Mine to Protect Chapter 69: NOT ANSWERING

*Hazel*

I shake my head vehemently at Lukas, hoping he respects my wishes.

“No can do,” he says, “she doesn’t want to talk to you.”

Derek is silent for a while, then I hear him say, “Tell her that I love her.”

“Yuk! Dude, I am not telling her that, you can tell her yourself, I am putting you on speaker.”

The buzz of the speaker is loud in the car, then Derek’s deep voice fills my ears.

“I love you, kitten.”

I don’t reply, my emotions are all jumbled, longing, sadness, resentment. I feel a fresh wave of tears coming, but this time I hold them back.

Lukas waits for a while, then switches the speaker off and tells Derek, “Give her some time.”

Derek doesn’t say anything else and hangs up.

A tense silence settles in the car, guilt eating me up, should I have answered him? Does he think that I don’t love him anymore? I still do, but is love enough to be happy?

“Princess, stop thinking so hard, I can see smoke coming out of your brain, you are overexerting it,” Lukas breaches his way into my thoughts.

I roll my eyes at him; I am doing that a lot lately.

“At least it means I am using it,” I retort wryly.

“Hey! I use my brain a lot too! I just used it to turn left, and to choose what we are going to eat this evening, all at the same time,” he replies jokingly.

I smile at his joke, it is a lame one, but I appreciate his effort.

“What are we going to eat?”

“Sushi!” he replies smiling broadly.

“Great, I like sushi too!” I join in his enthusiasm. “I haven’t had it in ages. The packhouse is too far away from anything, I wish I had a car so I could go to the nearest town and eat out, do some shopping, or just enjoy being among people. I miss my life.”

I miss the freedom of doing what I want, going where I want; with all that happened I hadn’t even noticed, but I was practically caged in that packhouse, hanging on Derek like my life depended on it. When did I started leaning on him so much? He is protective and attentive, and I have let myself be cuddled in his protective bubble, not realizing that it was also holding me back.

I need to find myself again, get back to being my independent self.

“You could ask Derek to take you, or you could borrow one of his cars, he has a driver too,” Lukas reasons.

“Can I drive?” I asked him out of the blue.

“You mean, drive my car? Like in now?” he asks, perplexed.

“Yes.”

“Do you have a license?”

“I do.”

“Have you ever driven a car?”

“I have.”

“Mmmmm…”

“I am a good driver. I swear I won’t wreck your car,” I state, pleading with my puppy eyes.

“Ok, but don’t drive too slowly, otherwise we will get home too late. I need some rest anyway,” he says grumpily, while stopping at the side of the road, so that we can switch seats.

I get behind the wheel of his jeep retro, and start driving on the highway, a sense of freedom, of being in control of my life immediately engulfs me. I floor it, wanting to feel more of it, and while we speed down the highway, I feel exhilarated, I start feeling hope that things will get better for me, and for our bond, because I am not ready to give up on us.

When we finally reach Luka’s pack it is already 10 p.m., and we are dead tired.

We park outside a white two-story house with a well-cared garden and a huge maple tree. I am surprised by the fact that we didn’t have to cross any fence or big gate, like in Derek’s pack. This house also doesn’t look like a packhouse, it could have 3 bedrooms max.

Amanda, Lukas’ mom, comes out the main door to meet us, with a huge smile that makes me feel immediately warm and fuzzy. Why couldn’t Derek’s mom be like this? Things would be so much easier.

I hug Amanda tightly, breathing in her calming floral scent, and she hugs me back with the same affection.

“Hey! Why are you hugging her first? I am your son!” Lukas whines accusingly at his mom, an exaggerated pout on his lips, making him look like a five-year-old.

We both laughed at his reaction, knowing that he is doing it to cheer up the mood.

“Here, here my big boy!” Amanda hugs him sweetly, with a smile on her face, and Lukas hugs her back, all hunched over because of the huge height difference. He looks like a good giant.

We go inside the house, it is simple, clean and has a homey feeling to it. I love it, it makes me feel immediately at home. A stark difference from Derek’s fancy décor. I should stop comparing everything to Derek, it is not fair to anyone, but he’s like a nail in my brain, stuck there.

Amanda shows me upstairs to a bedroom with a single bed, covered in a hand knitted white blanket with blue flowers embroidered on it.

“It’s lovely!” I tell her sincerely, “Did you made it?”

“No, your mom made it for me. She always said that I smelled of wave flowers, so she embroidered wave flowers on the blanket. It is one of my most cherished possessions, and I thought it would keep you warmer at night.”

I never knew my mom was able to knit, another truth I discovered too late. How many other things about her I am unaware of? I am starting to feel like I have never known her at all.

I smile politely at Amanda, but she has noticed my change in mood and places a warm hand on my arm to comfort me.

“Have you eaten already? I have prepared some stew with potatoes, if you’d like to eat something. And after I can show you some photo albums of your mom and me when we were younger.”

“I’d love that,” I reply, loving this idea.

I put my stuff down, refreshed a little, and join Amanda and Lukas in the living room, where there is also a six seats dining table. Three plates filled with stew, potatoes and white rice are already laid on the table, ready for us to tuck in.

“Have a seat, honey! What would you like to drink? Water, soda, maybe some red wine?” Amanda asks me, while bringing a carafe of water to the table.

“Wine, she definitely needs wine,” Lukas says vehemently.

I give him a look and reply to Amanda “Wine would be great, thank you.”

We all sit at the table and start eating, talking about our trip and what we are going to do tomorrow, no one touching the topic of what happened with Derek’s parents, which I am very grateful for.

We finish eating and I help Amanda clean up the dishes and the kitchen. It is so easy to be around this two, they feel like family already. I wish I could have this feeling at the packhouse too. I mean, I feel happy around Alice and Damon, but there are so many more people I don’t know, it just feels too foreign, sometimes hostile, like I can never relax. Maybe I can ask Derek if we can get our own house and stop living with everyone in the packhouse, we need our own private space, as a couple and a family.

That’s if he still wants me.