Raised by Wolves
Page 25
I didn’t respond.
“Come on, Bryn—my summer plans are just as subject to your state of groundedness as yours are. Did you pass?”
With my luck, Dev’s summer plans probably involved attempting to organize a werewolf theater festival. I shuddered to think of the number of roles I’d have to play when the surplus of males in the pack refused to don curly blonde wigs and play girls in the tradition of the original Shakespearean plays.
“I passed,” I said. “And for the record, I haven’t agreed to any of your so-called plans yet.”
With Devon, things were easy. Besides Ali, he was the only one I could look at without thinking of the rest of the pack.
“You don’t have to go, you know,” Devon said, his voice uncharacteristically understated. “If you decide you don’t want to, if you’d—for instance—rather hitch a ride into Denver and have a night on the town such as only I can show you …”
My look stopped Devon mid-sentence.
“Sorry. It’s just … you smell like him.” Devon said the words lightly, but a muscle in his jaw tensed. “You haven’t seen him in weeks, you didn’t touch him, and you still smell like him.”
That was news to me. Self-consciously, I sniffed at my own arm, and a couple of town girls glanced at me and snickered. They probably thought I was checking myself for BO.
“I don’t smell anything,” I told Devon, ignoring the townies.
Devon didn’t reply—he just twirled his pen around his fingers like a tiny, ink-filled baton. “Come on,” he tried again. “You. Me. Netflix.”
He was every bit as bad as Ali, pulling me back from the edge just before I dove headfirst into the abyss below.
Screw the townies, I thought, and giving them a real show, I butted my head gently against Devon’s chest, and he rested his chin on the top of my skull.
“You know I’m going,” I said, speaking directly into his shoulder.
He sighed, once quietly and once with the melodrama I’d come to expect from him. “Yes. I know. Nobody puts Baby in the corner, et cetera, et cetera, blah, blah.”
The fact that he could attach not one but two “blah”s on the end of a Dirty Dancing quote conveyed the true depths of his sour mood.
“I’ll be fine.”
Devon didn’t reply.
“Chase wouldn’t hurt me.” Even if Chase lost it, even if Callum and the Rabid were duking it out for dominance in his head, if I’d gotten under Chase’s skin half as much as he’d gotten under mine, I’d be fine.
Devon said his next words so quietly that I almost didn’t catch them. “It’s not Chase I’m worried about.”
I tried to make him repeat himself, but he wouldn’t, and that, more than anything, told me that the person Devon was worried about wasn’t me, and it wasn’t Chase.
It was Callum.
“You can’t honestly be worried about that,” I told Dev, but even as the words left my mouth, I sensed his wolf stirring.
Females were to be protected, but the alpha was to be obeyed.
“Callum would never hurt me.” That had been my litany since the moment he’d rescued me from under the sink. Crooned to me. Talked to me. Banished the haze.
“If you break your permissions, he won’t have a choice.”
I jabbed my fist into Devon’s stomach hard enough to knock the air out of a normal boy. He didn’t respond at all.
“I’m not going to break the conditions,” I said. “I didn’t last time. I’m not stupid.”
That statement was met with rather insulting silence.
“I followed instructions last time, didn’t I?”
More silence, and then, finally, Devon broke into a song from Annie.
“‘Hard Knock Life,’” I said. “Seriously?”
Devon shrugged, but I noticed that he didn’t step away from me, like his wolf thought that if they just stayed close enough to me, I’d be okay.
“Trust me, Dev. I’ll be fine.”
My words must have sounded like truth, because he backed off, but in the depths of my brain, I wondered if the future would make a liar out of me. Because the last time I saw Chase, I wasn’t fine. I didn’t break permissions. I didn’t force Callum’s hand.
Chase hadn’t laid a finger on me.
But I hadn’t been fine.
Come out, come out, wherever you are, little one. No sense in hiding from the Big Bad Wolf. I’ll always find you in the end. …
The only way I was going to be fine—now or ever—was when I knew exactly what had happened to Chase, and knew that it wasn’t going to happen to anyone else.
Ever.
Again.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU WOULD PRETEND FOR A SINGLE second that you don’t know exactly what’s going to happen!”
“Alison—”
“Don’t you ‘Alison’ me, Callum. You want to talk conditions, what were my conditions?”
“Ali—”
I recognized the voices from twenty yards away: Ali, Callum, and Casey. They were yelling so loudly that they didn’t even seem to be aware of my approach, which was really something, because I wasn’t making any attempt to mask the sound of my footsteps, and Callum and Casey should have heard me coming from a mile off.
“This is between me and Callum, Casey. If you can’t back me up, keep your mouth closed.”
Ali’s voice lowered in volume, and I gulped on Casey’s behalf. If she’d been using that tone with me, I would have turned tail and run, no questions asked.
“I don’t know why I even—”
A low, unidentifiable sound, issued from Callum’s throat, stopped Casey’s words in their tracks. I wasn’t sure if Callum had growled in warning or in threat, but either way, Casey didn’t finish what was probably an entirely inadvisable sentence.
I don’t know why I even bother?
I don’t know why I even try?
I don’t know why I even act like there’s the smallest chance you might listen to me?
It didn’t matter. Even I could tell that Ali wasn’t in the mood to hear any of the above. She was challenging Callum. Casey was trying to get her to back off. Our house had somehow become Dominance Issue Central, and I had a sinking suspicion that it was my fault.
Casey was mad at Ali. Ali was furious with Callum. And Callum was talking in low, even tones, like he couldn’t have forced both of them to their knees in under a second if he’d taken it in his head to do so.
This wasn’t good.
I stopped walking. I stopped breathing. I didn’t move.
“I left my family behind. I left my friends. I never contacted any of them again. I kept the pack’s secrets, and what did you give me in return?” This wasn’t a rhetorical question. Ali was waiting for an answer, and Callum replied, his voice gentle, like he was reprimanding a child instead of facing down the rage of a mama bear. “I gave you Bryn.”
“She’s mine, Callum. Not yours. Not the pack’s. She’s my daughter, and you swore to me that when it came to her safety, my word would be law, so whatever you know, whatever you’ve seen—”
And then, there was silence, so abrupt that I wondered for a second if I’d lost consciousness or gone spontaneously deaf in both ears.
“You might as well come in,” Callum called, disabusing me of that notion. His voice was dry, like he should have known I’d be hovering at the perimeter of their argument, marking every word. “This concerns you.”
I heard Ali mutter something under her breath but couldn’t make out what. Slowly, deliberately, I made my way to the house, taking my time with each step, not sure I wanted to see the looks on any of their faces.
I was right to worry.
Ali looked like Ali, Callum like Callum, and Casey looked like he wanted to kill me.
Like any of this was my fault. For once, I hadn’t done anything. Yet.
“How were your finals?” Ali asked, breaking the silence with a question that sounded so normal that I wondered for an instant if I’d imagined their yelling a moment before.
“Come on, Bryn—my summer plans are just as subject to your state of groundedness as yours are. Did you pass?”
With my luck, Dev’s summer plans probably involved attempting to organize a werewolf theater festival. I shuddered to think of the number of roles I’d have to play when the surplus of males in the pack refused to don curly blonde wigs and play girls in the tradition of the original Shakespearean plays.
“I passed,” I said. “And for the record, I haven’t agreed to any of your so-called plans yet.”
With Devon, things were easy. Besides Ali, he was the only one I could look at without thinking of the rest of the pack.
“You don’t have to go, you know,” Devon said, his voice uncharacteristically understated. “If you decide you don’t want to, if you’d—for instance—rather hitch a ride into Denver and have a night on the town such as only I can show you …”
My look stopped Devon mid-sentence.
“Sorry. It’s just … you smell like him.” Devon said the words lightly, but a muscle in his jaw tensed. “You haven’t seen him in weeks, you didn’t touch him, and you still smell like him.”
That was news to me. Self-consciously, I sniffed at my own arm, and a couple of town girls glanced at me and snickered. They probably thought I was checking myself for BO.
“I don’t smell anything,” I told Devon, ignoring the townies.
Devon didn’t reply—he just twirled his pen around his fingers like a tiny, ink-filled baton. “Come on,” he tried again. “You. Me. Netflix.”
He was every bit as bad as Ali, pulling me back from the edge just before I dove headfirst into the abyss below.
Screw the townies, I thought, and giving them a real show, I butted my head gently against Devon’s chest, and he rested his chin on the top of my skull.
“You know I’m going,” I said, speaking directly into his shoulder.
He sighed, once quietly and once with the melodrama I’d come to expect from him. “Yes. I know. Nobody puts Baby in the corner, et cetera, et cetera, blah, blah.”
The fact that he could attach not one but two “blah”s on the end of a Dirty Dancing quote conveyed the true depths of his sour mood.
“I’ll be fine.”
Devon didn’t reply.
“Chase wouldn’t hurt me.” Even if Chase lost it, even if Callum and the Rabid were duking it out for dominance in his head, if I’d gotten under Chase’s skin half as much as he’d gotten under mine, I’d be fine.
Devon said his next words so quietly that I almost didn’t catch them. “It’s not Chase I’m worried about.”
I tried to make him repeat himself, but he wouldn’t, and that, more than anything, told me that the person Devon was worried about wasn’t me, and it wasn’t Chase.
It was Callum.
“You can’t honestly be worried about that,” I told Dev, but even as the words left my mouth, I sensed his wolf stirring.
Females were to be protected, but the alpha was to be obeyed.
“Callum would never hurt me.” That had been my litany since the moment he’d rescued me from under the sink. Crooned to me. Talked to me. Banished the haze.
“If you break your permissions, he won’t have a choice.”
I jabbed my fist into Devon’s stomach hard enough to knock the air out of a normal boy. He didn’t respond at all.
“I’m not going to break the conditions,” I said. “I didn’t last time. I’m not stupid.”
That statement was met with rather insulting silence.
“I followed instructions last time, didn’t I?”
More silence, and then, finally, Devon broke into a song from Annie.
“‘Hard Knock Life,’” I said. “Seriously?”
Devon shrugged, but I noticed that he didn’t step away from me, like his wolf thought that if they just stayed close enough to me, I’d be okay.
“Trust me, Dev. I’ll be fine.”
My words must have sounded like truth, because he backed off, but in the depths of my brain, I wondered if the future would make a liar out of me. Because the last time I saw Chase, I wasn’t fine. I didn’t break permissions. I didn’t force Callum’s hand.
Chase hadn’t laid a finger on me.
But I hadn’t been fine.
Come out, come out, wherever you are, little one. No sense in hiding from the Big Bad Wolf. I’ll always find you in the end. …
The only way I was going to be fine—now or ever—was when I knew exactly what had happened to Chase, and knew that it wasn’t going to happen to anyone else.
Ever.
Again.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU WOULD PRETEND FOR A SINGLE second that you don’t know exactly what’s going to happen!”
“Alison—”
“Don’t you ‘Alison’ me, Callum. You want to talk conditions, what were my conditions?”
“Ali—”
I recognized the voices from twenty yards away: Ali, Callum, and Casey. They were yelling so loudly that they didn’t even seem to be aware of my approach, which was really something, because I wasn’t making any attempt to mask the sound of my footsteps, and Callum and Casey should have heard me coming from a mile off.
“This is between me and Callum, Casey. If you can’t back me up, keep your mouth closed.”
Ali’s voice lowered in volume, and I gulped on Casey’s behalf. If she’d been using that tone with me, I would have turned tail and run, no questions asked.
“I don’t know why I even—”
A low, unidentifiable sound, issued from Callum’s throat, stopped Casey’s words in their tracks. I wasn’t sure if Callum had growled in warning or in threat, but either way, Casey didn’t finish what was probably an entirely inadvisable sentence.
I don’t know why I even bother?
I don’t know why I even try?
I don’t know why I even act like there’s the smallest chance you might listen to me?
It didn’t matter. Even I could tell that Ali wasn’t in the mood to hear any of the above. She was challenging Callum. Casey was trying to get her to back off. Our house had somehow become Dominance Issue Central, and I had a sinking suspicion that it was my fault.
Casey was mad at Ali. Ali was furious with Callum. And Callum was talking in low, even tones, like he couldn’t have forced both of them to their knees in under a second if he’d taken it in his head to do so.
This wasn’t good.
I stopped walking. I stopped breathing. I didn’t move.
“I left my family behind. I left my friends. I never contacted any of them again. I kept the pack’s secrets, and what did you give me in return?” This wasn’t a rhetorical question. Ali was waiting for an answer, and Callum replied, his voice gentle, like he was reprimanding a child instead of facing down the rage of a mama bear. “I gave you Bryn.”
“She’s mine, Callum. Not yours. Not the pack’s. She’s my daughter, and you swore to me that when it came to her safety, my word would be law, so whatever you know, whatever you’ve seen—”
And then, there was silence, so abrupt that I wondered for a second if I’d lost consciousness or gone spontaneously deaf in both ears.
“You might as well come in,” Callum called, disabusing me of that notion. His voice was dry, like he should have known I’d be hovering at the perimeter of their argument, marking every word. “This concerns you.”
I heard Ali mutter something under her breath but couldn’t make out what. Slowly, deliberately, I made my way to the house, taking my time with each step, not sure I wanted to see the looks on any of their faces.
I was right to worry.
Ali looked like Ali, Callum like Callum, and Casey looked like he wanted to kill me.
Like any of this was my fault. For once, I hadn’t done anything. Yet.
“How were your finals?” Ali asked, breaking the silence with a question that sounded so normal that I wondered for an instant if I’d imagined their yelling a moment before.
