The Pack: Mercy's Choice (Born to be Were series book 2)

by Flynn, Donna

  The Pack:

  Mercy’s Choice

  Book Two of the Born to be Were series

  By Donna Flynn

  Copyright 2012 © by Donna Flynn

  Cover art by Kimberly Wagner

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law

  All characters in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to any person living or deceased is a coincidence.

  Thanks to my mom, who believed in me from the very start. I love you for all you do for me. Thanks also to my cover artist, Kim, who I know I annoy and bother constantly with all of my ideas and changes. Most of all, thanks to the readers who have made The Pack a success, and offered words of encouragement to a new author. I could not do what I do without you!

  Chapter One

  Mercy sat on the front porch swing of her family’s home, nestled high in the mountains of North Carolina, listening to her family and friends laughing and telling jokes inside the house after the enormous Thanksgiving meal they had shared. In the past, she would have been right there with them laughing and having a good time, carefree and unconcerned about the future, but now she just couldn’t muster her usual festive mood. Not when her life had been turned upside down by the secret those closest to her had been hiding from her since she was six years old. A secret that changed her life in ways that were mind-boggling.

  Only a few weeks before, her biggest worry had been what to wear to school and whether her cheerleading squad would ever get to know their new routine. Now, though, she lived with the fear that she might morph into a monster that could kill her cheerleader friends and the entire football team. She shook her head sadly, tears welling in her eyes as she remembered how horrifying it had been to wake after an attack by rogue wolves that almost killed her, and realize that she was now the stuff of her own nightmares. A Werewolf, or pack as her brothers liked to say, the exact monster that killed her parents. It scared the living hell out of her just thinking about what she had become. That deep inside of her an animal lay that was violent, unpredictable, and now in control of her life. She was deathly afraid of the wolf inside of her, feared what it might do if she couldn’t learn to control it. She didn’t know if she could handle it, didn’t know if she had what it took to make it in their world and she wasn’t sure she wanted to try. But in reality, she had very little choice.

  Another round of laughter filtered out of the window that had been cracked open to allow in some of the cool November air, bringing her out of her thoughts. One laugh stood out from all the rest, a laugh she would know anywhere, one that used to bring her considerable joy. That laugh belonged to Alec, the one person she had thought would never betray her, the guy she had worshipped since he took her hand when she was a grief-stricken six-year-old, and promised to be there for her always.

  For years, she had harbored a secret crush on Alec, and when he reappeared in her life after a lengthy separation, she had promptly fallen totally, hopelessly in love with him. To her great surprise, he claimed to love her too, and for a brief time she had thought that they had a chance at a future together but now everything had changed. Now that she knew he was a werewolf and had seen him in his wolf form, she was terrified to be around him. She knew he would never hurt her, but she couldn’t get past seeing him shift from the gorgeous guy she had worshipped for so long into the animal she had lived in fear of since her parent’s deaths. Even knowing what she did about him, God help her, she still loved him, and couldn’t fathom the idea of never seeing him again. She shivered and wrapped her arms tightly around her midsection grieving for everything she had lost because of the lies she had been told.

  “It’s not right the way you exclude yourself from everyone else,” Gregory, Alec’s father and her new Alpha, said. He walked out of the shadows of the porch, where he had been silently watching her. Since finding out she was a werewolf she had withdrawn from everyone, even his son, who loved her more than anything in the world. It wasn’t a good situation for her, or anyone else in her life. Her sorrowfulness was making his son miserable, which was worrisome. As an Alpha and the heir to his father’s pack, Alec usually had absolute control over his wolf, but given the turmoil of late, he worried his son’s tight rein over his wolf would slip if she did not come around soon.

  Mercy watched warily as Gregory approached, unsure how to react in his presence. She had claimed him as her Alpha, which essentially gave him full control over her and her wolf. Accepting him as her Alpha had not been a well-thought-out plan, but there hadn’t been much choice at the time. Alec had been dying, and she had needed Gregory to force the transformation from wolf to human upon her so that she could heal him. It had been entirely her choice, but still she felt resentment towards him and his close proximity made her extremely nervous.

  Gregory felt her panic as he sat next to her, leaning back to stare at the girl who would one day be his daughter-in-law if she could find a way past all the fear and anger, she was currently experiencing. As his son’s Bond Mate, Mercy was an integral part of the pack, but she had yet to comprehend that or anything else that had to do with being a werewolf. He noticed her jaw clench, and she moved further into the corner of the swing as far away from him as she could get, briskly rubbing her hands together. That gesture displayed her nervousness and told him that she wasn’t any closer to accepting him than she had been before he left a few weeks ago. It hurt considerably, given their history.

  When she was a child, his wolf had been caught in a hunter’s trap, and she had healed him. They had become fast friends while he was in wolf form, and he had come to care for her tremendously as human over the years that she had lived with her brothers. Finding out she was his son’s Bond Mate had only increased his love for her, but now she had not uttered a single word to him since the attack, and it broke his heart. As her friend and Alec’s father, he would do anything to ease her pain, but if she refused to talk, to learn about their way of life, he wasn’t sure how to go about helping her. Seeing she clearly was going to ignore him once again, he decided he would prod her and see if she responded. “You can ignore me. Turn away when I speak to you, I respect your right to do so, but on this day above any other, I had thought you might be thankful. If not for your family who love you dearly, then for the life you still have.” Her expression hardened, and he knew she was feeling none of those things. She was bitter and had every right to be, but they had done what they thought was best when she had come to them a broken child of six who had lost both of her parents in a vicious wolf attack. Had they made the best choices? Maybe not, but at the time it seemed the only way to handle the situation and now despite everything they had done to keep her happy and safe, all she could see were the lies and deceit.

  Mercy debated ignoring Gregory, as she had been doing since finding out she was a werewolf, but her curiosity finally got the better of her and she broke her silence. “I’m mad, I think I have the right after all the lies you have all fed me.” He opened his mouth to reply, but she cut him off before he could utter a word. “I trusted you once. I healed you with my own two hands and made you a friend. You returned that by lying to me, keeping from me the very nature of what I am. I want to know why, Gregory! Why would you all do such a thing to me?”

  He had been waiting for that question, but was sure his answer wasn’t going to soothe her. “None of us wanted to lie to you, but we did what we thought was best at the time. When you
came to us, you were so scared of wolves that we feared it would have driven you insane to know the truth about your heritage.”

  “It’s driving me crazy now,” she snarled, jumping up from the bench to stand before him, her face red with rage. “I saved your life, and because of that my parents were slaughtered by the very thing you want me to embrace. I don’t see this as a good thing, Gregory! When I think of wolves all I see is my parent’s bodies on the floor of our home, their blood soaking the tile that my mother laid lovingly by hand.” Her shoulders shook as she saw it all again in her mind. Tears rolled down her cheeks, she fought to breathe, and she felt her wolf stir inside of her in response to her upset.

  Gregory lowered his head, unable to look at her, shame for the few of their kind who couldn’t exist peacefully, filling him. “I’m sorry, you will never know how sorry I am that your parents died, but it was not because you saved me, it was because…”

  “Mercy,” Alec said from the front door, coming to her side hastily. “What happened?” he demanded, reaching for her, wanting to comfort her.

  “Nothing,” she murmured, turning quickly away from him and avoiding his embrace.

  “Please, Angel, let me help,” he begged, saddened by her refusal to let him hold her and offer the comfort she so obviously needed.

  “I have to go,” she mumbled, not even bothering to look in his direction before running inside to get away from them.

  “Mercy,” Lucan called out, walking into the hall from the living room as she ran into the house, watching helplessly as she raced up the stairs, her sobs echoing off the walls of the hall. His heart ached for her. It was killing him that the girl he had raised as his own child now hated him and everything he was.

  “She’s going to be fine,” Nina, his Bond Mate, said behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist, sensing his pain and feeling it as if it were her own.

  “I know she has every right to be angry, I would be too; but it hurts that she won’t talk to me about it.” He turned and held her against him, needing her embrace like the air he breathed.

  “You have to let her grieve. Everything she thought she was is now in question. It will take time to accept this,” she reminded him for the hundredth time since Mercy found out they were all werewolves.

  He hugged her close, thankful that the fates had seen to it that he had found her when he needed her most. He had no idea how he would have gotten through the last few weeks if she had not been by his side, giving him the strength to accept Mercy’s anger towards them all.

  “Come on, the others are waiting on us for dessert.” She stepped back, taking his hand in hers, pulling him towards the living room.

  “Well we can’t have that,” he joked. “God knows if Cade doesn’t get his pumpkin pie there will be hell to pay,” he chuckled, but he didn’t feel any joy. He missed Mercy’s presence, her laughter, and most of all the easy way they all used to be together.

  *****

  “I’m glad you made it,” Alec said, taking a seat next to his father on the bench that Mercy had vacated. Her hasty departure stung. It was not the first time in the last few weeks that she had fled while he was around, but it still hurt the same every time.

  “I would never miss a holiday with you if it could be helped,” Gregory told him sincerely.

  “I know,” Alec murmured. Since his mother’s death when he was four, Alec’s father had been there for every baseball game, every holiday, and every major event in his life. They were more than father and son, they were best friends, and at times like the present one, he was grateful to have him by his side.

  Gregory felt his sons upset, and his heart ached for him. “So, Mercy is still stewing?”

  “She doesn’t really talk to anyone. Even her best friend Gina can’t seem to get through to her,” Alec confided. They had invited Gina over hoping she could make Mercy see the finer aspects of being a werewolf, but it had backfired. Once she had realized Gina was pack, she figured out rather quickly that they had asked her to protect Mercy and be her friend when she had moved there. The confrontation had ended with both girls crying hysterically, and Mercy promising to call Gina once she had it all straight in her mind, but as far as he knew, she had not attempted to contact her.

  “I’m worried about what’s going to happen when she goes back to school,” Gregory told him with a sigh. “If she can’t accept what she is, she won’t be able to control her wolf when she is around humans. Have you thought about that? What if she gets angry and starts to shift, what will you do then?”

  “I can handle her if it comes to that. I am her mate, and an Alpha, I can control her wolf if it tries to show itself.” He would hate to use their bond to force her to do anything, but if she were to start shifting in front of human’s he would, even though it would kill him. As the future Alpha of his pack, he knew that they had to keep what they were secret from humans. Very few humans knew of their existence, and it had to stay that way if the packs were to survive.

  “It’s not that I think you can’t handle it, son, but I worry she might fight you. Besides that we have no real idea how dominant her wolf is, she could be stronger than we know.” Gregory knew that as a Born Were (a female-born pack), one of the rarest of their kind, Mercy was special. Her wolf’s abilities would be enhanced tremendously thanks to her DNA, but to what degree no one knew.

  “Dad, we have yet to see what she can do and I know that although she won’t admit it right now, she does feel our bond,” Alec said, but he too was also exceedingly concerned about Mercy’s future. If she didn’t learn to accept her wolf, there was the very real possibility that it might drive her over the brink of sanity, and that was something he did not want to dwell on.

  “This would have been so much easier if she would have claimed you before finding out what we are,” Gregory told him.

  “I would never have let her do that without explaining the consequence of her actions,” Alec said, filled with outrage that his father would even suggest it. “How could you say such a thing?”

  “Calm down, son. My concern is for you and the pain this is causing. I should not have spoken my thoughts out loud.” Gregory placed his hand on his son's shoulder hoping to bring peace to him, but Alec shook it off and began to pace in front of him.

  “I just need to make her see that we are not animals. That our people are good and not the monsters she believes us to be,” Alec said. He was frustrated by weeks of distance from his mate and more than a little out of sorts.

  “Son, she’s going to need time. Her parents' deaths have made her fearful of wolves. To know she is one must be terrifying for her.”

  “When I think of her so small and helpless in that house, with her parents who were both dead and unable to protect her.” He shook with outrage. “She could have been killed, or worse, they could have taken her and done God knows what...” He growled, his wolf surfacing with his upset, wanting to get out and run off the anger that had woken him. Alec felt his wolf fighting inside of him, forcing the shift that it had been denied for far too long.

  “Shift, son, our pack members, are keeping an eye on the woods, it is safe for you to run,” his father urged, regretting the pain his son was going through. If he had been a better father, he would have insisted they tell Mercy what she was the moment he realized she was more to his son than just a friend. It might have saved a lot of heartache for them both.

  “I’m fine,” Alec growled, despite the fact he was far from it. His spine tingled as it readied itself to shift and his wolf howled deep inside him begging to get free as it always did when he was angered, but this time he couldn’t control it.

  “You are not fine. You have not shifted since Mercy found out we are werewolves,” Cade said coming out of the front door, his concern for Alec evident upon his face.

  “There has been no need.” He gritted his teeth trying to force his wolf down, something that caused considerable pain when he refused to shift for extended periods.

  �
��Son, you know better,” Gregory said, reaching out to place his hand on his shoulder. “We must live in harmony with our wolf side. By forcing it down, you will only anger it. It will grow strong and take over when you least expect it.”

  “I can’t shift. What if she senses it or worse, sees me?” He bit out, hunching over with a loud hiss of pain as his spine moved to accommodate the shift despite his resistance to it.

  “Then she will see we are not the monsters she thinks we are,” Cade told him sharply.

  “God no,” Alec cried out, falling to the ground, his body transforming into his wolf form even as he fought to remain human. Claws extended from his fingertips, leaving long gouges in the wood below them and fur shot out of his skin covering his hands and arms. rapidly taking over his human form.

  “Son, let it go, you’re hurting yourself,” Gregory told him sternly.

  “Alec!” Mercy screamed, her footsteps as she ran for the front door alerting him that he was out of time.

  “No….” Alec bellowed, his voice inhuman and tortured-sounding. As his mate, she had felt his shift and the pain that now engulfed him had called her to his side.

  “Mercy, don’t go out there!” Lucan yelled, but it was too late to stop her from bursting through the front door.

  “Alec.” Mercy turned immediately to the shadowed end of the porch sensing his presence there, feeling his pain as if it were her own, but stopping dead when she saw the amber eyes that stared at her from the darkness. She backed up quickly, running into her brother who stopped her from falling as Alec’s wolf advanced towards her, its eyes never leaving hers as it slunk closer.

  “Let me go,” she cried out, yanking her arm, trying to get free of Lucan’s hold.

  Alec growled low and deep, a warning to let her go as she asked and Lucan did so instantly, knowing her mate would not understand he was only trying to help.