Whispers of Winter

16

Jo

I avoided Heath until they left for Idaho. Granted, I avoided everyone, spending most of my time hiding in Beck's slow-growing garden, but I avoided Heath the most. He also seemed to be avoiding me, but I got the feeling he was only keeping his distance because I was. I caught him watching me often, when he thought I wasn't looking, and he was never more than a room away.

I felt guilty, avoiding him, but every time I let myself look at him or exist in the same space as him without some sort of barrier between us, my body rang with the memory of him tugging me into his chest and wrapping his arms around me. His hand cupping the back of my head, gentle and protective. The rapid pounding of his heartbeat against my ear.

His reaction had surprised me, sure, but what scared me and had me avoiding him like the plague was my reaction to it. When he'd grabbed me and tugged me into his chest, I'd forgotten everything I'd been thinking about. My mind went blank, my body went warm, and the only thing I could think about or feel was his body against mine and the warmth he sent sinking into my bones. For a frightening, horrifying moment, I'd almost instinctively leaned into him, like I was meant to.

Worse, I still wanted to.

So, I avoided him. The rest of the pack must have sensed it, or Heath had told them, because everybody else had taken to giving me a wide berth of space. Cara didn't tug me outside to workout with her, Alex didn't drag me to the couch to help her with various projects, and even Grant didn't pester me to join him and pick the music in his woodshop.

They all spent most of their time preparing for whatever this meeting entailed. I didn't pretend to understand, or attempt to; learning more about it would mean accepting the fact that I'd started to care about all of them, and I wasn't ready to admit it, to them or to myself.

I noticed what they did, though. Alex, Beck, and Grant were gone often, running the perimeter or setting traps, I didn't know. Cara spent most of her time calming Max, who, in turn, was almost always playing Heath's shadow and watching him like he was bomb about to erupt. I couldn't exactly blame him; even I could feel the tension radiating from Heath as the meeting crept closer and closer.

The night before they left, I gave up on sleeping before I even tried. I disappeared into Alex's room exactly long enough for everyone to leave the living room, then grabbed a blanket from the couch and dragged a deck chair out to the open yard near Beck's garden.

The garden was on the side of the house, visible from the windows framing the fireplace. It stopped five feet from the tree line, spreading over the entire area. How he managed to grow most of the plants in the limited sunlight was beyond me, but I was happy he could. A small planter box was nestled closer to the house, filled with herbs, and the scent of cilantro wafted from it when you got close enough. He grew mint in the kitchen, in a small box by the window. I, admittedly, had taken to pulling off leaves and chewing on them, blaming Grant when Beck noticed the patchy growth.

The forest was quiet around me. It wasn't warm enough for the swarm of bugs to emerge from hiding, but a few brave ones were out, filling the air with gentle buzzing. I curled the blanket around me, kicking my ankles up onto the chair and tucking my feet under the blanket.

The sky here was beautiful at night; untouched by light pollution and filled with color. Familiar and unknown constellations glittered down at me. One night before the pack shifted, when the snow had finally stopped, I'd snuck out of the cabin and brushed a patch of snow off a chair to sit and gaze at them. I'd thought I was alone, stealing a moment from the world to breathe. I hadn't been, just like I wasn't alone now.