Ugh. No, thanks. I liked indoor plumbing a bit too much to give it up.
Beside me, Maze stood and started to dress himself, unabashedly swinging his junk around for all to see. No one paid much attention to him though, besides me, because Sarah and Henry were busy staring each other down.
Henry spoke, “I am afraid we will not be leaving unless it’s with Addie, at the very least.”
My eyes nearly bugged out of my head. Did he mean they were going to kidnap me, take me against my will? I might not have had a bright future ahead of myself thanks to the events of recent days, but to go off with strangers was the last thing I wanted to do.
“You will not force her to go,” Sarah said, smacking the table, causing me to jerk in surprise. “I have raised her to be her own woman, and she is more than able to make her own choices. You will not strongarm her like you tried to do me.”
“Why does it matter?” I asked. “Why, after all this time, do you want me to go with you? Seems pointless now, doesn’t it? You’ll never be family to me.”
“Family, no,” Henry said with a nod. He rubbed his grey goatee, meeting Maze’s stare as the younger man, finally clothed, leaned on the wall. “But we are a pack, and the packbond is stronger than the bonds of family. When you’ve shifted, you’ll know.”
The packbond. Seemed a silly nonword. Something an idiot would say, trying to convince someone else they thought was a fool into doing what they wanted. I was not an idiot, nor was I a fool. I might’ve been rash sometimes, but I would not fall for whatever game this Henry was trying to play. Sarah had left the pack for a reason, even if she’d kept it to herself all these years.
And the fact I was part wolf. Or shifter. Or whatever.
This was going to take some getting used to, wasn’t it? Hmm…maybe the whole floating book thing was because of my wolf side. Maybe I wasn’t as crazy as I’d thought I was. Maybe this was all some big misunderstanding because my mom had kept some important things from me.
Or maybe I was extra nuts just debating on it. Maybe this was all one huge hallucination. A shared delusion. Maybe we all took some drugs or something, even though Sarah was the very last person in the entire world who would take any sort of drug.
“I’m not going to shift,” I said, standing and crossing my arms. “Because I’m not going with you.”
Henry gave me a cold, calculated smile. So cold it froze the air between us. “Why? You’ve been kicked out of school, you have no job, nothing beyond this house and your mother, who owes her allegiance to the pack as well. I could tell Maze to throw you over his shoulder and order him to take you with us and he’d have to listen.”
How the heck did this jerk know all that? And Maze wouldn’t do that, would he? I glanced to Maze, who looked guilty at the mere suggestion. “What? So, he doesn’t have a mind of his own?” I asked, both upset and curious.
“Wolves follow their elders and their alpha.” Henry’s answer came quick, but my retort came quicker.
“How about I call the cops and have them drag you out of here in handcuffs? Cry a little and say you tried to kidnap me?” Never had I threatened something like that before, so I was surprised at how easily it flowed off my tongue.
“Whoa,” Maze stepped between Henry and me, holding up a hand to each of us. “As much as I’m turned on by a girl taking charge, I think we should settle down a bit, yeah?”
Turned on by…did he really just say that? I felt my cheeks flush, and I turned to look at Sarah, who remained quiet and pensive at the table. To my shock, my mom kept quiet, even after what Maze said.
This day definitely took a strange turn, didn’t it? Not at all what I’d been expecting. A creepy grandfather who’d been stalking us, apparently, and a weird wolf-boy who had a thing for my underwear and saying the strangest stuff.
“Why don’t we go for a few hours,” Maze suggested, trying to play the peacemaker in a situation where neither side would budge, “and then when we come back, maybe Addie will have changed her mind?” He turned his brown gaze to me, and I felt my skin growing warm.
Probably because I’d seen him naked, seen a whole lot more of the cute guy than I wanted to.
“I’m not—” I was about to tell them I wasn’t going to change my mind, but the look Maze gave me silenced me.
He wordlessly told me, shut up. Agree. Let us leave. Which was fine, because when they came back, Sarah and I could either be gone or ready with baseball bats.
I frowned, muttering, “Fine. Come back at five.” It was…almost six hours away. Plenty of time to prepare ourselves.
Henry frowned, an ugly expression on an old man I wouldn’t be afraid to bludgeon with that imaginary baseball bat. How limber and quick could he be, even as a wolf? He had to be at least seventy years old. Too old to do much damage. “All right, we’ll return at five sharp. And I expect a meal before hearing your decision.” He spun on his heel, motioning to Maze. “Come, pup. Let us go waste some time in the city.”
Maze met my eyes before following him out, his expression sorrowful. Despite how he’d acted in my room, he didn’t seem too bad.
Henry, on the other hand, seemed like an ass.
When they were gone, I glanced to my mom. “What are we going to do?” Never had a question felt so heavy, and never had an answer felt so important.
Sarah shook her head. “I guess I’m going to the, forgive my language, damned grocery store. Come on. I’ll explain what I can. Henry, even though I do not agree with most of what he said, was right. You do deserve to know the truth. I’ve kept it from you for too long.”
“Ooh, goody,” I mumbled.
It was anything but good, really. I kind of wanted to throw up.
Chapter Five – Addie
The grocery store was pretty busy, given it was a Saturday and it was noon, so most of my questions had to wait until we were back in the car. But during the drive there, I got the gist of it: my mom had run away from the pack when she was sixteen because she was in love with someone who wasn’t a wolf.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t the love story for the ages. If it was, I would’ve had a father, two parents who cared about me. Maybe we could’ve better protected ourself against the pack, never been found by Henry and his…Maze.
The Crystal Lake Pack. They had an entire community a few states away. Houses and stores built around some huge lake, pretty much cut off from society. They kept to themselves, which was the reason their presence was not known. The federal government didn’t know about them, so I didn’t feel too bad about not knowing.
As we walked through the store, I let Sarah do most of the talking. She carefully avoided the words wolf, shifter, and pack while they were in public.
Sarah pushed the cart along, guiding us through the aisles, picking whatever she needed off the shelves. I could not believe she was actually going to cook for Henry and Maze. She was more of a frozen TV dinner kind of mother than a warm, home-cooked meal every night kind.
I didn’t agree about making the jerk dinner. The way he’d talked, it was like he expected both Sarah and I to go back with them, like we had no other choice. In reality, we had every choice any other person had, minus the whole get a degree bit. We didn’t have to go to Crystal Lake. We didn’t have to do anything. Henry, whether he was my grandfather or not, was in for a world of surprise when he came back in a few hours and I told him to screw off in a not-so-nice way.
“I missed them at first. I grew up with them,” Sarah went on as we stood before rows and rows of seasonings. “But they’re very traditional. If you do something new they don’t like, you’ll never hear the end of it.”
I said, “Including being with someone who isn’t a…” An older woman walked by, chatting on her phone as she pushed her cart. If I said wolf or shifter, how many people would even notice? Odds were the other shoppers were so lost in their own lives, my mom and I could be talking about murdering Henry and they probably wouldn’t know. Still, I settled with saying, “You know.�
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Sarah reached for the Cajun spice. “Yes, including that. Your father was…so unlike the others. I fell for him so hard and fast. Even my inner—” She coughed. “—let’s just say every part of me liked him. If you decide to go, you’ll understand what I mean.”
Following Sarah to the checkout lanes, I asked as I helped load the conveyor belt, “If I decide to go? Mom, I’m not going. I only said that to get them out of the house.”
I was aghast that my mom had even suggested it. It was crazy. I wasn’t going to go, especially since pack life sounded so restricting. Women still didn’t quite have it as good as men in society, but this was the twenty-first century. People—and shifters—should be able to be with whomever they wanted.
Really, it wasn’t that crazy of a concept.
Sarah chuckled, though it was bitter. “You don’t know Henry. He won’t take no for an answer. Listen, dear. I’ve thought about it before. There was always a part of me that wondered if I was doing the right thing by keeping you from them. They are your family, as bigoted as some of them are. You have the right to meet them and make your own decision about them.”
Biting my lip, I stayed quiet as Sarah paid the cashier once the total was rung up. We walked out of the store and headed to the car in silence. I helped pack the trunk, lost in thought.
Family.
How big was the pack? Were we all actually related, or did we just call each other family because it was what shifters did?
Sliding into the passenger’s seat, I asked, “Does that mean I’m related to Maze?”
Sarah gave me a knowing look as she started the car. It was a look that instantly made me embarrassed for asking.
Not once in my life had I truly been interested in dating. Yes, some guys were nice to look at, but I never felt the urge to do more than look. Always liked the idea of spending time with someone of the opposite sex, but it never happened.
Was it due to the fact I was a shifter and didn’t know it? Was I more biologically programmed to feel attraction toward my own kind?
No, that couldn’t be the case, because what about my father and Sarah? My father had been human, and Sarah had said even her wolf side had been drawn to him.
“Why?” Sarah questioned, eyebrows risen, a slight melody in her voice. “Do you not want to be?” She chuckled, pulling out of the parking lot. “I’m only teasing. No, you’re not. Did you like him? It’s been a while since I’ve been around wolves, but I’m pretty sure he liked you.”
“Mom,” I whined, turning to face the window. I could not handle this right now.
“If there’s one thing you should know about shifters, beside the pack mentality, it’s that we form connections fast, almost immediately. You might not feel it because you haven’t shifted, but if you ever do, you will. It’s natural with us, nothing to be ashamed of.”
I wasn’t so sure about that, but I’d rather not linger on the subject of Maze. “And why is that? Why haven’t I shifted?” I was practically twenty years old; wasn’t it something that should’ve happened by now? “Is it because I’m not a full wolf? Or shifter…whatever.” Saying those words would take some getting used to.
“Being a shifter is passed down genetically. You inherited your wolf from me. She might not be as strong as a full-blooded packmate, but she’s there. Just tucked away deep inside you. In Crystal Lake, they would wait until pups turned thirteen before having them shift.”
“And they just shift, no problem? Is it something you have to think about?” I wanted to know so I could avoid it entirely. Turning into a wolf was not something I wanted to do.
Even if, maybe, it might be kind of cool.
“Not exactly. There’s a little more to it than that, at least for the Crystal Lake Pack. Under a full moon—because anything important is always done under a full moon when it comes to the pack—the alpha scratches the palm of those ready to turn. The wolf inside the alpha, the scratch, the pain…it’s some kind of call. It brings forth the pups’ wolves, allowing them to shift. Think of it like a key to the cage that kept the inner wolf at bay.”
The simile made sense, but something didn’t sit right with me. Thirteen? It just seemed so…young. At thirteen, I wasn’t even in high school yet. At thirteen kids weren’t even done with puberty. “Why so young?”
Sarah turned down our road. “Too young and you risk unleashing a wolf that’s too uncontrolled, but much older than that and it’s harder for both the wolf and the person.” As she pulled into the driveway, she turned her hazel eyes to me. “If you decide to change, if you decide you want that life, it will be hard. And once made, there’s no going back. Once your wolf is unleashed, you can never cage it again. Not really. It’ll always be there, hiding in the back of your head, its instincts pushing on you.”
It sounded miserable. I didn’t want that. Not even a little. Not even my curiosity could smash the worry in my head. A hard shift? No thanks. An easy shift? No thanks to that, too. I wasn’t a wolf; I was a person. A girl. I was fine with my life…mostly.
I helped Mom unload the car, lugging the bags into the kitchen and setting them on the granite countertops. I worked to put away the food, not even stopping as I muttered, “I don’t want pack life. It sounds miserable.”
“Crystal Lake is a good pack. Don’t think I ran away from them because my life was miserable there. It wasn’t. One good thing about them is they’re always there for you—”
“As long as you don’t fall in love with someone who’s not a part of the pack,” I muttered under my breath.
Sarah ignored me. “They’ll protect you, teach you, guide you. Being a part of a pack is something I can’t describe.”
Crossing my arms, I went to sit at the table, staring holes into the wood. Sure, it sounded nice, until someone wanted freedom. Then, apparently, the only way to get said freedom was to run away.
What kind of a family couldn’t accept Sarah’s love for a non-wolf? Seemed racist. Or…species-ist?
“Addie,” Sarah spoke my name softly, moving to sit across from me. She reached for me, and though I wanted to roll my eyes, I moved my arms to let her hold my hands. “I didn’t want to tell you this, because I don’t want it to influence you one way or another, but…” Her eyes shifted to the wall behind me. Whatever it was must’ve been important for her to act so serious.
When she said nothing more, I prompted, “But?”
“But shifters are dying out,” Sarah finally said, squeezing my hands. “We’re not as plentiful as we used to be, in part because humans have evolved their society so quickly these last few centuries. You, me—we’re special.”
How in the world were we special? I didn’t understand, and with the look on Sarah’s face, I wasn’t sure I wanted to.
“Female shifters are rare. Something in our genetics makes girl pups less likely. When you have two shifters making a pup, there’s no doubt the child will be a shifter, too. Cut those odds, say, a human female and a shifter male, it’s half. Shifter females are protected and more controlled because of it.”
I felt sick. “They wanted you to be with another wolf, not my dad.”
“Yes,” Sarah answered. “Because there was no way to be sure whether any kids we had would be wolf or human. When you were born, I knew. Shifters can sense each other. You can’t, because your wolf hasn’t been released.”
I took my hands away from her, getting up. “This is ridiculous. How…” I shook my head. “That’s why Henry wants me to go back with him.” I would never call him grandfather out loud, because the man didn’t deserve the title. “He wants me to pop out babies.”
I was nineteen, and I had no experience whatsoever when it came to that sort of thing. Babies, dating. The opposite sex in general. Just because my body was ready and bleeding every month did not mean I was ready.
Having a baby? And a wolf baby at that?
Heck. No.
“Partly, I’m sure,” Sarah didn’t deny it. “Eventually. I’m sure he’d lov
e that. He always was the kind of wolf to put the needs of the pack and its future above everything else. But, believe it or not, he wasn’t nearly as awful earlier as he can be. I think he really does want you to go with him. You are his granddaughter, and I’ve kept you from him all these years.”
That was Henry being nice? I did not want to know what he was like when he was angry.
“And what’s to say if I go with them, and I decide I want to leave, that they’ll let me go?” I wasn’t sure why I said it. I wasn’t debating on going. I wasn’t. The last thing I needed, the last thing I wanted, was the drama that apparently came hand in hand with a shifter pack.
I wasn’t going to go.
I wasn’t.
So why did I ask? Why was I so curious?
“If they don’t let you go,” Sarah said, more serious than ever as she held my gaze, “I will march into the pack and get you myself. No wolf, alpha or not, father or not, could stop me.”
I leaned back in my chair, moving my hands to my lap, fiddling with my fingers. My thoughts roamed a mile a minute, dozens of different possibilities surfacing in my head. What if I ended up liking the pack? What if I didn’t want to leave? What would it mean for us? Sarah clearly didn’t want to go back, ever.
And on the flipside, what if the pack was worse than Sarah remembered? What if they kidnapped me and hurt her when she tried to come after me?
What if, what if, what if. There were too many possibilities. Too many unknowns.
“You ran away from them,” I said, “and you’d let me visit them?”
“You’re an adult, capable of making your own decisions,” she said. “I took the pack from you before you were even conceived. Who knows? You might be happy with pack life.” Sarah looked sad then, though she fought it with a forced smile as she added, “Especially now, being kicked out of college and all. Which you still haven’t explained, by the way.”
Crystal Lake Pack: The Complete Series: A Reverse Harem Shifter Romance Page 4
