I let my shoulders fall and met her gaze. “You’re basically on fire.”
She smirked. “That’s what I thought. So, Ellie’s not sure about Abey, huh? That’s not good.”
I shrugged. “I don’t think it’s him she’s not sure about, it’s this fated stuff. You have to admit, it’s a pretty hard pill to swallow. Even if you did grow up knowing about it.”
It was Bea’s turn to look away, and I wondered at her reaction for a second before she met my eyes again. “Yeah. It is.”
I frowned at her response for a moment, but knowing Bea, if she wasn’t ready to talk about it, you wouldn’t get anything out of her.
“Did you know that children of fated mates are more likely to find their fated mates?”
Bea met my gaze then, something undefinable in her eyes. “Oh yeah?”
I shrugged, no happier about the information than she was. “That’s what I’ve read. I was thinking about asking Will what he knew, but–”
“NO.” I frowned at my sister as her cheeks bloomed with another blush. “I mean, no. Don’t ask him about that. You know what the legends say.”
I did, and I wasn’t, but what the heck was with her reaction?
Before I had the chance to ask any follow-up questions, Bea stood from the bed and walked toward my door, her shoulders stiff and her steps quick. “I just remembered there’s something I need to take care of. I’ll catch you later, Callie.”
Before I had the chance to say a word, she was gone. I watched the place she’d disappeared from carefully, wondering what the heck had gotten into my sister. She was always the steady one. The unflappable one. Nothing ever got to her, but it seemed this time something had. I just wondered what it was.
I turned back to my laptop and continued my research. Unfortunately, but not unexpectedly, there was very little real information about werewolves, but even so, my stomach sank with every line I read. I was so engrossed in my research and the mounting dread pooling in my belly that I didn’t notice the mountain of a man behind me until he tapped me on the shoulder.
I spun around quickly, my hand on my stuttering heart. “Abraham! Don’t scare me like that!”
My older brother smirked before plopping into the empty seat near my desk. “I called your name three times, Callista. S’not my fault you tune out when your brain gets goin’.”
I shot him another glare before turning back to my laptop. “What’s up, Abey?”
He leaned forward to peer at my computer screen, so I slapped it closed and turned to him with a closed-mouth smile. “Anything I can help you with?”
His narrowed eyes roved across my face and I had a bad feeling I wasn’t going to like what came out of his mouth next. “Why are you reading about fated mates?”
My stomach fell to the soles of my feet as my brain powered into overdrive. “Oh. Uh. That had nothing to do with you.”
He sat back in his seat and folded his massive arms across his chest, blue eyes still assessing me. “Everything in my pack has to do with me.”
I rolled my eyes, but he wasn’t done.
“And you’re my little sister, so it’s doubly my business.”
I scoffed. “By like an hour.”
He shrugged. “That still makes me the big brother. Which means I get to ask again, why are you reading about fated mates?”
Crap.
Crap. Crap. Crap.
I couldn’t tell him the truth. Not only would he be devastated, it would betray Ellie’s trust and make her super upset with me. It would also probably cause a fight between them, and I’d witnessed enough of those already to last me a lifetime. In fact, the last time they had a big fight, she got herself kidnapped. None of us were ready to make that mistake again.
But if I told him the information was for myself, he’d start sniffing around my business and that was the last place I wanted my brother to be.
I could tell Abey was getting impatient and about to start throwing his weight around, so I said the first thing I could think of. “I just wanted to know more about them.”
He didn’t blink. Didn’t move a muscle or even breathe for the longest moment of my life. Finally, he asked, “Why.”
I shrugged and clasped my fingers together in my lap so he wouldn’t see the way they shook. “I guess I was just thinking about Mom and Dad lately and I got curious. You know me,” I said with a nervous laugh.
He pressed his lips together and kept quiet for so long, I almost just spit out the truth. I was seconds away from opening my mouth and word vomiting when he finally spoke.
“What do you want to know?”
I let out a tiny sigh of relief before shrugging. “I don’t know,” I said slowly as I struggled to come up with an answer that didn’t give Ellie away. What she wanted to know was how a bitten wolf could be fated to be with a born wolf, but I couldn’t tell him that. She was the only bitten wolf any of us knew. If I mentioned it, he’d instantly know I was talking about her and that would just set off a whole series of events I wanted to avoid at all costs.
So, I said the first thing that came to me. “Like, how do you know?”
The corner of his lips tilted into a small smile as the suspicious look slid from his face only to be replaced by a wistful one. “You just know,
