Itâs been a few days since Colton told me about his mom, and I swear she keeps plaguing my thoughts.
Itâs like a tiny itch in my brain I canât shake, and I keep coming back to it repeatedly for no apparent reason. I even dreamed of her last night, and it was the weirdest, most confusing thing ever.
It came after I finally located a memory of her in this shared library of thoughts and couldnât shake her soft face from my visuals.
I must have tried too hard and implanted her in my brain to mess with me. Itâs the only explanation.
I vaguely remember her without Coltonâs influence, only in my memories, sheâs faceless because I couldnât remember her all that well, so itâs nice to apply features to her.
She has Coltonâs flawless beauty, black hair, darkest chocolate eyes, and sallow skin, with a soft ambiance thatâs less masculine than his.
She used to come to the library near our farm every weekend to read books to the children.
I remember her being a caring, quiet lady, well-spoken, well-dressed, with no prejudices against wolves from rival packs.
The children were all one to her. She always wanted to see us live in peace and harmony, and she had this warm pull that I see in Colton sometimes when he isnât closing up on me and freezing me out.
The dream lingers in my mind, despite my being up for hours, and now, Iâm sitting on the grass, taking a break from training, and I can still feel her voice filtering through from the recesses of my mind.
Fatigue lets it slip back in as I cool down and catch my breath, and her haunting melodic tone, filled with pleading, rings the words through again that woke me this morning. âSave us.â
Itâs all that comes through, giving me the same shivers as when I dreamed it.
She walked up to me, in a bright white, sterile, wall-less space, with no one else around me but blurred nothingness of light and stale air.
I was standing in the middle of what felt like a hospital, I donât know, unsure where I was meant to go or how I even got there. Confused.
She caught my eye when she appeared in the distance, almost hazy and surrounded by a fog that cleared as she came closer.
She was dressed in a light shapeless gown, almost like a medical covering, except it was pure snow-white, not blue or patterned.
Her hair was loose, free, and hung longer than I can recall from my memory bank, almost touching her waist, whereas she always kept it jaw length in even Coltonâs memories.
When she came into focus at first, I could see her cheeks were wet with tears, her eyes bloodshot, and her skin streaked where they had fallen repeatedly.
Her smock was soaked through, as though theyâd been absorbing thousands of them for an eternity.
Her desperate sadness consumed and overwhelmed me, and I was rooted to the spot, unable to breathe with the heaviness of her pain.
She was eerily pale, beautiful still, but only the shadow of the woman from Coltonâs memories, thin and worn down, as though her life were being sucked away.
She touched my face softly, startling me with the sheer heat she exuded, and leaned in so close that she almost kissed me.
Her warmth invaded the coolness of my air and whispered it right into my face, startling me to wake in the dull stillness of my room.
Those two damned words.
Shuddering again, aware that the memory of her touch on my skin has pushed a physical sensation onto my cheek, I touch it to remove the feel of it.
The dream felt real, and I hate that it wonât leave me alone in waking hours, replaying on a loop and deeply affecting me.
Itâs the total opposite of Colton, though, as heâs been practically absent, physically and mentally, something heâs been doing for an infuriating number of days.
Itâs like opening up about her reminded him of all the reasons he chose to reject me, and he backtracked at a hundred miles an hour and ultimately pulled away.
Heâs been on active avoidance ever since, and itâs both broken me and pissed me off beyond the limits of my boundary.
He comes to training, barks orders at me from a safe distance, and has permanently closed the door to our mind-link.
Itâs making me madder than hell, infuriated that he has done another U-turn once again, but whenever I try to talk to him, he walks off and blanks me.
Itâs a big fat âStay away from meâ aura all around that dense head of his, and he wonât even look me in the eye.
He makes sure I canât get close or touch him, and he either sticks with the sub-pack so I canât get him alone or leaves before anyone else does so I canât follow.
I know what heâs doing, and as much as I want to punch him in his genitals for it, I understand, but itâs so frustrating.
What makes it worse is Carmen has caught onto the strained atmosphere and is laying on the oozing flirt mode with all her might, driving even the males of the pack to eye-roll every time she baby-talks him.
I think she sees it as hope or an opening that sheâs on the path to getting him back, and itâs making me sick to watch her smugly move in on him at every opportunity she gets.
Colton still isnât tolerating her, but it doesnât mean Iâm not having visions of turning and ripping her throat out multiple times a day.
Killing a fellow wolf from your pack is a mortal sin, no matter the excuse, but I would happily pay the time for that crime.
Meadow is the only thing keeping me sane.
Last night, she camped out in my room to cheer me up and distract me, watching movies and having girl time to throw off all the stresses of everything going on around us.
She brought me clothes and makeup, not that I need them now that my belongings were left at my door when I returned from training a couple of days ago.
I suspect Colton went and packed up everything in the orphanage carrying my scent, but I canât be sure, and he wonât stick around to let me ask him at all.
It adds to my fury because it shows he still cares, he still thinks about my needs, but he wonât face me at all.
His mind is set, and I know what this means for us. Heâs already chosen his course of action, and heâs biding his time until itâs done.
He doesnât come to the mess hall to eat either. He just shows up at the park to train and leaves as soon as weâre done for the day.
He spends the rest of his time with Juan, patrolling the lay of the land and overseeing the training camp and the new buildings.
Iâve seen them walking together many times, and I almost couldnât control my loathing growls or the hatred I have for that man.
The pack is getting uneasy, and Meadow mentioned he hadnât called any kind of communal since as though heâs avoiding any real dialogue with any of us.
He knows the pack will have questions about this. He brought me to them, made it seem like I might have a chance, and then snubbed me as they were beginning to accept my presence.
Heâs caught inside his head as he tries to work things out, but weâre losing time. Itâs ticking away slowly as the full moon approaches in its cycle. I donât think I can take much more.
Logic is telling me to give up on him, but I donât want to accept that heâs done and given up on us after what he said to me. My heart doesnât want to believe he could be this way.
Iâve been lost in my thoughts, anxious, obsessing, crying, and worrying myself sick with the chaos of this lack of closure.
Iâm not being a cold idiot, cutting him off, or avoiding him like he is with me. I would talk to him in a heartbeat if he let me.
Itâs like he just abandoned me after dumping me in his sub-pack, with no idea what Iâm supposed to be now, how to feel, and what Iâm meant to do after the full moon.
If he marks her, where do I go? What do I do? Iâm only here because of my link to him.
Iâm not a Santo, I donât belong here, and although the sub-pack seems to be warming to me, Iâm not bonded to them. Iâm not one of them, and Carmen will kick my ass to the curb the second he marks her.
Sheâll be his beta until she takes her place as luna, pushing Meadow down the ranks from merely becoming his mate.
Sheâll have more say than any of them, and I can see Colton allowing her to move me out for the sake of their pairing.
She hates me passionately and spends all her time either drooling after him or throwing me shade. Itâs just a waiting game until she finally has the power to eject me. Thatâs how it works.
I exhale heavily and pull myself up off the grass where Iâve been sitting cross-legged for the past ten minutes, ripping at strands absentmindedly, letting my mind run riot.
Meadow strolls on up beside me and slumps down, too. Sheâs barely flushed, no evidence of panting after scaling thirty-foot tree climbs, and almost no sweat has formed on any part of her at all.
And sheâs unaffected. Iâm over here looking like I rolled in a puddle, red-faced, and having a cardiac arrest some twenty minutes after I did it.
I have to admit, though, that my stamina is improving in only a few short days, and I no longer get the shakes and near vomit like the first time we did this. Iâm getting stronger.
âWhat is it with men today? I swear, I must be getting my cycle because I want to stab idiots in the head. Itâs like the haze is coming in and making them all stupid or loco.â
Meadow falls back on the grass, looking very athletic in pink leggings and a matching sports bra that enhances her natural assets.
Cesar has been driving her mad the past few days, with his overprotective side kicking in as Juan upped the training schedule and started pushing his agenda a little harder.
Heâs been all over her, shadowing her through the course, stopping her before any he thinks might be dangerous, and meeting her fury at mollycoddling her.
Males canât help it. Even if their femmes are capable, they need to shelter their mate.
The haze is mating season, and yes, itâs fast approaching and can make the males a little crazy possessive, over-sensitive, and willing to wrap their mates in cotton wool.
Itâs an inevitable part of our year, which, thankfully, is short-lived but sees every male and femme whoâve turned go into horny overdrive.
Most mated couples donât leave the bedrooms for days on end. The unmated are fair game, resulting in rushed unions after itâs over.
Many markings, out of unwanted pupping, have been made in the past. Itâs craziness.
Iâm not looking forward to it coming at all, seeing as this will be my first year on this side of the fence, and I have no idea how it will feel, especially with a head and heart invested in a guy who intends to mark another.
Meanwhile, the villagers around the mountain refuse to budge, with only a few moving to the makeshift accommodation Juan has been building.
I know this is angering him, and itâs denting his ego that these people donât see him as the authority he thought they did.
After all these years of putzing around thinking his transition to ârulerâ was set in stone, and no one would dispute it.