ISABEL

SIXTEEN

Dylan spent a whole five minutes staring at the phone on the nightstand, trying to figure out why Isabel had a sudden change of mind. No matter how hard he tried to solve the puzzle, his thoughts kept settling for one answer, which was the fact that deep down Isabel's facade of indifference, she actually cared about him. Although she used his family sending out a search party as a good excuse, he has come to the realization that she does feel his worries about being far away from his family and was only giving him a hand in reaching them. He wasn't aware that he was smiling to himself all this time until he looked at the mirror in his bathroom.

'Don't get overly excited, Dylan. This may be her own way of asking you to leave'

At the thought of that his smile dropped, turning into a hurt expression. His forehead creased into a frown, to show how displeased he was at himself to think that his mate wanted to make him feel happy.

Dylan took a quick shower, ridding himself of the day's sweat before grabbing the phone from the nightstand to call his family. He had wanted to make the phone call the next morning, but decided against it when he concluded that Isabel wanted him out of her life. After contemplating who to call, he decided to call his elder brother, so as not to make the issue complicated.

"Hello?" Daniel picked the call after two rings. He sounded agitated and cranky, like he hasn't had a good sleep.

"Daniel. It's me" Dylan said gently, feeling sorry for his brother who must've been under a lot of pressure in the past couple days.

"Dylan? Is it really you?" His elder brother cautiously asked.

"Oh my God, Dylan. What happened? Where are you? Did someone take you prisoner? Are you alright?" Daniel bombarded him with questions, sounding anxious, but yet, ready to attack the culprit behind his disappearance.

Dylan, rather than answering his brother's question let his thoughts ponder on Daniel's third question. Was he Isabel's mate as she claimed or was he her prisoner, given that their relationship wasn't all like every other mated werewolves.

"Dylan, are you still there? Hello!..." Daniel's panicked voice brought Dylan back to earth, but he wasn't able to answer any of his brother's questions as he heard noises in the background and all of a sudden his mom was on the phone.

"Dylan. My baby. What is going on? Where are you?" She sounded like she had been crying, but he could hardly believe that were the case since she was also fed up with his presence.

"Mom, I'm fine" He replied calmly, pushing aside the ugly memories he shared with his family before now.

From the other end he could hear sighs of relief, which meant that his dad was also in the room.

"Thank goodness you're okay. But honey, we need to know where you are" His mom pressed.

He couldn't give out such information just like that because his parents would misinterpret the whole thing. He has to explain everything bit by bit.

Inhaling deeply, he said "I found my mate"

"That's great news! You'll have to introduce her to the family, don't you think?"

"I can't"

"I know you're mad at us, but honey, please come home... We're sorry for upsetting you. Just come home"

"I'm mated to alpha Martinez" He blurted out without giving it much thought, making the room at the other end fall silent.

He couldn't take back his words now, so he gave them a minute to take in the information. Better late than never.