You Are Not Rejecting Me novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Eleven Minutes

Seren rejects Cadell aloud in front of everyone and Idris asks Nia to say it; she can't, and when Seren drives away alone, Nia stays on the porch.

"I haven't said it," I said.

"I know you haven't," Idris said.

He still had his hand on the bag.

"Seren said it for herself, and then you said you were going with her. Those aren't the words, Nia."

"You don't know what I was going to say."

"Then say it to me."

I opened my mouth.

My wolf lifted her head and growled so low that I felt it in my teeth.

Nothing came out.

Idris watched me try, and he did not smile, and he did not look away.

"That's what I thought," he said.

A second engine came up the drive.

This one was a pickup, and it did not skid, but it parked sideways across the walk.

Cadell Garland went through the front door hard enough to make the glass in the hall mirror shake.

I got to the top of the stairs in time to see Seren come down with her suitcase and set it by the door.

She had put on her good leather jacket.

"Seren," Cadell said.

He was out of breath, and his work jacket was buttoned wrong.

"I was at the Antler for ten minutes. A friend from the feed store asked me to come look at a horse trailer. I didn't touch anyone."

"I know what I saw," Seren said.

"You saw a hand on my arm."

"I saw the whole town laughing at me."

Idris came down behind me and stood at the foot of the stairs with his arms folded.

He did not say a word, and he did not take his eyes off his brother.

Seren turned to face Cadell squarely.

"I reject you," she said. "I reject the bond between us. I reject you as my mate."

It was quiet in the hall.

Cadell's hand closed on the back of a chair, and the wood cracked under his fingers.

I have known him for two and a half years.

He is loud when he is angry and louder when he is happy, and I had never once heard him say nothing.

He said nothing for a long time.

Then he said, "Seren, I swear on my mother's grave."

"Don't," she said.

"I never touched her."

"It doesn't matter if you did or didn't," she said. "I'm done being the Luna who finds out from a group chat."

She said it clearly, so the people in the hall could all hear it.

She looked at me and held out her hand.

"Nia. Let's go."

I came down two steps.

I stopped.

Idris said, "Cadell, a word."

"Not now."

"Now," Idris said. "She's said it once. It isn't done until the moon, and you know that."

I knew it too.

Everyone in our pack learns it as a child.

A rejection counts only if the words are said twice.

The first time can be in anger, anywhere.

The second time is face to face, under the next full moon.

Until then the bond holds, and both wolves feel it.

The next full moon was fourteen nights away.

Seren knew that as well as anyone.

"Then I'll say it again in fourteen nights," she said. "Louder."

Cadell dropped into the chair he had just cracked.

He put both hands over his face.

I wanted to go to him, and I wanted to go to her, and my feet would not take me to either one.

Idris crossed the hall to me.

He spoke quietly enough that only I heard him.

"Here's what I'm asking, and it's all I'm asking," he said. "Stay in the guest wing until the moon. Nothing from me. I won't touch you, and I won't ask you for anything."

"And then?"

"Then you say whatever you want to say, in front of whoever you want, and I'll stand there and listen."

"Why would you agree to that?"

"Because you can't say the first half of it yet," he said. "Your wolf won't let you."

I hated that he was right.

I hated more that he did not sound smug about it.

"Fine," I said. "The guest wing. Until the moon. No touching."

"No touching," he said.

He held out his hand to shake on it, so I shook it.

His palm was warm and rough.

Heat went straight up my arm and settled low in my stomach, and I pulled my hand back much too fast.

He saw it, and he said nothing.

Seren was already out the front door.

I carried my suitcase down the steps after her, because I had never in my life failed to follow her.

Her car sat at the end of the walk with the engine running.

She had the passenger window down.

"Get in," she said.

"Seren, I need a minute."

"You need nothing. Get in."

I stood on the gravel with the bag in my hand.

"Get in, Nia," she said. "Or you're choosing him."

Behind me I heard the screen door close, and I heard Idris not follow.

My wolf lay down across my feet and would not move.

I stood perfectly still on the gravel for the first time in my life while my sister was already moving.

Seren looked at me for a long moment.

Then she rolled up the window and drove away alone.

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