Tough Love

Chapter 21

But I didn’t pull away yet.

I let my hand caress the side of his face, cupping his cheek. He put his hand over mine, as if wanting to freeze my hand right there, and closed his eyes.

“You look tired.” I murmured.

He laughed dryly and said, “You don’t even know.”

A few seconds of a comfortable silence passed. “I ran patrol for the night. We caught scents of the Circle. Were so close…”

“How far did you go?” I asked.

He smiled. “Do you want to know?”

“Holden.”

“We ran till New Hampshire and Maine.”

“You what?” I screeched, my hand slamming on the table with a thud. The waitress set down the coffee and a small apple pie for both of us.

Holden smiled and took my hand in his, kissing each of my fingers.

“It was duty, patrol. I run farther than that sometimes.”

“Holden, why are we here then? Look, you need sleep. We could’ve come some other time when you weren’t trying to deprive yourself of sleep to just see me. Come on,” I was already getting up.

“Emily, I’m not tired. Truly. And even if I do go home I have so much work to finish,”

“Holden…” I trailed off, biting my lip.

“I’ll be fine. Now I’m going to eat some pie,” He said nonchalantly, waving his hand as if sleep was the last thing on his mind. We both started eating, me still worried about Holden.

“Maybe I can help with the paperwork. I mean, aren’t I supposed to help you with it once I become the female Alpha?”

“Well, yeah, if you wanted to. But you need to finish high school and all this is too much.” He said sternly.

“I can’t just sit here though. I need to do something.”

“You can. You can by just being here with me and keeping me company,”

At the end, I finally convinced Holden to get some rest. We came to my house. We started finishing all our homework, me giving Holden all the answers so the homework could be done faster. All the Alpha stuff was enough mental exhaustion for Holden. We finished in a matter of time and I made sandwiches for us both. He ate slowly, only eating half. I noticed his loss of appetite, and being an Alpha werewolf, that was plain unusual. Mom was home early and saw both Holden and me doing homework. She smiled and winked at me and left us alone for the rest of the day.

Homework was finished in a matter of time. It was Friday and Holden had all of Saturday and Sunday to finish his Alpha paperwork and business. He was going too hard on himself.

Holden trudged up the stairs and I showed him my room. I plopped down on the bed and Holden dropped his bag on the floor and said, “Nice room.” He commented, looking at a family picture placed next to my bed.

I laughed. “Yours is better.”

He smiled and shook his head before lying next to me on the bed. He wrapped his hands around my waist and pulled me close to him until I was lying next to him.

“You know, my mom could pass by any minute.”

“Hey, all I’m doing is embracing you while were lying down. No harm in that,”

I laughed and moved even closer to Holden. His chest rose and fell in an even pattern, brushing against my own chest.

I lay there, embraced in Holden’s arms, my head settled on Holden’s shoulder, and soon, he fell asleep with his quiet snores filling the room. And I couldn’t help but think about everything that had happened in my life; Brandon and our breakup, Dom’s kiss, our friendship being mistaken into love… Me moving to this new city of Boston and falling blind. With being a mate to the Alpha of the strongest pack in North America, Holden’s rejection, but finally finding out he was trying to keep me safe. From getting bitten by a vampire and almost dying. And lastly, losing someone, again, who I thought was a person I could trust.