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Kade leans in. Her breath is so warm and enticing, all he can think about is eliminating the last bit of distance and kissing her.
Elara’s eyes are on his, then on his mouth. Her fingers fist around his shirt and she stops pushing him away and almost imperceptibly pulls him even closer. There’s heat in her gaze, heat that he can’t ignore, heat that he feels low in his groin with the breathtakingly close proximity.
“Why do you care?” she whispers as she asks the question again. Her breath dances over his lips and makes him shiver slightly.
Kade closes his eyes and takes a deep steadying breath before pulling away and breaking the connection between their bodies. He tries to ignore the way she sways from the loss of his support, or the brief flash of pain in her eyes when her fingers brush her lips that he left unkissed.
“Kade?” she calls out.
He turns his back to her, running his hands through his hair and growling quietly.
“Kade!” she demands.
He turns ever so slightly, looking over his tense shoulders at her. “Just remember what I said, Elara. Denzel and his…people? They’re not to be trusted.”
“And you are?” Elara snaps back.
Kade grins at her wolfishly and starts backing away with a shrug.
“The devil you know is sometimes safer than the devil you don’t,” he says.
“I don’t know you either,Kade!”Elara says in a huff, pushing off the tree and walking back home.
19
Elara
Elara flips her hair over her shoulder as she walks through campus, enjoying the warmth of the sun on her skin. It’s been two weeks since she started training with Denzel, and things have settled down.
And all it took was focus and control
Those are the two words Denzel repeated throughout their training. It’s when your mind or emotions go haywire that unpredictable things happen. There’s been no more color-changing curtains or exploding glass.
The hours spent using her senses in ways she didn’t know were possible, in finding her center, and in perfecting a strike have all paid off. Her body is sore, but her mind is becoming more and more honed. She no longer has that strange urge to growl and can control some of her more animalistic urges. And then there’s discovering the magic that lives in her veins.
Elara’s not sure whether it’s harder to come to terms with being a werewolf or being a witch. Both are fantastical. Unbelievable.
But now her truth.
And over the past two weeks, she’s slowly adjusted to that.
Enough that she’s agreed to go to the waterfall with Jordyn and Kira. They’d been hesitant when they’d suggested it, and Elara can’t blame them. She’s not sure what they thought about her strange few days when she hadn't been certain of anything in the world. And things aren’t…okay yet.
There’s Laith, for one.
Although Kira has been spending time with him and hasn’t noticed anything unusual. That knowledge removes a little more weight from Elara’s chest. Maybe it was just a wolf attack. A terrible coincidence.
And no Kade.
Elara instinctively checks over her shoulder, seeing nothing but busy students and familiar buildings. A part of her almost misses him. He was a safety-net of sorts, someone who always turned up when things fell apart.
She straightens her shoulders and flicks her hair again. Her emotions have been a maelstrom for the past couple of weeks. That’s why she thought that way. And that’s why everything kept going wrong. She’s learned how to get that under control now.
She doesn’t need Kade and his creepy stalker tendencies.
Elara’s just about to turn the corner to the cafe where she’s meeting Jordyn and Kira when she hears her name being mentioned. She stills, recognizing Kira’s voice. And the concern in it.
“Yeah, she was acting a bit…off there for a couple of weeks,” says Jordyn quietly.
