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She does her job with grace and courtesy, despite the fact that she should be their advisor, not their waitress. Her smile tightens at something Apollo says, something I don’t see because I’m not looking at his lips. I can only tell it was him because of the smirk he wears when I look back at them.
Alina doesn’t respond. She simply takes the water from me and puts it down in the middle of the table. She sets their glasses down next, her face stony. She doesn’t pour the water for them.
She doesn’t put the glasses in front of each of them.
She just picks up the empty food tray and leads me back to the kitchen, past the table full of grown-up mean girls, and she doesn’t mention what he said, not even in ASL.
Whatever it was, it made her mad.
I’m not bold enough to ask. I know it was probably something about me.
I make up the orders with Emily while the others waitress.
Usually, we take turns with everything, but it feels like Alina wants me to avoid the dining room until the Alpha’s sons and their groupies have gone.
I don’t complain about that.
My guardian shouldn’t still need to protect me, but after watching that awful woman from the nursery walk Adam back into that building, I’m feeling a little raw.
Alina’s always taught me to see the good in things, but sometimes there’s just too much bad to push past to get to the good stuff.
Dark thoughts from my younger years start to flood my thoughts.
Those girls don’t think I should be here.
Maybe that’s because I shouldn’t be.
I try to shrug those thoughts off.
Alina saved me for a reason.
She knew it was wrong to leave a defenceless toddler to a terrible fate.
These people are following old traditions that don’t make sense.
They never question why. They never oppose their Alpha’s wishes.
I’ve been taught to believe they were wrong, but what if they’re right?
What if I’m the reason a monster has set foot in Nightshade?
I picture that footprint in my mind, and I know I should have told Alina about it. I should have asked her to go to the Alpha because there’s no way that man would ever listen to me.
I’m afraid of what it means, but I can’t keep it to myself any longer.
That monster came out here once, he could come again.
I don’t want to be the reason someone gets hurt.
Goddess, I can’t believe I’m going to do this.
When our shift is over, and the last of the tables have been cleaned, I tell Alina to wait.
The others leave, switching off the dining room lights, but leaving the kitchen ones for us.
Alina watches me expectantly. Her patient expression makes me want to cry.
She’s always been there for me, always fought in my corner.
