Goodbye, my sweet girl. Despite what you may think, I’ve always been so very proud of you and love you dearly.
We will meet again on the plain reserved for our kind in the netherworld.
Until then, I love you. Follow your heart and everything will be fine. You know what you need to do, you always have done.
Mom
xxxxxxxxxx
***
Two days later, Erin’s house was bare and empty around her as she went from room to room for one final check, ensuring there was nothing which she’d forgotten to pack. It felt strange to see each room so hollow and without the familiar adornments of furniture, trinkets and pictures.
Between the bare walls and the empty floors, it was almost as if Erin had never been there at all. But she had. The memories of her time there were burned in to the foundations of the house and if the walls could talk they’d have quite the story to tell.
“Is everything all packed?” Sean asked from the doorway where he stood with Jack strapped to his chest.
“I think so.” Erin nodded.
“The tenants are due to arrive around six so we’ve still got plenty of time,” Sean said, checking his watch.
Erin wasn’t selling her home; instead she was merely renting it out. The money from the tenants was being placed in to a generic bank account used by all the pack. The tenants would never meet Erin or know who she was; it was too dangerous for them to do so.
It was surreal to imagine someone else living in her home, someone else experiencing the highs and lows of relationships and family as she had done.
“And I mean, the tenants, they will be safe here? There won’t be any more wolf attacks?” Erin fretted.
“They’ll be fine,” Sean reassured her, smiling. “Once we leave, so does our scent. The other wolves will know we’ve gone, don’t worry.”
“I don’t like the thought of us having a scent!” Erin made a face of mock disgust.
“Think of it as more of a musk,” Sean quipped.
“Ewww, that isn’t an improvement.” Erin crinkled her nose.
“So are you ready to leave?” Sean asked, bouncing slightly as he stood in the doorway for Jack’s benefit. Their little boy loved to be rocked and bounced about.
“Almost.”
Erin wasn’t sure if she was ever going to be ready to leave her house because she was leaving so much more than bricks and cement, she was leaving behind her entire life and the woman she had once been.
She’d already severed any ties with her workplace, telling them that motherhood was her true calling in life and that she wouldn’t be returning to work. People were naturally disappointed, as she was well liked in the office, and so she made promises in vain of how she would return and visit them all from time to time. She knew that in a couple of months, a year, Erin would become just a memory to them, a girl they had once worked with and rarely thought of. It saddened her to realize just how easily she could be erased from someone’s life.
The only person she wasn’t willing to leave was her mother, but in the wake of her mother’s death there was nothing connecting her to her old life. What mattered now was Jack, and Sean, and keeping their family safe. And the ranch would keep them safe.
“You look sad,” Sean commented with concern as he watched Erin glance around the hallway with vacant eyes.
“I’m just…taking it all in.” She shrugged her shoulders. “I never thought I’d be leaving this place so soon, let alone to join a wolf pack! It’s all a little crazy, more than a little crazy! Sometimes I’m not even sure that I believe it myself.”
“It’s a big change,” Sean sympathized.
“But it’s the right one.” Erin nodded with certainty. “I know it’s what my mother would have wanted. Her letter…somehow it set me free to follow my own path.”
“I’m sure that was her intention.” Sean smiled.
“Yeah,” Erin sighed. She was reluctant to leave her home but time was getting away from her. It was a long drive to the ranch.
“It’s just a house.” Sean noted, sensing her discomfort.
“It’s more than that,” Erin corrected him. “It’s the final thing that connects me to who I used to be, to the old Erin. Once someone else is living here, I fear that the old me will just completely fade away.”
“That won’t happen.” Sean walked over and placed an arm around her, giving her a gentle squeeze. “Wherever you live, you’ll always be you. You’ve got a strong, unbreakable spirit, Erin. Never forget that.”
“You think so?”
“I know so,” Sean confirmed fondly.
“Just give me five more minutes, okay?”
“Okay, I’ll wait out by the car.”
Sean wandered outside in to the mid-morning sunlight as Erin turned and headed upstairs. She wanted to have one last look round her home. No mattered who lived there, she would always consider it as hers.
Upstairs, she looked in on her bedroom, the scene of such terror; such anguish and pain. Now the room lay empty and innocent. You’d never know that a vicious attack had taken place there. Erin found it disconcerting how the slate could be wiped clean. To her, her home housed a thousand memories, some good and some bad, but to the new tenants it was a blank canvas awaiting all the memories that they were going to make there.
But more than the house, Erin knew she would miss her mother. Her reluctance to leave was tied in with this being the final place her mother knew of. When she left her, left for the ranch, she was entering the unknown and she was scared that her memories of her mother wouldn’t be quite so strong there.
Already, Erin missed the older woman. Missed calling her up, hearing her familiar voice and more often than not her disapproving tone. Erin’s mother had been her life raft, without her Erin feared she would drown her own mistakes. But now she had Sean, and she knew he would always save her, they were mates after all.
Finally, taking a deep breath, Erin walked out of her bedroom and shut the door behind her. She noticed how the door had been swiftly replaced. Gone were the scratch marks and the dents, in its place stood a new, polished door, perfect and without flaws.
Walking down the staircase, Erin recalled the first time she’d had sex with Sean. There, upon the lower steps, he’d entered her and changed her life forever. She felt like there needed to be a plaque on the wall or something just to mark the event. But instead there was nothing, the moment existed only in her mind, the physical location unblemished by it all.
Stepping outside, Erin sighed again. She knew in her heart that this was the final time she’d ever lay eyes upon her house. Closing the door, she turned the key in the lock and backed away from the home she had so dearly loved.
“I’ve got a guy who will run the key into town for us, to give to the realtor,” Sean explained, reaching out a strong hand for the keys. Erin dropped them in to his palm, feeling as empty as the rooms she’d just examined.
“It will be okay,” Sean said soothingly as she got in to the passenger seat and secured her belt. Turning, she looked at Jack in his car seat behind them. He was already asleep; she had no doubt that he’d sleep the entire journey to the ranch.
“Instead of thinking of this as the end of one chapter, think of it as the beginning of a new one,” Sean suggested, his eyes bright with optimism. “This is the start of our lives together, Erin. You, me and Jack, we will be a family together.”
“Yes, we will.” Erin smiled as she leaned back in her seat.
“Besides, we’ll soon have another addition to the family/” Sean turned and said to her, grinning knowingly.
“What?” Erin’s eyes shot open.
“You’re pregnant, sweetheart. Can’t you tell yet? I can. And it’s a girl, how exciting. Our little family will be complete.”
“I’m having a girl?” Erin looked down at her currently flat stomach in disbelief. Then she realized that it made sense. Her heightened emotions, her desire to cling to the past, it was all thanks to her p
regnancy hormones, she’d just been too distracted to notice the cues.
“I’ve always wanted a daughter.” Sean beamed excitedly.
“A little sister for Jack,” Erin mused aloud, wrapping her head around it all.
“Okay, so are you all set to start the next chapter in your life?” Sean asked as he turned the key in the ignition and the car came to life. It was packed to capacity all around them with the various souvenirs of Erin’s previous life.
Erin looked out at her house, out at the memories of what had been and then turned to Sean, her life mate, and nodded.
“Yes,” she confirmed. “I’m ready.”
“You are going to love the ranch,” Sean gushed as he backed out of the driveway. “There’s so much land, and horses. We can teach Jack and his sister to ride horses it will be amazing.”
“It sounds…perfect,” Erin admitted, looking out of the window as her neighborhood sped past. She considered waving goodbye but decided against it.
“It is perfect, all my life I’ve dreamed of finding my mate and raising a family there,” Sean disclosed.
Erin smiled at the sweetness of his admission. Her dreams had never been that grandiose. All she’d ever wanted to be was happy. She wanted to escape the darkness her mother had warned her against and find her true self. Yet here she was, embracing the wolf blood within her and joining a pack and it felt…right. It felt like what she was destined to do. Finally, Erin didn’t feel in conflict with herself. She was following the right path, the path she wanted to go down.
“I’m happy,” she admitted aloud, liking how it sounded. And truly she was. It wasn’t the conventional happily ever after most girls yearn for but to Erin it was perfect nonetheless. She’d found the man of her dreams, would soon have two beautiful children, the only missing piece of the puzzle was her mother, but they would be reunited in death, her mother’s note had promised as much.
“And if you’re happy, I’m happy.” Sean smiled, pulling out of town and joining the freeway.
Erin closed her eyes and let the motion of the car lull her to sleep. When she awoke, she would be at the ranch and about to embark on her new life as the mate of the pack’s leader. It was impossible yet perfect, and she couldn’t have been happier.
THE END
Phases of Passions II (Trilogy Bundle) (Werewolf Romance - Paranormal Romance) Page 10
