Page 56 of Sigma
She’s watching, too.
I back her inside. She looks annoyed, but she moves back to the stove. “Just gotta do eggs and toast. I’m calling Bailey, though.”
“Fine, I’ll just wither away while you get your gossip,” I make a sad attempt at a joke.
She smirks while she dials on her phone on speaker. It goes to voicemail.
“Shit,” she mutters and ends the call before she pushes the button on the toaster.
A few minutes later, we’re sitting at the table together with plates of food.
But while the flavors are just the same as the last time she made it, each bite lands like a rock in my gut.
I only get a few bites into me. I can’t do this. I’m sitting here seething. I should run. Shift and run. But I don’t think I can get far enough. So, for now, I’ll just have to lock down and shift.
“I need to shift,” I mutter, grabbing the contraption for my face and putting it into place while moving outside.
She follows.
“Do not fuckin’ follow me, woman, not when I tell you I need to shift and especially not without the weapons in your hands!” I get into the bunker but she’s still on my fucking heels.
“Stop!” I shout. “I need to lock myself down, and shift.”
She stops in the doorway.
“Are you upset about the stuff he said about your pack? About your father? Because I heard every word. You wanna talk?”
“Go back inside.”
“Jared…”
“Back off!”
“You can talk to me.”
“You cook for him?” I demand.
“Huh?”
“You make that same breakfast for him after he fucked you?”
She rears back, realization hitting her face.
And I’m trembling while fumbling the last strap onto my face as cold shocks my system.
I attempt to box-breathe, but it doesn’t halt the visions from coming. Images of him fucking her. Visions of her feeding him those perfectly crisped potatoes from her dainty fingers hits my brain and the cold shunts in.
Fuck!
Now I see Uncle Mike. With my sister cowering as he backhands her. A flash of Linc’s wolf nuzzling Cicely’s wolf’s face hits me next before it flashes to the sight of my mother’s bloody and mangled form lying on the floor by the wood stove.
“Jared, no… I…”
“Why can’t you fucking back off when I tell you to FUCKING BACK OFF?” I roar, lunging toward her.
And fear hits her face as she flinches at my body language and takes a step back.
My last thought before everything goes black is one of absolute self-loathing. I fucking hate everything I am.
