Chapter 27: The Wall Between Them

Caleb gave her a look that made her squirm inside. She bit her lip, finally tearing her eyes away for a brief second. However, they still found their way to him.

“You first,” she replied, “what do you remember?”

Caleb sighed and shrugged his shoulders.

“Honestly, not much,” he began, “I remember giving the speech, I know I felt your presence more than ever before. I fought to keep it under control, but it felt like I was losing. I was afraid of what would happen, so Galen helped me lock myself up. The next thing I remember is waking up to coffee this morning.”

‘He doesn’t remember me at all…’ she thought to herself sadly.

“Nothing else? You don’t remember when I came into the room? Or anything else?” she asked, doing her best to keep calm.

“No,” he replied honestly, “I know you were there because Galen told me you were.”

‘How can he not remember anything?’ she wondered, ‘wait, this is good! If he doesn’t remember, I don’t have to tell him everything.’

“So, can you fill in the blanks?” he asked, his tone playful and sweet.

He was being so friendly to her; she couldn’t help the smile that played on her lips. Even in this awkward moment, it felt strangely comfortable between them. More than it had ever been with Granger.

Ashleigh swallowed down her guilt and focused on staying calm as she spoke.

“As you said, the mate bond, the pull was crazy yesterday. There was um, a scent in the air… I just... I followed it. It led to that room, and I went in. I helped you down, and um, that was it,” she said, nodding her head.

“That was it?” he asked, unconvinced. He raised an eyebrow at her and kept her gaze until she turned away.

Her shyness made him smile to himself.

“I know that I was far gone,” he began, “and Galen mentioned that you also looked rough. So, I’m sorry but I think maybe you left something out?”

‘Thanks, Galen,’ she growled internally, ‘the best way to hide the truth, is within the truth.’

“Ok, yea, I was feeling a lot. My skin was on fire, I couldn’t breathe. So, when I reached the door… I knew what was happening. I knew you were on the other side and that we were both feeling the bond.”

“And you came in anyway?” he asked.

Caleb’s tone held something in it she didn’t recognize. Like he was asking two questions at once. She hesitated to respond.

“Yes.”

“Why? Ashleigh, why did you come to me, when you knew we were both out of our minds with desire?” he asked quickly.

His impatience was getting the better of him, he wanted to know her answer, he wanted to know if what he thought she wanted was real or not.

Ashleigh suddenly remembered the morning of her birthday party, in the woods. The way he had asked why she had invited him. Her heart began to race, she felt the panic set in.

“Bell,” she said quickly.

“Bell?” he asked, confused.

“Yes, my friend Bell. I remembered something she said. She told me that the mate bond was overwhelming, that it left you feeling suffocated, and like

you were on fire,” she replied, licking her lips as her mouth dried from the nerves.

‘Suffocated?’ Caleb thought to himself, he remembered feeling breathless, feeling a desperate need to have her near him, to breathe her in, but suffocated?

“So, she said that the only way to… Uhm to… to relieve that awful feeling was to…touch,” she swallowed hard as she finished her sentence.

“You touched me?” Caleb asked softly, eyes wide as an image of her at the Blood Moon gathering pressed up against the wall played in his mind once more.

“No!” Ashleigh shouted turning red.

Caleb took a deep breath, trying to absorb what she had said while also trying to put the image out of his head.

“Not like that, you pervert! I touched your cheek!”

Ashleigh looked away from him, embarrassed by his assumption. But even more so with her musings on how he would have reacted if it had been like that.

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“Alright, I want to get this straight. So, you felt the bond,” he asked, looking to her for acknowledgement.

Ashleigh nodded.

“And for you, it felt…?” he asked, waiting with anticipation for a reaction.

She didn’t respond, she tried to think of how to answer, but her nerves were written all over her face.

“Horrible?” he asked quietly.

Ashleigh’s eyes flew up to him and then quickly away as she saw the hopeful look in his eyes. She hesitated but nodded.

“Ok, so this,” he paused, reacting to the before saying it, “horrible, feeling led you to me, and you were desperate to get rid of it. So, you forced yourself to make physical contact with me? Is that about right?”

Ashleigh nodded awkwardly.

Caleb felt like an idiot. What had gone through his head, was entirely in his head. He didn’t know what he had expected exactly, or what he would have done if she had shared feelings for him. But it didn’t matter, she found her attachment to him horrible.

“Ok,” he sighed in frustration, “Ok, I guess, I’m sorry. I’m sorry for all the trouble I caused you.”

“It wasn’t your fault. Not entirely,” she said, feeling guilt crawling over her like a swarm of insects. “Granger and I have always spent the full moons apart, because of the mate bond, I just didn’t think about it this time because—”

“Because I’m not your mate, he is,” Caleb growled. “I understand.”

‘No,’ Ashleigh thought to herself honestly, ‘because I wasn’t afraid of staying with you. Because I trust you.’

“Exactly,” she replied sadly.

Caleb refused to look at her, and for this she was thankful. As long as he didn’t look, he wouldn’t see the tears that she shed for him.

‘It’s better this way,’ she reminded herself, ‘if he doesn’t remember, there is nothing to be explained, nothing that he needs to forget.’

She turned her body away from him, unable to stop the flow of tears. Caleb glanced back and felt a sharp pain in his chest at how far away she seemed to be from him. Their distance would only continue to grow further and further apart.

‘What did I expect?’ he scoffed in his mind. ‘She had made it very clear; I am nothing to her. As she should be to me.’

Their shared experience from the night before left a lasting but very different impression on each of them. Ashleigh embraced the pain of her memory, hoping he would never know it. While Caleb felt a bitter emptiness for a hope he had never expected and wished he could ignore.

They sat together quietly for a long time, neither knowing how to break the silence or the awkwardness. In the end, it was Ashleigh who spoke first.

“I should go,” she whispered.

Caleb didn’t respond.

Ashleigh got up from the couch, heading for the hatch leading out of the treehouse. She looked back at Caleb.

‘At this moment, to myself, I can admit it,’ she thought, ‘a part of me wishes I had met you first.’

Her heart had ached so much in the past month that she didn’t know anymore who it ached for.

Caleb stood up and she quickly turned away, wiping the tears that had escaped. He came to her with purpose, opening the hatch. Ashleigh looked up at him, but he didn’t look back. She made her way down onto the ladder and just before she reached the bottom, he called down to her.

“We will begin our training tomorrow; I hope you can understand why I’d rather not start today.”

His voice was not warm, or kind, or familiar. It was cold and distant.

It hurt.

“I know, we are both pretty worn out. Safer to give it a day,” she answered pleasantly with an understanding smile directed at him.

The light of the sun that entered through the massive window highlighted him from above like an angel, but the cold stare of his icy grey eyes belonged to a demon.

He shut the hatch without a word.

She had built the wall between them; he was just staying on his side.

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