Page 19 of Dream Girl
“Your entire theory about why we were both real, and how we could travel to each other in our dreams, was based on math. You were going to prove it so you could visit me in real life using the string cheese theorem. That’s how you were going to find me. But your mom didn’t like how focused you were on math. Hearing you tell me about what they were doing to you undid me. I tried to find you. I really did.” My voice broke, and my hands fisted as I wrapped my arms around Evan to keep myselffrom going to her. “So did Lexi. We tried so hard. One day you never came back to my dreams.”
It crushed me.
“I think it’s just string theory? But it’s just that, atheory. It wasn’t even a good theory; it was a hobby.” She grabbed my drink off the counter and drained it. “I mean, I think I do work with string theory, but…” She turned to Evan. “Why can I remember that and not how I ended up here? What is wrong with me?”
“Brains are weird,” Evan soothed.
“It was your life’s work, well, it was going to be. Don’t you remember?” I frowned, even more confused. It wasn’t somesilly thingto her.
“No.” She chewed on her lower lip and made herself small. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m in this predicament because I don’t know how I got here.” Her chest shook as her big, blue-grey eyes seared my soul. “But I remember you.”
Those words were bullets in my chest.
“I… I miss you.” She hugged herself again. “There’s a lot I don’t remember about you–and us. It makes sense now, why I always had this drive to pursue that research even though that wasn’t my actual field, so I could get to you. But it was all theoretical. So how did I physically travel here? How would I dream-travel? None of this makes any sense. Just like what I do and don’t remember. It’s nice to see you, but I’m so confused that it hurts.” Frowning, she muttered numbers and walked out of the room, like she did when she needed to puzzle things out.
“I’m so sorry. Um, I’ll make her go.” I pulled Evan tighter to me so I wouldn’t run after her. “Somehow, I’ll make this up to you.”
“Are you saying Grace dreamt of you, then traveled from a parallel world to get to you?” Evan’s eyebrows rose. “Parallel worlds, like something out of a movie?”
“Yeah. Her world’s kinda like ours, but doesn’t have designations. I know it sounds weird, existing in other worlds, but that’s all we could think of when we couldn’t find each other in real life,” I told him.
“No designations? Is everyone a beta?” Evan checked his phone again.
“Um, I guess? Wait, you believe all this?” I blinked. Sure, I had, once. But it had been over the course of the seven years I dreamed of her.
Evan shrugged. “While it could be disorientation from her concussion, the theories she’s talking about arereal, well, as real as any theory. Spencerwas obsessed with parallel worlds for a while when we were younger. That would explain why there’s no record of her–she’s not from here.”
The fact that Evan justacceptedthe possibility of her being from another world took me aback. But then again, he’d grown up with our packmate Spencer–and him talking about the possible existence of parallel worlds didn’t surprise me. That man was a mad genius.
“You’re not angry about her?” My brow furrowed.
Evan shrugged, sending reassurance through our bond. “Why would I be? Shedreamtof you across the universe. It’s quite romantic.”
“She’s exactly the type of person you feared would take us from you.” I took a swig directly from the bottle, even though Brennan would have a fit if he knew.
Part of me wanted to go to her. I wanted to fix it, like the alpha I was.
What I wanted was her.
Whatever we’d had was still there, and I felt the tug.
But I had Evan now.
Evan pressed his forehead to mine. “Babe, I’m a little more secure now. I’m pretty sure that she’s not going to steal you fromme. In fact, I’m downright drawn to her. I’m curious, does her pussy taste like peaches? It was so hard not to lick her when she was using me as a pillow. I didn’t know how she’d react.”
“What?” I kept rubbing my head. “It was a dream, yeah, but her pussy tasted like peaches, and when we fucked–” I stopped myself. “I’m so sorry.”
“Stop.” He wrapped his arms around me. “It’s okay to be attracted to her. You loved her, right? I’m actually surprised you didn’t pull her in your arms and kiss her–and that she didn’t do the same to you. That wasn’t how I’d expect a lovers’ reunion to go.”
Me neither.
“I bit her,” I blurted. I might as well lay it all out.
“During dream sex?” His eyebrows rose.
My horny teenage-self had lots of dream sex with Grace. Especially after I went full-blown alpha at seventeen and my knot came in.
“They used drugs to keep her from coming to me in her dreams, and because she was good at math. Which was always so weird. When they sent her to that awful place, I tried to bond with her so that I could track her and get her out. Theyshockedandbeather to get her to admit that I wasn’t real. Whodoes thatto their kid? I could feel her slipping away.” I looked at him, hoping that he understood.
