You are the Answer {boyxboy} ✓ (Dogs, Bats & Monkeys series, Book I | Riley)

Chapter 24

"I'll call you a cab. With a human driver, to take you home. We won't stop you. And you never have to see me again."

He was leaving me... He was letting me go... He was leaving me...

Those two notions were running on repeat in my mind, making me dizzy and nauseous.

"Wait."

It was just a whisper, but Rhys heard it. His body tensed, arm falling stiffly to his side as he slowly turned around. He finally dared to look at me, his head tilting down a little as if he wanted to make himself smaller. He took a hesitant step and I reached in front of me, my palm facing him.

"Wait," I repeated. "Don't go, but stay over there."

Rhys nodded and pulled his lips between his teeth. My arm dropped and I hugged my knees again.

What was I doing?

Apart from shaking. I was consciously shaking back to front, but my body was also unwillingly shaking, trembling... Trembling so much that I wasn't sure it would ever cease.

I closed my eyes and let go of my knees to rub my forehead. A skull-splitting headache had erupted there to add to the pleasant effect of shallow breathing and the desire to vomit.

What was I going to do?

Rhys wasn't human... But he was still Rhys.

But all that fur, the claws... That was unnatural... It was wrong... But it was Rhys.

I loved him. I wasn't sure about that before, but I knew it now; why else would I consider staying with him?

Why else would the fear of him harming me make way to the panic that this could be the last time I saw him?

But could I be with him?

It would be so abnormal; he wasn't even human for crying out loud!

I sniffed and rubbed my nose. My eyes opened and landed on him.

"What now?" My tone was still low. "What are my options?"

"You can leave," his voice was louder and raspy, "or you could accept me and things would go to the way they were. There would be some little changes..."

"Little?" My laugh came out as a cry. "Little. You are a... something."

"Shifter." He spoke quieter now. "A werewolf some call it. But we are compatible with humans. A lot of shifters mate humans."

"Mate." I sighed and leaned my head on the wall.

Mate.

So that was why they spoke in such a strange manner, with so many riddles. That was why they would begin a sentence or a word and then change it. They had a whole terminology of their own; of course they wouldn't share it with a human like me.

Things were starting to make sense now. Things like why they distrusted outsiders, why the outsiders feared them... Things like why they always had that animal presence about them, even when at ease.

"Are there any humans in the Silver Bullets then?"

"No. We are a relatively new pack. You will be the first, if you agree to stay with me."

I looked at him again.

"Am I expected to move in with you?"

"You are not expected to do anything, Riley. I only want for you to be happy..." His voice cracked and he covered his mouth with his hand. He removed it and wiped his cheeks - wet with tears - before he went on: