Chapter 180

Alaric’s POV

“Cara needs a specialist?” I asked, approaching Eamon and Landon at once.

Both of them turned to me in surprise. Clearly they had thought they were speaking in private. Had they not heard the elevator open?

“Oh. Alaric. It’s you,” Eamon said, recovering first. Landon continued to gape at me. “Was Cara not at the house?”

“No,” I said. “I suspected she might be here.”

“Likely she is, though we’ve all tried to convince her to go home,” Eamon said. “Perhaps you will have better luck.”

He was attempting to distract me from what I heard and my follow-up question. Though I allowed it until now, I wasn’t going to let it continue.

“There’s something going on,” I said. “What would Cara need a specialist for?”

Landon, finally recovering, offered smoothly, “What doesn’t a woman need a specialist for? She wants everything to be perfect, for you, of course.”

Landon might have been the smoothest of the brothers, but I wasn’t about to fall for such a blatant lie. What I did learn from this, however, was that neither Landon nor Eamon would tell me the truth about what was really happening. Like Colin and the twins, they were going to remain tight-lipped, likely until Cara herself revealed to me the truth.

Maybe I would never know.

Realizing I was wasting my time here with them then, I excused myself and proceeded down the hallway. I could feel them watching me, but I ignored it.

It wasn’t so long ago that I had last been here that I would have forgotten the way, so I followed the path I knew to Cara’s office.

Before I could get there, though, I ran into another one of Cara’s brothers. The one who hated me the most, Aidan.

Truly, I thought we had mended bridges over the past few months, as the twins and I had worked together to rescue Mia and save Cara. But, whatever was going on with Cara had burned down those bridges, at least between Aidan and me.

He glared at me like he wished his eyes could start fires.

“Aidan,” I said as a greeting. He crossed his arms, turned around, and walked the other way without a word to me.

Strange. But there wasn’t much I could do about it so I kept walking.

When I came closer to Cara’s office, I heard talking from within. I didn’t want to eavesdrop again, and thought of waiting somewhere else, but then I heard the voices.

She was speaking with Noel.

I still didn’t want to eavesdrop, but walking away didn’t feel so good either, so I gathered my courage and stepped into the office.

Cara and Noel stopped midsentence, both turning to look at me. Cara sat behind her desk with Noel sitting in one of the chairs in front of it. That distance pleased me. At least nothing physical seemed to be happening.

“Alaric,” Cara said. “You are early.”

“Am I?” I asked, checking my watch. I had taken the early flight so it was only 10am. As we hadn’t discussed what time I would be arriving, I knew I couldn’t be mad that she hadn’t been expecting me. Still, wouldn’t she have thought I’d want to come as early as possible to spend as much time as I could with her and the kids?

No matter, I supposed. I was here now.

“I’m sorry, Noel,” she said. “Raincheck for brunch?”

“Of course,” Noel said, standing. “I will call you later.” As he turned away, he greeted me. “Alaric.”

“Noel,” I said, as cordially as I could, while my jealousy raged.

They had made plans for brunch, on the same day that I was set to arrive to visit?

More and more, I was beginning to feel like an outsider here. Maybe my presence was truly unwelcome, as Cara seemingly hadn’t been looking forward to it at all. Yes, she sent Noel away to make time for us, which I appreciated, but that it was even necessary stung more than it probably should have.

I wanted to be here for Cara. She had asked me to come with her to BloodyMoon, and I thought that meant something. Yet already, our first weekend visit, I was feeling that chasm between us open farther and father.

We were out of sync. And I only had two days to try to bring us back into alignment again. If that was even what she wanted, which was hard for me to discern right now.

This secret, whatever it was, wasn’t good for us. But I couldn’t force her to tell me.

Still, Cara must have been able to see something in my face. My disappointment, perhaps. Or maybe she simply felt the strain in her own chest, her own heart.

I didn’t feel welcomed here, and I didn’t know how to change that. Was it even up to me to change?

As I debated within myself, Cara stood up.

Cara’s POV

I had plenty of reasons for not wanting to tell Alaric the truth about my diagnosis, but those reasons, when measured against the guarded pain on his face, did not seem good enough to keep quiet anymore.

I still worried about things. I didn’t want Alaric to give up his pack for me, so I would have to make clear that physically, the distance between us would remain regardless of my condition. He had to keep doing these commutes.

But emotionally, I desperately wanted to close the gap. I felt like I was losing him. Maybe I was. But I wasn’t going to stand idly by and let it happen.

Yes, I probably should have realized that Alaric would take the first flight out to see me. I probably should have prepared a full day of fun and things for us to do.

I’d been so preoccupied. As much as I tried to fight my illness, I was still tired. Sometimes it was difficult to keep everything straight in my mind.

I was even making a lot of mistakes at work, though my brothers and the others had been very courteous in covering for me. I still felt at a loss. I felt like I was losing myself.

I didn’t want to lose Alaric too.

I wanted things to be normal with him, but in trying to maintain that normalcy, I was only pushing him away. There was only one solution.

“Alaric,” I said and ushered him further into the office, closing the door behind him. I gestured for him to sit in one of the chairs. He did, but with a raised brow. As he sat, I moved to the partner chair, both in front of my desk.

He looked at me with a strange sort of anticipation and also worry. “Cara,” he said. “Just what is going on? I know something’s wrong. I know something happened at the hospital. But no one is telling me anything. They keep saying you have to be the one to tell me.”

He sighed. “I won’t push for answers, but I hate being left in the dark.”

Reaching out, I placed my hand on his knee. “I’ll tell you,” I said, “But you have to make a few promises to me first.”