25 | Trouble

"I'm sorry Luce."

"Sorry isn't going to fix this. Not this time." I snapped.

Silence filled the foyer of our home and I released a sigh, turning to look at my sister as hung up my coat on the rack.

"What were you thinking?"

We had driven home in silence. I had been too upset to speak. In the end, they had suspended Mary-Beth for three days and I suspected that the Vanderville's would press charges if they couldn't punish her in whatever way they saw fit. This was a shit storm.

She grimaced and dropped her face, fixating her gaze on her feet. She dug the toe of her sneaker into the floorboards. "I wasn't thinking. I was just – angry. I was so angry, and I wanted to hurt her." She squeezed her hands tight, knuckles turning white.

This was what I feared, deep down, that my sister was going to turn into some kind of monster. She might've had a bad attitude before her shift but I didn't have to worry about her snapping and killing someone. It was a drastic shift. It was very clear to me that I was in no way prepared to raise a teenager and I definitely wasn't prepared to raise a teenage werewolf. As if all the normal hormones weren't bad enough.

"That's a piss poor reason. Dad raised you better than that Mary-Beth. I—" couldn't handle this right now. "Just go wash up. We'll talk about this when you're done." I needed the time to collect myself and figure out how I was supposed to respond.

"Look, I didn't attack her for no reason. She was—"

"What did I just say?" I interrupted her. She held my gaze, jaw clenching. I could feel the anger radiating off of her. It sent a shiver of fear down my spine but I held my ground. I wasn't going to give in. I was going to hold her responsible for her actions – just because she was a werewolf now didn't mean she was free to do whatever she wanted, justifiable reasons or not.

She dropped her head and turned away. "This is bullshit." She stomped her way up the stairs.

"I agree. It's fucking bullshit." I yelled after her.

Her response was to slam the door when she reached her room. I flinched at the sound.

The silence that followed was interrupted by movement in the kitchen. I had forgotten that Cal had followed us back to the house, even after I'd told him that it was unnecessary. I narrowed my eyes and marched into the room to see him bent forward, looking around in my fridge, pulling out leftovers from the night before. He turned and cast a look at me over his shoulder – eyes trailing from my head to my toes.

He stood up to his full height as he closed the fridge. "You've never been one to not speak your mind. Out with it."

"I trusted you." I pointed a finger at him.

He cracked the lid on the container as he lifted it to his face and took a sniff. He made a face before dropping the leftovers back on the counter. "Okay. What's the problem?"

My eyes widened. "Are you seriously asking me that question? Look what happened. Let Mary-Beth go back to school. What could go wrong?" I mocked him, making my voice deeper. "Great idea, Cal."

He blinked, not looking amused but he didn't stop me. He only watched, arms crossed over his chest. I wanted a response from him. I wanted to get rid of my anger, stress, and fear. In my eyes, Cal was the perfect target for all of it, except he wasn't giving me anything to work with. Instead, he was only making me feel like a petulant child throwing a tantrum and he was the patient parent waiting for me to finish.

"My sister almost killed someone." I hissed.

He rolled his eyes. "An exaggeration—"

"Not just anyone, though." I interrupted whatever else he planned to say. "No, it had to be my boss's daughter."

"Yeah. Well, you threatened to rip her throat out, so..."

I paused in my pacing. I looked at Cal with wide eyes as that had only just occurred to me. My legs went weak and the urge to sit down overtook me. I wobbled my way to the kitchen table and plopped down in one of the chairs. I pressed my hand to my forehead, shaking my head.

"Why did I do that? Oh God, I am totally fired." This was going downhill fast. At this rate, I'd need someone waiting to put out the fire when I crashed and burned.

Cal approached the table, pulling out a chair and taking a seat next to me. "We'll get you another Job. Don't worry. Until then – I'll make sure you're taken care of."

I lifted my face to look at him. I didn't understand this man. He was constantly contradicting my perception of him. It was impossible to decide if I liked him or hated him, it was something I had to decide moment to moment.

"I'm your alpha, after all." That made more sense. It was an obligation of his position.

I eased back in my seat with a tired sigh. I could feel the beginning of a headache. "Speaking of that...was it the best idea to come out to Bradford like that?"

Cal looked away from me, jaw clenching.

"You let me worry about that."

I narrowed my eyes – that wasn't a good reaction to my question. "Look, I get that you're the alpha. I know I agreed to that, but I am going to need more information than what you've been giving me."

He turned back to me. "Why? Don't you trust me?"

I barked out a harsh laugh. "No."

Cal frowned at my response. I didn't know why he had expected me to trust him. Sure, he'd helped me and Mary-Beth out – promised to protect us but I didn't think he was doing it for our sakes. He wasn't the good Samaritan type. No, Cal had other reasons and I had a feeling those reasons were ambitious in nature.

"And why should I trust you when you don't trust me?"

"What do you mean?"

I leaned forward, tilting my head. "You never share anything with me. Any information I get from you is like pulling teeth. If you want someone to trust you, you're going to have to trust other people."

He held my gaze, searching my eyes. My heart began to beat a little faster. My unhealthy fascination with Cal making itself known. I wish there was a way for me to break his magic pull over me, but it only seemed to grow stronger. It didn't matter that I was undecided about my feelings for him – that they were fickle, changing from moment to moment. I had lost my mind the moment I'd laid my eyes on him. Maybe, it was purely carnal. Maybe, if we banged it out everything would go back to normal.

"You're right."

I blinked at this response. "I'm sorry?"

"I said you're right."

"That's what I thought you said – but that couldn't be...You would never say something like that to me."

He rolled his eyes. "Don't push it."

My lips pulled up in a smirk. The anger and stress, fading a bit. I liked that he had attempted I was right and I liked that I had gotten under his skin.

"So, how do these things normally go?"

Cal lifted a brow. "What things, exactly?"

"Two Alpha's in one town kind of things?"

He made a thoughtful sound as a crease formed between his brows. "It depends."

"On?" I pressed, making my eyes bigger. Hadn't we just come to a silent agreement that he was going to start trusting me with more information?

"How big the territory is." he got up from his chair. "In the cities, it's not odd to have two, sometimes three, alpha's operating in one place. It's necessary with all the wolves and space they have to govern and maintain. It would be too much for one."

Twin Peaks wasn't a city – as far as towns went it was on the small side. "And if the territory is small?"

Cal cast a quick look in my direction. He didn't want to talk about this. It was written all over his face, but he knew me well enough now to know I wasn't going to let it go. We were all in this together now, for better or worse. I had no plans to walk around in ignorance and find myself blindsided. I wanted to be prepared for whatever fate we were careening towards.

"There can only be one." He tipped his head back, gaze focused on the ceiling. "I'll be forced challenge him for the position."

"That doesn't sound so bad."

"We'll fight to the death." My heart shriveled up in my chest.

I swallowed, hard. "And if you lose—"

He turned his face toward me. The look in his eyes told me everything I needed to know. If he lost then I lost too, everything. Losing wasn't an option. We'd have to make sure that he won at all cost, even if it meant sinking low and crawling around in the dirt. I would sink as low as I needed – cheat, steal, lie...kill. If that meant I got Mary-Beth and me through this alive and in one piece.

"You don't need to worry, though. I have no intention of losing."

"Does anyone?" I questioned.

He ignored my question, which had been more rhetorical than anything else. "We've got time to plan...in case things go differently than we want." He held my gaze with a new intensity. "I won't let anything happen to you. You will survive all of this – I promise."

I nodded my head as his promise stole the breath from my lungs. For once, I really believed him.