C H A P T E R N I N E

            “Aw, that's so sweet!” Missy gushed and then continued to explain how cute Logan seemed to be, ignoring Lila's groans of frustrations. Due to Missy's sixth sense of 'knowing' if something interested happen plus the number on Lila's hand, she squeezed the gossip out of Lila.

            “Yes. I know. You've told me a million times.” Lila moaned. She should've just cancelled meeting up with Missy.

            “What happened at dinner? I don't know the whole story but Justin seemed pretty worried when he phoned me and this morning he just grunted when I asked.”

            “Oh.” Lila remembered that she still had to tell Missy. Justin would have bent the evening and made it look as if Lila was irresponsible and wouldn't have mentioned being beaten by Lila this morning. “I didn't feel too good and I walked out of the house. I came back later and had an argument with Justin, I felt too guilty to sleep and then I K.O'd him this morning.” Lila rushed out, skipping a few details.

            “Where'd you go? Come on, you can tell me. If it helps, I won't tell Justin if you don't want me to?” Missy asked and Lila could feel herself caving. Should she tell her?

            “You're not alone, remember?” Evangeline reminded Lila.

            “I don't know...” Lila answered Missy.

            “Please?” Missy begged Lila. “I can tell you want to talk about it. I don't know if it's a sixth sense or something but I can tell that you need someone to talk to.”

            “Fine!” Lila caved. Missy was right; she did need someone to talk to. She'd never really had a girl friend who she could talk to about anything and everything. “Just don't tell Justin or anyone. Okay? Not even Jace.”

            “Sure, that'll be easy.” A surprised look took over Lila's face... wouldn't Jace know if she was lying or hiding something from him? “Oh, I don't tell Jace everything. If there's something he should know, I'll tell him. Plus, he won't notice. He's not good at observing.” Missy waved Lila off. “I know, mates should tell each other everything but seriously, it's not like he needs to know everything.”

            “Oh, okay. Right, last night I was arguing with my wolf and I didn't take notice of where I was going and I ended up in this abandoned place... street? I don't know. I think it was a cul-de-sac. Anyway, I had this pull to this house and it was like someone had been in there and just wrecked the whole house. A few things happened and then I found this book.” Lila rummaged around her bag and produced the notebook she'd taken from the house.

            “What happened?” Missy asked.

            “What?”

            “Well, you said a few things happened. What where they?” Lila started to feel uncomfortable. If she was to explain what happened, she'd have to explain the incident. She didn't know if she could handle it. It had taken her a few weeks to get her head around the whole idea and she was still disgusted with herself for it. How long would it take Missy?

            “I don't want to say. Not yet.” Lila finally replied to Missy.

            “Oh, alright. I'm here when you need to talk about it. It seems pretty serious.”

            “Yeah. It is. Um, anyway. I don't know whether to read it yet.” Lila fingered the corners of the book. It looked tattered now, but compared to the house it looked spotless.

            “Why don't you want to?”

            “I... I don't know what's in it. It looks like a diary and if I read it, it might have some things I never want to read about.” Lila sighed. She was going to have to read it... eventually.

            “Huh. Well. Enough about the book.” Missy snatched it out of Lila's hands and threw it into Lila's bag. “So tell me about boarding school. I want to know if there were any hot guys!” Missy waggled her eyebrows and Lila let out a small laugh. Drawing up her knees to her chest she thought about what she would say. Truth be told she hated the boarding school.

            “Eh. It was already, I didn't really notice anyone.” That was an understatement, Lila thought. She'd gone out of her way to avoid everyone. She only hung out with some of the girls because she was forced to. On a regular day, she'd have to put up with being pushed into lockers, into walls and out of the way. She'd have to put up with the harsh words they all shouted at her. It was all because she couldn't afford to buy a wardrobe of designer clothes, all because she'd rather help the poor than get a new hair style.

            If Lila could have bought designer clothes, got free hairstyles, botoxed herself... she wouldn't have. She'd rather stick with the abuse than turn into a snobby, up-her-own-arse, brainwashed idiots. She could have showed them all that she was stronger than them, that their words wouldn't harm her but she remembered what she promised Papi before she'd left. She promised that she wouldn't let them get to her, that if they were vile she'd ignore them.

            “That went out the window, didn't it?” Evangeline commented, after Lila had travelled down memory lane.

            Your fault. You broke the promise. I didn't.

            “That bad, huh?” Missy caught Lila's attention.

            “You could say that.” Lila shrugged. Missy didn't need to know how bad it really was.

            “Was it full of snobs who judged you?” Lila nodded, sighing. “Well, we're not like that. I'm not like that. I probably know more about you than you know me.” Missy chuckled.

            “Justin?” Lila guessed.

            “Yup. Apparently you took it quite hard when Papi died.” A pang hit Lila's chest. Sure, she could say out loud that it didn't affect her anymore but the truth was that she teared up every time she visited his grave or she had a nightmare.

            “Yeah.” Lila looked down, staring at a blade of grass. She plucked the emerald blade from the ground and twisted it round itself.

            “Did his death have something to do with the... incident?” Lila swivelled her head round to Missy. She couldn't know, Justin swore that no-one apart from him and Mamaw knew. If Missy knew... “I don't know what happened but Justin said that there was an incident which was why you came back.”

            “Oh.” Lila let out a shaky laugh. “Yeah, it did.” Lila felt the burden of the secret she held coming back to her. She had a bad feeling that someone knew about what happened. She wanted to tell Missy, but then Missy would have to keep it a secret and Lila couldn't do that to Missy. It took Lila almost three months to tell Mamaw and then another month to tell Justin. But she needed to tell someone, someone who could help her...

            “You're going to tell Alpha Darren?” Evangeline asked, surprised. “After telling me you couldn't tell anyone that you couldn't face it, you're really going to tell Alpha Darren?”

            Yeah. He can help.

            “Psh. Yeah sure, if you want to get kicked out. How idiotic can you really be? I knew you were du-” Lila cut off her wolf from another one of her rants.

            I don't need your approval. You can't control me, not now. Lila decided, for herself, that she was going to tell Alpha Darren. She had to; if someone came back from the boarding school, she could snap. She still didn't like to shift, or have strong emotions incase Evangeline took over... again.

            “Hey, Missy, do you reckon I could talk to Alpha Darren tomorrow?” Lila asked Missy.

            “Yeah I guess. Is it important?” Lila nodded.

            “I don't want anyone to know. Promise me?” Lila bargained with Missy.

            “If you promise me you'll tell me after, then yeah.”

            “I... I can't burden you-”

            “Lila, we're friends. We'll probably be best friends soon; I can tell. I'm not going to judge you, okay?” Missy comforted Lila and Lila nodded. She'd tell her, soon. She'd have to.

~ * ~

            Lila dumped her bag on the kitchen counter and groaned. She couldn't believe her luck. She'd texted Logan throughout the day and Justin almost caught her. Almost. Luckily, Lila had managed to delete the text just as Justin had stolen her phone.

            “Li, what's up?” Justin jumped onto the seat on the other side of the table. Lila rolled her eyes as she saw Justin reach over, pluck an apple from the fruit bowel in the middle of the table and take a massive bite out of it before dumping it on the kitchen table and glare at her. “What?” He asked, spitting out pieces of apple.

            “Ew. Don't talk with your mouth closed. Where's Mamaw?” Lila asked, Mamaw was always at home. She barely ever left the house. Lila or Justin didn't know why, they just assumed Mamaw had things to do at home.

            “She's visiting Papi.” Justin told Lila glumly. Lila mouthed 'oh' before looking for the cookery book. Whenever any of them visited Papi's grave, they never felt like doing anything. It was like their energy had been zapped.

            “Do you want to help me cook something? I don't want to make Mamaw cook.” Lila asked Justin, finding the cookery book.

            “Nah. I'll go tidy the lounge and set the table. Mamaw will be back soon. You said you had something to tell her... I'm assuming I'm involved?” Justin asked as he glanced over Lila's shoulder.

            “Yeah, you are. I'd rather tell you both over dinner though.” Lila told Justin whilst flicking through the pages to find the perfect recipe.

            “Macaroni and cheese with bacon? Wow.” Justin snorted.

            “Shut up, I don't see you cooking.” Lila retorted back.

            “Whatever.” Justin moved to the fridge and took out the bacon and handed it to Lila before grabbing the antibacterial spray and washing down the table. “You and Missy seem to be getting on well.” Justin commented.

            “Yeah. We are. She's really nice and lovely.” Lila smiled and started to take out pans. She boiled some water and got out the pasta, preparing for the meal. It was silent, except for the food cooking. It was around fifteen minutes later that Justin started to speak again.

            “You need a good friend. You've barely ever spoken to anyone except me and Mamaw and then you flew off to boarding school where who knows what happened... It's nice to have you back home, where all your friends are.”

            “All my friends are? I didn't know them until Monday!” Lila grinned, checking over the pots.

            “Yeah... well...” Justin trailed off thinking of something to come back with.

            “Whatever, Jay.”

            “Smells nice, how long do you reckon it'll be?” Just as Justin asked, his stomach started to awaken and complain.

            “Twenty to thirty more minutes? Don't worry, I won't let your stomach eat itself.” Lila started to laugh and they heard the front door slam. They cast worried glances at each other.

            “Mamaw?” Justin yelled.

            “Justin Yang! You use your indoor voice in here!” Mamaw's scolding voice came from the doorway. “Have I not taught you anything?” Justin scowled and slumped onto one of the dining room chairs.

            “Sorry, Mamaw.”

            “There's no point in apologising. Just remember not to do it again.” Mamaw hobbled over to the head of the table and sat down.

            “Lila, what are you cooking?” Mamaw asked, noticing the smell circulating around the room.

            “Mac and cheese with bacon.” Lila replied whilst dishing out the food evenly, leaving some in the pans. “Sorry it's nothing fancy.”

            “Nonsense, it's perfectly fine.” Mamaw waved Lila off. Lila brought Mamaw and Justin's food over and placed it in front of them. She power walked back to the kitchen counter to get hers before she sat down and played with her food.

            “How was Papi?” Lila asked, making conversation.

            “He's good. The grave is spotless. When are you two going?” Mamaw asked the twins.

            “Sunday?” Justin responded, and asked Lila at the same time.

            “Yeah, Sunday's good.” Lila put down her fork and took a deep breath in. “I've got some news. It's good and bad...”

            “What is it?” Mamaw asked, and then complimented Lila on her cooking. Lila felt proud, she never really got that many compliments. Well, she didn't whilst she was at the boarding school.

            “I'm telling Alpha Darren about the incident.” Silence descended upon the room as Lila announced her news.

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I don't really like this chapter, but it's vital for the next one where you FINALLY learn what's been eating away at Lila ;)

And WOW, thanks for all the reads and votes and comments, they mean a lot! :'D