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“You wanted us to break up in person,” I say. “I guess this is it.”
“I didn’t want us to break up at all.” He shoves a hand through his highlighted blond hair. “I don’t understand what’s happened to you.”
“I’m sorry, Luke. I’m just in a weird–”
“I don’t even know who you are right now,” he interrupts. “You’re wearing the same dress you wore to last year’s Homecoming. You took me to a dance at a fucking brewery. You didn’t even get your hair and makeup done professionally. What has happened to you?”
I blink. Those are his takeaways? Not that we’ve grown apart. Not that I seem lifeless and flat. Not that I’ve been a terrible girlfriend–which I have–but that I didn’t buy a new dress and go to a salon to prepare for the dance?
“Sorry I didn’t go all out for our break-up date,” I spit with sarcasm and start marching away.
“Where in the hell are you going?” He catches my arm, yanking me back.
I stumble in my Jimmy Choo heels, falling into Luke with my hands out, ready to push him away.
As it turns out, it’s not necessary.
A strong arm loops around my waist, and I’m lifted from the ground. “Let go of her.”
Abe
It takes everything I have in me not to shift and sink my teeth into this asshole’s flesh.
Instead of releasing Lauren, the guy tightens his grip. “Ow.” She tries to yank her arm away.
The sound of her distress sends my wolf into a frenzy. I don’t quite manage to stop the unearthly growl in my throat. When I speak, my voice is deadly. “Don’t make me kill you, bro.”
Lauren’s now ex-boyfriend must hear the murder in my voice because he lets go.
I pivot her body away, putting my bulk between her and the threat.
“Whoa, okay,” Lincoln calls out, jogging toward us. “Looks like it’s time to leave the party.”
“Who the fuck is this?” The guy demands, looking down his nose as he gives me an up and down sweep. Rich boy looks like he spends his days calling to the butler to pat his ass.
I’m her fucking mate. My wolf thrashes below the surface, furious that he can’t stake a claim on her right here, right now. Furious some other guy is here questioning my right to protect her. I don’t touch him–roughing up humans is forbidden–but I shove my chest right into his personal space, getting so close I make him look up into my nostrils.
“Nobody.” Lauren tries to insert herself between us.
I shoot an arm out to tuck her safely behind me.
“Leave it, Oakley.” Lincoln packs more authority in his tone than I would have thought possible for a human. My body doesn’t respond like it would to an actual alpha command, but he wins a grudging respect from me. Especially considering I have at least seventy-five pounds on his tall but lanky form. “My sister doesn’t need you to play bodyguard.”
Lauren’s fingers wrap around my biceps, giving me that sweet hit of candy apple and cinnamon. “I don’t.”
I don’t move. I’m an alpha. There’s no fucking way I’ll back down to a human, especially not a human pretending he has some claim on Lauren.
“Get in the car, Luke,” Lincoln pushes his way between the two of us and gives his friend a shove toward the front of the car. He opens the driver’s side door and climbs in.
Pretty boy–Luke, I guess his name is–walks backward, glaring my way. When he tries to see past me to look at Lauren, I shift to block her from his view.
“Lauren, this is fucked up,” he shoots across the car as he throws open the passenger side door.
“I…I don’t know why you came.” The heaviness–the emptiness–in Lauren’s voice drops my aggression level. A vision of her standing on that cliff with one foot over the edge flashes in my mind.
I turn to face her. She releases her grip on my arm and blinks up at me.
I haven’t seen this look on her before. It’s almost like…she needs something from me. No, that’s not it. Because she doesn’t appear to know what she wants. It’s more like she’s lost but hopes I might have something she needs, whatever it is.
