Sneak Preview Sunday:

Here's another addition of JEALOUSY. Things start to heat up when Nadine's worlds collide. What will this do to her relationship with Carter? Find out in the third installment dropping May 1st. Dream on, Dreamers! #lodw

Jealousy: Josh shook it, happily. “Hey. Thanks for letting me sit with you. It has not been easy trying to figure all this out. I thank the Great Maker for Nadine. She has been heaven sent.” I cringed when he spoke about the Great Maker. While most people would have said God his people in Haasfolk called Him the Great Maker or just Maker in general. It was one of those things I didn’t have a chance to go over with him before all this happened. The others didn’t flinch though much to my surprise. They had lots of questions for him. Instant celebrity status. We were all listening to Josh regale us on the ins and outs of relearning how to button jeans when Carter approached. I felt him before I saw him. I could feel the waves of confusion coming off him even before he reached the table. He didn’t speak though. Instead, he stared at Josh sitting beside me and he did not look happy. “Hey Cartman. Did you meet Josh yet? Dude, he just spent a year in a coma. Isn’t that some shit,” Sam told him. Carter didn’t respond. He just looked at me with one question in his head. I knew what he wanted to ask me. Why was Josh here? He wanted to know more importantly, what was Josh to me? The true answers, I could never tell him. I couldn’t tell him that Danny was my cousin’s husband. I also didn’t want to lie. I had been lying to him about so much and our relationship had suffered for it. As much as I wanted to tell him the truth, tell all my friends the truth I was bound. I was bound by the Council and my own fears. I lowered my head instead continuing with my lunch. Carter without even saying a word to me or Josh decided he didn’t want to sit with us that afternoon. He made his decision about Josh without uttering a single word to him. Carter told Sam he would see him later before heading out of the lunchroom. That was the meeting I dreaded, and it went exactly how I expected. Kelly ann said it best though. “Boys. Can’t believe for one second a girl can just be friends with a guy,” Kelly Ann mused. No truer words were spoken. “Hey, don’t harsh on my man. He is just protective of what’s his,” Sam grumbled. Thus, began a great debate between Kelly Ann and Sam on women, men and property rights. As they bantered back and forth Josh and I were not listening. Josh was looking at me curiously. I tried not to pay attention, but he was being obvious. “What,” I asked in a whisper. “That young man has claim you as his mate,” Josh asked sincerely. I knew what he was thinking. I wasn’t sure how I could explain my relationship with Carter. He was more than a boyfriend. Was he my mate though? In these terms, people from the Realm would agree he was my mate. It also meant many in our junior class were mated, multiple times. Our relationship was not as simple as being mates. I definitely could not explain it to him in front of the others. I would give him a break down of how relationships in the Real worked later. That was as soon as I figured out how they all worked myself. For now, I had to let him know the conversation was to be tabled. “Things work differently here, Josh. Not everything is as black or white as you may think it is,” I whispered. “That boy thinks you are his mate, Nadine. He sees me as a threat. That is as black and white as you can get,” Josh stated firmly.