Chapter 40

Over the next few days, Joseph sent so many flowers, they covered every flat surface of my room with the exception of a narrow pathway I’d made across the floor.

This morning, the housekeeper grumbled as she tried to clean around all the vases. Her dustpan was full of dried-up flower petals.

The nutritionist had brought me breakfast again. After we went over my meal planning for the day, I asked, “Have you talked to Asher lately?”

“Every day I see you,” she said.

I nervously hooked my fingers together. “How is he?”

“He seems distracted,” she said. “And a bit closed off. Usually he doesn’t mind my chitchat. Lately, he hasn’t given me much to work with in terms of conversation.”

She laughed it off, but my heart cracked straight down the middle.

During cheer practice, I focused single-mindedly on the routine, losing myself to the dance and the movement of my body.

I did so well that Coach complimented me during break. But I still felt hollow.

“Did you hear about the hockey team?” said one cheerleader to another as we did our cool-down stretches.

“Oh, yeah. The scandal, right?” said the other.

“What happened?” asked Nicole, from beside me.

“Turns out that new player was stealing all their plays and giving them to other teams. They found out and cut him from the roster.”

“From what I heard,” said someone else. “There’s talk about expelling him, too.”

I froze, confused. Hadn’t Asher said that Joseph was behind it all? Had he been wrong, or did he think they were working together?

I wished I had taken the time to hear him out more fully, instead of clamming up like I did.

Especially now, with the discovery that the traitor was someone on the team after all. Asher had been so adamant that he had to trust his team. What would happen to them now? Were they fractured, like Asher feared?

I had to talk to him. I had to make sure he was okay.

I had to –

Do nothing.

This time apart had been my idea. I couldn’t just go and contact him now. He’d demand an explanation, and I didn’t know if I could give him one.

I still wasn’t sure that everything he’d said about Joseph was true.

Torn with indecision, I fell off from the conversation. Eventually, Nicole noticed, when I didn’t answer her after the third attempt saying my name.

“You alright?” she asked when she finally had my attention.

I wasn’t. “No,” I said, surprising myself. I’d meant to lie.

“Maybe talking about it will help,” she said, offering me a kind smile.

I motioned her closer. I didn’t want to share with the rest of the group.

When she obliged, I gave her a super-abridged, very select version of events.

“So I was dating this guy for a while, but it turns out he was a playboy. So we broke up. But now he’s back and says he’s learned his lesson.”

She didn’t look convinced. “…Okay.”

“But there’s also Asher. Asher doesn’t like him at all, but my ex doesn’t trust Asher.” I sighed. “They both think the other is lying to me, and I don’t know which one to believe.”

Nicole nodded solemnly. She waited a moment, as if to see if there was more. “That’s it?”

“Isn’t that bad enough?”

“Not really,” Nicole said. “I’m waiting for you to tell me what the real problem is.”

I didn’t understand. She must have been able to tell from whatever look I had on my face.

Nicole stopped stretching to fully face me. “Cynthia. Really.”

I shrugged.

“Okay.” She held up both of her hands. She waved one. “On one side, you have this ex who has lied to you about anything and everything.”

Then she waved the other hand. “On this side, you have Asher who purposefully volunteered during training week just to spend time with you. Asher, who I presume, has never lied to you before?”

I nodded.

She waved both hands up and down. “One lies. One doesn’t. I wonder who you should be believe.” The last sentence dripped with saracasm.

“Oh.”

Oh. Had I really been so blind? Had I let my own insecurities about myself dig so far under my skin that I was willing to not trust Asher?

Asher, who had always protected and defended me. Who had just told me that he protected me because he wanted to, not because of Dylan.

Asher, who was able to regain control when his wolf went feral because of his closeness to me.

“It sounds so simple when you put it like that,” I said.

“Yeah.” Nicole lowered her hands.

But if I was going to trust Asher, that meant he hadn’t been lying about Joseph being the mastermind behind the hockey team’s sabotage. Which left the question, why?

Had it been solely because of his dislike of Asher?

Or was it something more sinister?

A chill struck through me.

Asher, my heart sang. I couldn’t wait to finish practice. I would run to his dorm and apologize.

I never should have asked for this time apart. It was torture, for no reason.

Finally, practice officially ended, and I rushed to the locker room to shower and change. I didn’t want to go talk to Asher all sweaty and gross.

When I finished showering, I returned to the lockers. Elena, arms crossed, was leaning against mine.

I tightened the towel around myself. I felt ill-equipped to deal with her without my clothes on.

“I haven’t seen you with Asher lately,” she said. “But rumor says that he’s rejecting any other woman who tries to get close.”

Now, I really wished I had my clothes on. I saw her track my blush down my neck to my exposed collarbone. I didn’t know how true that rumor was, but it made me so happy.

Was Asher really turning down other women?

Was it… because of me?

If I still believed Joseph’s words, I would have counted this as a point against me, as evidence that Asher’s duty to me was costing him his usual promiscuous lifestyle.

Instead, I believed Asher now, who said he wanted to protect me. Asher wouldn’t do anything he didn’t want to do, regardless of his promise to me.

“I never knew you to be selfish, Cynthia. But here you are, with a lock on Asher and you don’t even want him.”

I definitely wanted him, but I wasn’t going to tell her that.

Yet any sense of victory dried up as a vicious thought rooted into my mind.

Asher wanted to protect me, not date me. He’d already made that clear.

Even if we were speaking, I would have no claim over him. With everything that had been happening lately, bringing us closer, it had been so easy to forget the canyon that yet separated us.

As much as I wanted him, Asher wasn’t mine. And he never would be.

“Since for whatever the reason, you’ve decided you don’t want Asher,” Elena continued, voice like poison. “Why not back off and let someone else have a try?”

My body locked up. Is that something Asher would want?

No, he could still date if he wanted to.

Memories of my previous jealous actions flashed through my head. Shame pulsed through me.

Maybe I was standing in his way, after all.

“You care about Asher, don’t you?” Elena said to me. She tried for sympathy in her tone but it sounded unnatural.

I didn’t think I had to lie about that, so I nodded.

“Then let him date, Cynthia. Give Asher the chance to find love.”

Love?

Knees weak, I leaned against the lockers.

Was that what Asher would want?

Love, with someone else?