She’s purposefully blinding herself, but I refuse to ignore the pattern and the way it echoes Auren’s manipulation.
Was I wrong to encourage her to open the pack? At the time, I wanted to make her happy, and I thought Leif was a decent guy under his standoffish outer appearance, but maybe I was wrong.
The bell above the door chimes again, and this time Leif steps through, water dripping from his coat onto the worn wooden floor. Dark circles hang beneath his eyes, the periwinkle blue dulled by exhaustion. His shoulders hunch forward, and his movements lack their usual grace as he scans the café.
When he spots me, he weaves between tables, bumping a chair and murmuring an apology to its occupant.
“Sorry I’m late,” he says as he drops into the chair across from me. Water beads on his coat sleeves and drips onto the table. “I had to run back to my hotel for some documents for the?—”
“I got you a coffee.” I push the mug toward him, cutting off his stream of excuses. “Splash of cream, no sugar.”
Leif blinks at the interruption, his attention dropping to the coffee. “Oh, thank you.”
He fumbles with his coat buttons, fingers clumsy with cold and fatigue. When he shrugs it off, the sweater beneath hangs loose on his frame. He’s lost more weight.
A pang of concern cuts through my frustration. Whatever’s happening to him isn’t good. But concern for Leif doesn’t outweigh what this is doing to Emily.
“You look like hell,” I say, not softening my assessment.
His hands wrap around the mug, seeking warmth. “It’s been a long week.”
“It’s been a long month,” I correct him. “Maybe longer.”
The steam from his coffee rises between us, carrying the bitter scent of roasted beans. Rain streaks the windows at the front of the café, blurring the outside world into smudges of gray and blue. Inside, the hum of conversation and the clatter of dishes create a barrier of white noise.
“Jared, if this is about missing dinner on Wednesday, I already explained to Emily?—”
“This isn’t about Wednesday.” I take a sip of my coffee, the bitter liquid burning a path down my throat. “This is about what’s happening to Emily while you figure out whatever the hell you’re figuring out.”
His fingers tighten around his mug. “I don’t understand.”
“Let me tell you about Auren,” I say, setting my mug down with a decisive thunk.
Leif’s posture stiffens with recognition at the name. Good. At least Emily has shared that much with him. Hopefully he remembers Auren’s performance at the market too.
“Emily met him when she was twenty-two. Young, just starting in the world, and eager to start her own pack.” I lean forward, though no one sits close enough to overhear. “Auren presented himself as this delicate, artistic soul who needed protection from a world too harsh for someone so sensitive.”
A barista calls out an order at the counter, the name lost in the ambient noise, while outside, the rain intensifies, drumming against the glass.
“At first, it was small things. Auren would have bad days and needed Emily to drop everything and comfort him. He’d create crises that required her immediate attention. If she ever pushed back, he’d turn cold or start crying. Either way, Emily became responsible for his emotional state.”
Leif hasn’t touched his coffee. His focus remains on the surface of the liquid, faint ripples forming from the tremor in his hands.
“Soon, her whole life revolved around anticipating his needs. She stopped seeing friends because Auren would fall apart if left alone too long. She worked herself to exhaustion providing what he demanded. She poured every ounce of herself into making him feel secure, while he took and took and never gave back.”
Anger burns through me all over again on Emily’s behalf. If I’d been around back then, I never would have let him hurt her like that, and I won’t let Leif hurt her now.
“It was emotional manipulation disguised as vulnerability,” I state, the words falling between us like stones. “And when you keep disappearing, when you refuse to explain what’s going on, when Emily has to worry and wait and rearrange herself around your absences, you’re putting her right back in the same position.”
Leif’s breathing changes, becoming shallow and quick, and the blood drains from his face. “I’m not trying to hurt her.”
“I believe you.” And I do. Whatever demons are chasing Leif, he’s not Auren. But it doesn’t change the impact. “But intent doesn’t matter if the effect is the same.”
A group of teenagers erupts in laughter at a table near the window, the sound jarring. Leif flinches at the noise, his shoulders drawing inward.
“Emily hasn’t said anything,” he says, a question hidden in the statement.
“She won’t. That’s the problem.” I take another drink of my coffee to steady myself. “Auren trained her to accept scraps of attention and call it love. He taught her that her job was to wait, to understand, and to make allowances.”