And that was the moment my denial melted away and I hit the next stage of grief.
Anger.
It started in my chest, flaring to life, growing in size until that wasn’t enough space to contain it. Then it spread through my limbs, igniting the blood in my veins and reaching into every nook and cranny of my body.
Without realizing what I was doing, I started stomping down the hallway toward him, my vision going red and my body vibrating with rage.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I hissed.
He kept his eyes on his phone as he shrugged. “Alpha called.”
I watched him for a moment longer, waiting for something else. Anything else, but that was all he had to say. And all it did was feed the fire.
“You need to leave.”
He shook his head. “You can take that up with Abraham.”
I stomped my foot and growled softly in the back of my throat. “This is my fricken business and I get to say who comes and who goes, and I say you need to go.”
He ignored me. Again.
Flat out ignored me.
Not a shrug. Not a head shake. Not even a blink of his eyes that still wouldn’t meet mine.
It only fanned the flames.
I opened my mouth to say I don’t even know what when the door to Ellie’s office creaked ajar. I barely spared a glance for her and my brother before focusing on Wyatt again.
“What’s going on?” Ellie asked.
I turned to her, noticing the way her eyes widened before looking at my brother. “What the hell is he doing here?”
Abraham’s brows dipped in confusion. “He’s here to watch over El.”
I fisted my hands tighter. “Why wasn’t I informed of this?”
Abraham’s frown deepened. “I didn’t know I needed to run it by you.”
“This is my office, and everything needs to be run by me.”
Abraham held up both hands. “Okay, Callie. I assigned Wyatt to guard El until we figure out what’s going on.”
I stood up straighter and leveled him with a glare. “Assign someone else.”
“Excuse me?”
I took a shaky step forward, my control slipping. “I said assign someone else. I don’t want him here.”
“Callie, you’re being ridiculous.”
“I am not,” I growled. “This is my company, and I get to say who comes in here and I say he can’t. I want him out of here right now.”
My brother’s eyes were still wide as he tried to reason with me, but I couldn’t be reasoned with at that moment. “Callie, El needs a guard.”
“Then assign someone else.”
“There is no one else.”
I crossed my arms over my chest so they wouldn’t reach out and wrap around my brother’s neck. “You’re telling me out of all your enforcers, he’s the only one who can do this job?”
Abraham shrugged. “He’s the only one I trust with her safety. This is for El, Callie.”
My chest heaved as I stood there, clearly outnumbered. The tiny little part of my brain that was still rational realized this was important. That Ellie needed protection. But the rest of me was white-hot with rage and didn’t care about anything but the fury brewing inside me.
“I’ll stay out of your way,” Wyatt finally spoke up.
We all turned to him, but he was looking at me, his gaze somewhere around my chin.
“Not good enough,” I said.
He pushed off the wall and stood to his full, impressive height. “There’s someone out there that’s willing to snap a cat’s neck and nail them to your door, and it seems like their sights are set on Elizabeth. You’re going to let whatever’s between us get in the way of protecting her?”
Him being reasonable only made me angrier. Who did he think he was, making sense and talking calmly and being the mature one in this situation? It was absolutely unacceptable.
I stood there, my whole body heating with the flames of my rage as everyone held their breath in anticipation of my reaction. My hands shook with the need to shift and get this pent-up energy out of my system, but that wasn’t an option.
I was an adult.
I was a professional.
I was a scientist.
I would not let Wyatt get to me.
Nope. Not today.
A sinister growl crawled its way out of my throat before I threw my hands in the air and pinned Wyatt with the most menacing glare I could muster. “Fine. But I don’t want to see you. You stay in this office and the hell away from me.”
Before I completely lost my mind, I spun around and stormed back to my office, the coffee completely forgotten. I slammed my door behind me for good measure and winced as the newly constructed wall trembled with the force.
I paced back and forth across my office floor as I worked to get myself under control. This wasn’t like me, and I hated that Wyatt could bring this side out. I hated that I had a side like this. I prided myself on my cool, calm intellect, but it was failing me at that moment.
Because about twenty feet away was a man who’d walked out on me again. And instead of being able to come to work and leave him and all that nonsense on pack lands every day, he’d followed me here too.
That small, rational part of my brain piped up again to remind me that he hadn’t just walked away–I’d pushed him away. And he wasn’t there to make my life miserable, he was there to watch over Ellie.
But I wasn’t in the mood to listen to reason.
***
The next couple of days did
