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It wasn’t perfect. But at least Cyrus would be able to plead his case.
THIRTEEN
MILA
The bland eggshell walls of the hotel room laughed at Mila. Their cruel perfection mocked the chaos inside her. Anger, hurt, confusion, and sadness competed to see who would infect her first. She looked around the room, her distaste growing with the sinking pit in her stomach. Her mind was like quicksand, and she was being swallowed whole.
She had never seen Cyrus so mad. His hazel eyes were dark and angry. She could have sworn he was more animal than human for a second. And maybe he was. She didn’t know him, not really. The weight of that irrevocable truth hung around her like a noose.
What did she think she was doing? She was staying with a complete stranger, thinking about a life with him,wantingto love him and for him to love her in return. It was stupid, sofuckingstupid, but for a second, she really believed this was going to besomethingmore.
Turns out it wasn’t.
How could he tell her he wanted to give her the world yet not be willing to share his secrets? If attraction and possession were all there was to a mate bond, then it wasn’t something she wanted. He wouldn’t even listen to her. He just yelled and shut her out. And there was nothing she could do about it.
For the first time since she met Cyrus, they were on opposite sides. She wanted to give in to her anger and never look back. That’s why she left. Because she couldn’t stand to be around him. She needed to think clearly, and she couldn’t do that with him so close. Her heart didn’t agree with her, though. Even now, some part of her felt guilty for walking out and abandoning him.
Because if she was honest with herself, there was more than anger there. The anger was just an easier, louder demon to deal with. But it was what lurked underneath that caught her breath. It was the pain, the scars that built the wall he had put up in those moments. That was what hurt. He took himself away from her and built barriers. And she ran.
She slumped on the edge of the bed.What now?
Mila’s mind went to the documents she had found. He was searching for someone or something. She didn’t have time to look at anything closely, so she couldn’t be sure. But she wasn’t an idiot. Whatever he was doing had to do with that.
His reaction only confirmed her suspicions. Whatever secret he was hiding had to do with the family he never wanted to talk about. And she wanted to know why. What was Cyrus hiding?
What would he not want her to know?
Shifter or not, all guys were the same, it seemed.
She bit her bottom lip. Sighing out loud, she knew she was going to give in. After the day she had, she wouldn’t be going to sleep unless she found out what could make Cyrus lose his shit the way he did. He was protecting something. She was sure of it. The question was,what?
She rushed to her bag, pulled out her laptop, and sat by the window. Looking out across the open sky, she couldn’t help but think about just how dramatically her life had changed, how dramatically she had changed.
Just yesterday, she was wondering what could have been more important to Cyrus than spending time with her. The day before that, she was sure she could fall for a man like him, and now she was sitting alone in a hotel. Running from him, angry, confused, and, most of all, wishing she had stayed.
He could be an asshole; she wasn’t going to cut him slack for that. But a small part of her could understand. It was a sensitive topic, something he obviously didn’t like sharing. Guilt crawled through her mind as she remembered going into his office without permission. So maybe he did have a reason to be angry. Plus, she had seen his eyes. They held more than fury. This hurt him.
Mila fired up her search engine and punched Cyrus’s and his parents’ names into the search bar. Google was a good place to start. She wasn’t the most tech-savvy person in the world, but she was a naturalfinder.Her brothers used to call her the family bloodhound. She found everything: keys, misplaced wallets, lost dogs, you name it. It was her inquisitive nature that made her so good at cataloging her surroundings and picking up on details others may have missed.
She found new articles, devouring each story and checking for consistency in the facts each presented. It looked like they died during a plane crash on the way to a travel expedition. The articles weren’t too clear on what the couple was going to do, and a lot of the so-calleddetailswere just flowery tragic words with no real meaning behind them.
The stories were clean, almost too clean. It didn’t give her the slightest clue as to why Cyrus would act the way he did. No matter how tragic the subject is, you don’t get that worked up about something you have the answers to.
Mila broadened her search results, looking for information on Cyrus’s parents. The results looked normal, a few gossip sites for followers of elite society, some scandal rumors, and then facts. All and all, regular.
From the looks of it, Cyrus’s parents were well-known and just as financially secure as their son. Something caught her attention when she was about to click out of another dead-end gossip site. There was a comment underneath the article, an unidentified user with only one thing to say:Follow for the truth.
Below the message was a link to a group of Reddit threads. The moment Mila saw it, a tingling sensation traveled down her spine. She clicked the link and was taken through several threads, each one anonymous yet seeming to have access to information that was not openly published. Apparently, the bodies were never found.
What was once a linear tale began to dip and curve. It was like looking at a pixelated image. The gist of the story was clear, while the details remained vague and unfocused. Cyrus’s parents were on a flight to the Arctic at the time. The thread proved to have more value than she could’ve imagined. One person pointed out that there were no tourist destinations in that part of the world. After a quick cross-reference, she discovered they were right.
Why would his parents be going to the Arctic? The travel group was obviously a lie. There was nothing out there but miles of snow and ice. She doubted anyone would travel there unless they were going somewhere specific. Which meant they had plans, but then the plane crashed. Something slipped into her consciousness, like the spark of a match.How did it crash again?She started to reread the threads and news reports, searching for anything she might have missed.
After another hour of reading, she gave up. All she found were vague descriptions of a plane crash that could have been any plane crash in history or an engine failure. Nothing believable or concrete. A weight bore down on her chest. Howdidthe plane crash? And wherewerethey going? Was this what Cyrus was trying to find out?
Her mind spun, shooting through the web of unanswered questions. She thought of her own family, of how she would feel if they died, and she had no answers. She could see the pain clearly now as she looked back on that moment in the office for the millionth time. Her memory showing her what she should have seen. The wound that lay bleeding behind his eyes.
Her heart lurched, split between her compassion and her pride. Fury spilled through her veins. No matter what she felt for him, Cyrus was the one who drew the lines. He pulled her in, coaxing her with honeyed promises and assuring her she could be herself, and all the while, he was hiding who he really was. And it didn’t look like he planned to tell her the truth.
