The Worst Liar Ever

The Worst Liar Ever


"Julia? Julia, where are you?"

My mother's voice is pitched at that particular frequency that means she's three seconds away from either crying or organizing a manhunt. Possibly both simultaneously.

"I'm fine," I say, which is probably the biggest lie I've told all day, and that's saying something considering my recent track record with honesty.

"Fine? FINE? You disappear for hours without telling anyone where you're going, you don't answer your phone, Amy's mother says you never arrived at their house, and all you have to say is 'I'm fine'?"

Okay, so maybe 'fine' wasn't the best opening line.

"I'm safe," I try instead. "I just needed some space."

"Space? Julia, after everything that happened today, you decide you need 'space'? Your father has half the pack out looking for you!"

My stomach drops to somewhere around my ankles. "He what?"

"He's convinced you've been kidnapped by vampires!"

The irony is so thick I could choke on it.

"Mom, I haven't been kidnapped—"

"Then where are you?"

I look at Rowan, who's watching me with an expression that clearly says 'this is going well' in the most sarcastic way possible.

"I'm at the lake," I say, because it's technically true even if it's missing some crucial details. Like the fact that I'm on the vampire side of said lake. In a vampire house. With a vampire who just told me he loves me.

Minor details, really.

"The lake?" Mom's voice climbs about three octaves. "Julia, you almost drowned in that lake yesterday! Why would you go back there?"

"I needed to think."

"You can think at home!"

"Can I though? Because at home, everyone wants me to make a decision I can't make, and I'm tired of disappointing people."

The line goes quiet for a moment, and I can practically hear my mother's brain working through what I just said.

"Julia," she says finally, her voice softer now, "you're not disappointing us. We're just worried."

"You're worried I won't reject my mate. That's not the same as worried about me."

"That's not fair."

"Isn't it?"

More silence. Then: "Come home. Please. We'll talk about this when you get here."

"I can't come home right now."

"Why not?"

Because I'm having dinner with a vampire family and trying to decide whether to fake my own death is not an answer that will improve this conversation.

"Because I'm not ready," I say instead. "I need more time."

"Time for what?"

"To figure out how to be the daughter you want and the person I need to be. Those things don't seem compatible right now."

I hear my mother take a shaky breath, and guilt floods through me like ice water.

"Your father wants to talk to you," she says.

"Mom—"

But the phone's already changing hands, and then Dad's voice fills my ear, carrying all the authority of a Beta who's had enough of his daughter's supernatural nonsense.

"Julia Claw, you have exactly five minutes to tell me where you are before I track you by scent."

"You can't track me. I'm across the lake."

Silence. Then: "What did you just say?"

Oh, shit. That was supposed to stay in my internal monologue.

"I'm on the other side of the lake," I repeat, because apparently my brain has decided that digging the hole deeper is a valid life strategy.

"The vampire side."

"Is there a vampire side? I thought it was just a lake."

"Julia." His voice drops to that deadly quiet tone that usually precedes someone getting grounded until they're thirty. "Are you with 'him'?"

He doesn't say Rowan's name, like speaking it out loud might summon actual demons.

I look at Rowan again, who's now sitting in the other armchair with his head in his hands, probably regretting every life choice that led to him mating with the world's worst liar.

"Define 'with,'" I try.

"I'm going to ask you one more time, and I want a straight answer. Are you with the vampire?"

The vampire. Not Rowan. Not your mate. Just 'the vampire,' like he's some kind of disease I caught instead of a person.

"Yes," I say, because I'm apparently incapable of strategic dishonesty. "I'm with Rowan."

The explosion that follows is loud enough that I have to hold the phone away from my ear. I catch words like 'betrayal' and 'disappointment' and 'how could you' mixed in with what sounds suspiciously like the beginning of a Beta command that would force me to come home immediately if I were close enough to feel pack authority.

Which I'm not.

Because apparently mate bonds trump pack bonds, which is both convenient and terrifying.

"Dad, I can explain—"

"There's nothing to explain! You promised us you would reject him! You looked us in the eye and lied!"

"I didn't lie! I said I would try!"

"And clearly you didn't try very hard if you're at his house having what I'm sure is a lovely time while your family falls apart!"

"That's not fair!"

"Fair?" His voice cracks. "You want to talk about fair? It's not fair that my daughter chose a vampire over her own family! It's not fair that everything we've built, everything we've protected, is going to crumble because you can't control yourself!"

Each word hits like a physical blow, and I feel tears starting to burn behind my eyes.

"I'm sorry," I whisper.

"Sorry doesn't fix this, Julia. Sorry doesn't save us when the pack finds out. Sorry doesn't bring back the daughter I thought I raised."

"Dad—"

"Come home. Right now. Or don't come home at all."

The ultimatum hangs in the air like a death sentence.

"What?"

"You heard me. Either you come home tonight, reject that vampire, and save this family, or you stay there and we're done."

"You don't mean that."

"I've never been more serious in my life." His voice is cold now, empty. "Choose, Julia. Your family or him. Right now."

My hand is shaking so hard I almost drop the phone.

"You're asking me to choose between dying and losing you."

"I'm asking you to choose between selfishness and love."

"That's not fair! You can't ask me to—"

"I can and I am. You have until midnight. After that, if you're not home, don't bother coming back."

The line goes dead.

I stare at the phone, my brain refusing to process what just happened.

My father just disowned me.

Actually disowned me.

With a deadline and everything.

"Julia?" Rowan's voice sounds distant, like he's speaking from underwater. "What did he say?"

"He said come home or don't come home at all."

"He's bluffing."

"He's not bluffing. You didn't hear his voice." I look up at Rowan, and everything feels surreal, like I'm watching this happen to someone else. "He meant it. If I'm not home by midnight, I'm not his daughter anymore."

Rowan's face goes carefully blank, the expression of someone trying to hide their reaction. "What are you going to do?"

"I don't know. I don't—I can't—" The words won't come out right. Nothing's coming out right.

I stand up too fast, and the room tilts sideways. Or maybe I tilt sideways. It's hard to tell when your entire world is crumbling around you.

"Hey, easy." Rowan's there suddenly, hands on my shoulders, steadying me. "Breathe."

"I can't breathe. My dad just disowned me and Amy hates me and I'm supposed to meet your family for dinner like this is a normal thing that normal people do, but nothing about this is normal!"

"Julia—"

"And you know what the worst part is? The worst part is that I still can't choose! Even knowing what it costs, even knowing I'm going to lose everything, I still can't force myself to reject you!"

I'm crying now, ugly crying, the kind where your face gets all blotchy and your nose runs and you make sounds like a dying walrus.

Rowan pulls me against his chest, and I let him, because apparently I've lost all sense of dignity along with everything else.

"What if they're right?" I sob into his shirt. "What if I am selfish? What if I'm destroying my family because I'm too weak to do the right thing?"

"The right thing according to who?"

"Everyone! Everyone except me!"

"Then maybe everyone else is wrong."

I pull back enough to look at his face. "Or maybe I'm wrong. Did you consider that? Maybe I'm the one who's broken and everyone else can see it except me."

"You're not broken."

"I shot a penguin instead of a vampire, Rowan. I'm definitely broken."

He makes a sound that might be a laugh or might be a sob. "That penguin story is never going to die, is it?"

"Never. It'll be on my tombstone. 'Here lies Julia Claw, who was killed by her own terrible life choices and also that one time she shot a penguin.'"

"Your tombstone is not going to say that."

"You don't know. I might request it."

We stand there for a moment, me crying into his shirt and him holding me like I'm something precious instead of a complete disaster of a person.

"I have to go back," I say finally.

"No, you don't."

"I have to try. One more time. Maybe I can make them understand—"

"Julia, they're not going to understand. Your father just gave you an ultimatum. There's no reasoning with that."

"But he's my father."

"And I'm your mate."

"Don't make me choose."

"I'm not making you choose. He is."

I know he's right. I know my father's the one who drew this line in the sand, who made this impossible demand.

But knowing it doesn't make it hurt less.

"I need to go home," I say, even though the thought makes me want to throw up. "I need to at least try."

Rowan's quiet for a long moment. Then: "Okay."

"Okay?"

"I'll take you back. But Julia?" He tilts my face up so I have to meet his eyes. "When this doesn't work, when they give you the same ultimatum again—come back to me. Don't choose death because you think you deserve it."

"I don't think I deserve death."

"Don't you?"

The question hangs between us, and I realize I don't have an answer.

Because maybe part of me does think I deserve this. Deserve the pain, the loss, the impossible choice.

Maybe that's what happens when everyone you love tells you you're wrong.

You start to believe them.

"Take me home," I say quietly. "Before I lose my nerve."

Rowan nods and wraps his arms around me.

The world dissolves into darkness.

And when we reappear at the edge of the woods behind my house, I realize I have about thirty minutes to save my family.

Or thirty minutes to say goodbye.