He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not

The Lone Wolf

Riley began playing with his lip piercing and quirked his eyebrows as he waited for my reply.

I raised both my arms up as if I was getting ready to fly. "I didn't feel like sticking around," I answered honestly.

"Why not?"

I shrugged. "I just didn't feel like it, ok? Now if you'll excuse me I have a tree to climb."

I turned back around to the tree. I heard Riley's faint chuckle. "Got locked out of your house again?" he asked.

"Maybe."

Riley shook his head. "Come to my house and stay the night, like you've done before. My parents are on patrol tonight but I don't think they'll mind."

I carefully weighed my options. I could say no and try to climb the tree to get inside the empty house where I would do nothing but cry myself to sleep. Or I could say yes and go to Riley's where I'm pretty sure it's warm and there are people there so I won't feel alone and helpless.

"Fine," I said.

Riley smiled then turned on his heels and led the way. I was following right behind him as if we were playing follow the leader. Of course as soon as we passed a few houses dogs caught our scent and began barking.

When I was little I always wanted a dog but I couldn't have one, I couldn't even have a cat. They would all hiss at me then take off running. There was some perks to being half wolf but then there were some major set backs.

It didn't take us long to get to his house and I wasn't surprised to see Sage step out of the living room holding a plate of cookies. I took one and bit into it. I wasn't really hungry but I didn't want to be rude.

"Thanks."

Sage smiled and glanced at Riley. A look passed between them. She set the plate down on the coffee table and headed for the stairs. We stood there in silence for a few minutes before I spoke up.

"I knew there was a catch to this so go ahead, Riley. Ask me what's wrong and what's really bothering me. No wait don't, you already know the answer. Rhiannon told you." I couldn't hide the coldness in my voice. Riley didn't say anything, I plopped down on the old green beat up couch.

"Why would I do that?" he asked looking sincere.

I rolled my eyes. Seriously why were boys trying to toy with me today? "Because you know that I was rejected."

Riley stood by the couch, his expression unchanged. He moved my feet, sat down and let them fall onto his lap.

"I'm not going to ask. If you want to tell me, you'll tell me. Just like I told Rhiannon, this is between you and that jerk."

"Tristan."

Riley grimaced at the mentioning of his name "Yeah, whatever. But I will ask you this. "

"What?"

"You want me to kick his ass for you?"

Riley's goofy grin made me laugh. I know he was joking but he was serious as well. If I said yes, I know he'd do it no matter what the consequences were, he was like my brother. The funny thing is I don't want him to beat up Tristan. I don't want anyone to beat him up because it's not the same as what he did to me. All that would do is physically harm him, I wanted to emotionally hurt him like the way he hurt me. The only person that could even do that would be me.

"No it's ok but thanks."

"You sure? Cause I'll do it."

I laughed. "I know you will but still the answer's no."

"Okay whatever you say." Riley got up from the couch. "The guest bedroom is all yours."

"I'm going to stay up for a little bit."

He didn't argue instead he walked to the staircase. Riley had barely gotten to the second step when I called out his name.

"Thanks."

"You're welcome," he said and went upstairs to Sage.

Sage was one of the youngest girls to find her mate. Usually you didn't find them until you were sixteen or older. Sage had barely just turned fifteen a few months ago. Even if your mate was seventeen and you were fifteen, you wouldn't know that they were your mate until you turned sixteen. Yeah I know it's confusing and seems very complex but that's how I found Tristan on my sweet 16th birthday and got dumped. Life is full of surprises.

Riley and Sage were good together but I always thought Rhiannon and Riley would end up together. I was wrong. I was also shocked when Rhiannon came over to my house crying about how her and Riley broke up. That night, Rhiannon cried to sleep and I cried with her. This was less than a year ago. Now here I was crying again over some stupid guy and my best friend wasn't here to cry with me.

My eyes started watering and I swallowed the lump in my throat. I can't cry here, not now, not yet. If Tristan was gonna play that game, I could play it to. Probably better than he can. Since all Tristan wanted to do was get girlfriends and sleep around I could do that too minus the sleeping around part. The greatest thing that's been discovered since chocolate is revenge.