him get too close to her again. Work together? Fine, so long as she wasn’t alone with him. But kissing? Touching? Losing her head over him because her body craved him like he was freaking manna from heaven? Uh, no. That was not a part of her game plan. She would give herself last night as a freak moment of insanity after missing him as badly as she had, but no more. That’d been her last freebie. There wouldn’t be any others.

When they’d climbed into the truck that morning, both of them taking the backseat again, Eli had turned to her and asked, “Are you okay?” At her questioning look, he’d stiffly explained his concern. “I wasn’t thinking about the bullet graze last night. Did I hurt you?”

“My side is fine,” she’d murmured. He’d caused her pain, just not physically.

As if he’d read her mind, he’d said, “I wasn’t rejecting you, Rey. I was—”

“It doesn’t matter,” she’d cut in, watching the clouds through her window as the wind blew them across the sky like puffs of dandelion seeds. “I don’t care.”

“That’s a damn lie. If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t be hurt. And I’m sorry as hell that it happened, because I didn’t mean to hurt you. Not last night, and not before. That was the last thing that I... Damn it, I was trying to pro—”

Her head had whipped to the side so quickly her hair smacked her in the face. “If you say you were trying to protect me, I will get out of this truck and I won’t get back in it. Understood?”

“We need to talk about this,” he’d argued.

“No, we don’t need to do anything, because the time for talking was last night. Now you can just forget that anything ever happened.”

He’d muttered something under his breath that she didn’t catch, but didn’t say anything more when Kyle and Lev hopped in the front, the blond merc taking the first stint behind the wheel. She’d balled up a sweatshirt Kyle offered her, using it as a pillow, and slept.

Then, when they’d stopped for lunch a little while ago, she made sure to catch Eli alone before they entered the restaurant, and told him, “I don’t know what your problem is, and I don’t care. I just want you to know that what happened last night—that’s it, Eli. It doesn’t happen again. You don’t get to keep making me feel like a fool.”

She hadn’t waited around to get his reaction, heading inside to join the others. He’d come in a few minutes later, and passed on ordering anything, which had garnered some interested looks from his friends. Lev had lifted his brows at her, as if to say What’d you do to him? She’d shrugged in a I have no idea what his problem is kind of way, but the merc didn’t buy it, his sea-colored gaze filled with curiosity. Too drained to worry about any of it, she’d sucked down a few spoonfuls of soup and resumed her nap once they were all back on the road.

Or at least she’d tried to. Unfortunately, sleep eluded her for the second part of the day, and it wasn’t just Eli’s brooding presence that had her feeling so restless. It was the entire situation.

After so many days like this, cooped up in a vehicle, Carla was thankful her mother had never been the family vacation type. She was ready to chew her own arm off because she was so...so on edge. She felt trapped, like there wasn’t enough air in the cab for her to get a deep enough breath. And what air there was smelled like Eli, which did nothing to help her relax.

Needing to eat more often than human males because of their high metabolisms, the guys decided to stop for a late afternoon snack once they crossed into Maryland. They found a popular diner, and despite her foul mood, she bit back a grin at the reaction the mercs received as they walked to their table. The humans there might not know what the tall, good-looking mercenaries were, but they sensed there was something different about them, the way a vulnerable animal might sense the nearness of a beautiful, mesmerizing predator; the instinct to run battling against the desire to soak up the stunning view.

When they got back in the truck, Kyle said they needed fuel and pulled into a nearby gas station, while Sam pulled in behind him.

“I’m gonna grab some sodas for everyone to have on the road,” Lev said, getting out just as Kyle started pumping the gas.

Sitting in the backseat with Eli again, she knew she needed to make use of their privacy. There were things she needed to tell him before they reached the Alley in a few hours, and now was the perfect time.

Turning toward him, she asked, “Are you nervous about tonight?”

He hadn’t spoken to her since trying to explain himself that morning, remaining silent, his rugged jaw clenched tight, even when she’d stopped him outside the diner at lunch, telling him that last night would never have a repeat. He’d spent the day in a dark, dangerous mood, and now was no different. Keeping his gaze focused out his window, he responded to her question with nothing more than a slight shake of his head.

“I called Wyatt this morning, so they know to be expecting us at the Alley.”

This time, he nodded, still not looking at her.

Carla sighed, forcing herself to just get to the point. “Listen, Eli, there’s something I need to tell you before we get there, and now seems like the best time.”

He must have picked up on something in her tone, because he finally turned toward her, his dark eyes difficult to read as they connected with hers.

Rubbing her damp palms across her jeans, she said, “It’s about Elise, and I think you should know because...well, coming back is going to be hard enough for you as it is. I don’t think you need any more shocking revelations thrown in your face.”