by TJ Klune
I didn’t want to believe her or Patrice, but I knew they were right.
Kelly didn’t push. I didn’t know why until he told me that he would support whatever decision I made. But I thought there was something in his eyes, something in his voice that proved him a liar, even though his heart remained steady.
I loved him fiercely.
What if that changed? What if nothing was ever the same?
It didn’t hurt that he was distracted too, trying to get Carter to open up. Carter, who had turned surly and gruff, who rarely smiled or spoke. I heard their many one-sided conversations as Kelly pleaded with him over the phone to no avail. It upset him, but I didn’t know what else could be done aside from finding Gavin and bringing him back.
Carter had nearly bitten Kelly’s head off when he said as much. I heard the anger in his voice when he snapped that Gavin had made his choice, and he didn’t give a fuck about it.
Elizabeth said Carter spent a lot of time alone in the refuge outside Caswell. I hoped he was finding peace in the trees like I had.
“This isn’t just for you,” Gordo said now, voice soft. “I… look, kid. I won’t pretend to know what it’s like between you and Kelly, but I do know what it’s like to be mated to a wolf. And all the baggage that comes with it. Things are better now with Mark, but we’ve had to fight tooth and nail, fang and claw to get where we are. Loving a wolf… it’s hard. Especially when one of those wolves is a Bennett. We don’t have normal lives.”
I snorted despite myself. “That’s an understatement.”
He ignored me. “But you’ll never know just how deep that love goes until you give in to the truth. You may think you can continue on as you are now, and maybe you will, for a little while at least. But you’ll know deep down that it isn’t everything. That you’re still holding a part of you back. And Kelly doesn’t deserve that. Not after everything. Not after all he did to get to you.”
I hung my head.
“I’m not trying to make you feel bad, kid. Just wanted to lay it all out for you. Give you something to think about.”
I nodded, listening to the sounds of Rico and Chris in the garage, shitty rock music playing from the old stereo.
Gordo’s chair creaked as he sat back. “We have a fight on our hands. One day, and one day soon, we’ll find him. And when we do, it’s either going to be him or us. And we’ll need everyone that we can get by our side at their full strength.”
I looked up at him. “Your dad.”
“Yeah.”
“And your brother.”
His expression tightened. “I don’t give a fuck about—”
“Don’t lie, Gordo. Not to me. Not when you’re giving me shit about the truth.”
His knuckles popped as he curled his hand into a fist. “I….” He shook his head. “Goddammit. I don’t know what to think about… him.”
“Gavin.”
“Yeah.”
“He looks like you.”
“The fuck he does,” Gordo growled. “Mangy-ass motherfucker.”
I laughed.
Gordo looked surprised, and his lips quirked. “Bastard.”
I sobered, putting my glasses back on.
Little wolf, little wolf, can’t you see?
“I’ll make you a deal.”
He looked wary. “What?”
“I’ll go through with this. What I need to do. To get my memories back. But you have to promise me that when we find Gavin, when we bring him back, you’ll treat him like you treat me.”
Gordo scowled. “And how’s that?”
“Like I’m your brother.”
Gordo’s expression stuttered. He opened his mouth but closed it. “Fuck. Kid. Robbie, you are my brother.”
“I know. But so is he. And he deserves to know it. From you. From all of us.”
Gordo closed his eyes, breathing through his nose.
He didn’t even give me shit when I rose from my chair and rounded the desk, then leaned over and hugged him. He brought his hand up and gripped my arm. “Yeah,” he eventually said. “Okay. I… I’ll do what I can.”
“I know you will,” I mumbled into his hair.
“So, deal, then?”
“Deal.”
“Good.” He shoved me off him. “Because the full moon is tomorrow, and everyone’s coming back from Maine. I already told them you’d do it. Now get the hell out of my office. You have work to do, and I don’t pay you to fuck around.”
“You what!”
He ignored me, squinting at his computer, typing with one hand in that hunt-and-peck method I’d come to know.
“Gordo!”
“Get out.”
I went.
Gordo offered me a ride home, since he was headed to the pack house anyway, but I waved him off. I wanted to walk. Clear my head. Put my thoughts together.
He hesitated before nodding.
Out on the street, people waved at me.
I waved back, but I didn’t stop to talk to them. I didn’t have the words yet.
The people of Green Creek had been relieved at our return, though they’d been scared at first when they saw some of our pack missing. They’d calmed when Gordo and Ox explained (leaving out some of the more violent details) that Joe and the others would be away for a little while longer.
I’d felt guilt at the look on Bambi’s face when she’d come running toward Rico.
He grinned at her, but she stopped in front of him, eyes wide.
“You’re different,” she whispered.
Rico’s smile faltered. “Uh. Yeah.” He scratched the back of his neck. “I guess… I guess I am. Got myself a little full moon problem.” He glanced away.
And I said, “He saved my life. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him. And he came back to you because he knew you’d murder him if he died.”
They both stared at me.
And then Bambi launched herself at him, wrapping her legs around his waist. He held her up by her thighs, and she cursed him, telling him he was fucking stupid, and how dare he scare her like that, and show me your eyes, show me your damn wolf eyes, and then he’d growled at her, and I realized I probably didn’t want to witness what was going to happen next, so I left them to it.
But when I turned around to walk away, I almost walked smack into Dominique and Jessie, and that wasn’t any better, given how Jessie was getting her own welcome home.
I left the town behind, heading for home. There was a crispness to the air, the leaves beginning to change colors and dropping to the ground. Every now and then a car passed me by, but I didn’t look up from the road.
At least not until I heard the woop woop of a siren as a car pulled up behind me, tires crunching in the gravel on the side of the road.
“Sir, I need you to stay right where you are,” a voice announced from a speaker. “I’ve had reports of a wild animal on the loose.”
I grinned and shook my head as I turned around.
Kelly Bennett climbed out of his cruiser, straightening his duty belt before closing the door. The light bar was flashing red and blue.
“Wild animal? Sounds serious.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Oh, it is. You gotta be careful ’round these parts. Things in the woods like you wouldn’t believe. Mountain lions. Maybe even a bear or two.”
“Is that all?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Heard stories.”
“About?”
His eyes flashed orange. “Wolves.”
“I think I can handle myself.”
“That right? Well. Might put me at ease if I could escort you wherever you need to be.”
“I don’t know where that is.”
His smile faded slightly. “You sure about that?”
Shit. “Gordo called you.”
He shrugged.
“Fucking witches,” I muttered.
“Didn’t say much,” Kelly said. “Just that you were walking home. He thought you could use some company.”
“And that’s all he said.” It wasn’t a question.
“He might have said a little more,” Kelly admitted. He leaned back against the front of his cruiser, crossing his legs. It was strange, really, this simple act of him being here as he was. He made it hard for me to breathe in all the best ways. And I understood what Gordo had been saying in his office. About me. About Kelly and what he did or didn’t deserve. About all of us. It made sense in ways it hadn’t even a few minutes ago.
Because there was this guy. This man. This wolf. And he was looking at me like he never wanted to see anything else. I knew as sure as I knew anything else that if I said no, if I said I wanted to stay as I was now, he’d be fine with it. He’d be okay. He’d support me, and he wouldn’t push.
But I owed him more.
I owed him everything.
I moved toward him as he leaned against his cruiser in the autumn sunlight. He spread his legs, allowing me to step between them. His hands went to my hips, fingers tugging on the hem of my work shirt, my name stitched in red on my chest.
He said, “Hey,” and “Hi,” and “Hello,” and I knew I would do whatever it took. He never stopped fighting for me. I needed to do the same. For him. For myself.
For us.
I pressed my forehead against his, breathing him in, and it was grass and lake water and so much goddamn sunshine.
“I’m scared,” I whispered.
He said, “I know you are. But I’m going to be with you every step of the way. No matter what.”
He kissed me, warm and sweet.
Which, of course, was ruined a moment later when Chris and Tanner drove by, honking the horn, hollering out the open window. They slowed but didn’t stop. I flipped them off but never stopped kissing Kelly. I heard them laugh as the truck sped up, heading for the houses at the end of the lane.
“We got this,” Kelly said. “All right? We got this.”
I sighed. “I know. I just….” I shook my head. “What if this changes? You and me?”
“Then we adapt,” he said. “We grow. We learn. And we do it together. The two of us. I love you, Robbie. No matter who you are.”
We stayed there for a time.
Eventually we moved on.
That night we lay curled together in our bed in the blue house. He fell asleep first, and I watched him as the night stretched on.
“Okay,” I whispered to him. “Okay.”
Nightfall on an autumn evening.
The moon was full and bright.
The pack was together again.
We ran through the woods.
Into the clearing.
Bambi was there, laughing and trailing after a black wolf with white paws like socks (much to Rico’s dismay and Chris and Tanner’s delight). He was still learning, apt to stumble, not quite used to four legs. He’d learn. I thought Bambi would be pack, and soon. Jessie was making rumblings of needing to open up membership for Team Human, seeing as how the numbers had dwindled. Ox and Joe were going to talk to her in the coming weeks. I didn’t think they had anything to worry about. It probably didn’t hurt that Bambi was pregnant, though I didn’t think Rico knew. Elizabeth was the first to figure it out, given how her scent had changed. We were all waiting to see how long it would take Rico. Chris and Tanner had a bet going. Chris said it’d be another month or two. Tanner thought he wouldn’t know until he was actually holding the kid in his arms. And since it’d happened before Rico had been turned, the kid would be human.
A child.
In the Bennett pack.
Carter trailed after Kelly, rubbing up against him at every chance he got. I watched them from the sidelines, sitting with Patrice and Aileen. Carter was thinner than he’d been even a few weeks before. He had a haunted look in his eyes that never seemed to fade. Kelly was worried. I was too.
“You can run with them,” Aileen said quietly. “There’s still time, boyo.”
I shook my head, the itch of the full moon maddening. “It’s okay.”
“In your head,” Patrice said. “Stuck. What are you afraid of?”
“Most things.”
“Ah. I see.”
I looked at them. “You think this will work?”
“If you want it to,” Aileen said. “There’s only so much we can do, Robbie. Magic isn’t… it’s not the be-all and end-all. It’s not wish fulfillment. It can be a dangerous thing depending on the user.”
“Livingstone?”
She shook her head. “Nothing. I don’t know how he’s done it, but he’s turned ghost.”
“Gordo says we need to be together in order for us to beat him.”
Aileen and Patrice exchanged a look that I couldn’t decipher. “He’s right.”
“Do you think it’ll be enough?”
Patrice sighed. “It has ta be. He won’t stop. He’s wolf now. And he’s tasted blood.”
“How?” I asked helplessly. “How the hell did he survive the bite? It should have killed him.”
“It should have,” Aileen agreed. “But it didn’t. And we can either waste time speculating, or we can actually do something about it. Look, Robbie, I’m not going to lie to you and say this will be easy tonight, or whatever we’ll face come tomorrow. Ox is special. The fact that he has remained as he is, the Alpha to the Omegas, even after the destruction of Livingstone’s magic, is a testament to that. But he cannot do this alone. Neither can the Alpha of all. I may not be a wolf, but I know the importance of pack. They need you as much as you need them.”
I looked out at the others. Ox lay as a black wolf at the other edge of the clearing, watching his pack run. Joe was beside him, resting his head on Ox’s back. Chris and Tanner and Rico were wrestling while Jessie and Bambi rolled their eyes, Dominique sitting next to them, eyes flickering between Beta orange and Omega violet. Gordo sat with his back against a tree, Mark’s head in his lap.
Elizabeth nosed Carter as Kelly yipped, tugging on his tail. I thought he was going to snap at the both of them, but he sagged, giving in. He howled, and it was tinged with blue, though he began to chase after his brother.
“We’re not whole,” I said. “Not yet.”
“Gavin.”
I looked at Patrice. “He’s part of this.”
He rubbed his jaw. “I didn’t—” He shook his head. “Bennett pack. Just when I tink I have you figured out.”
“We need to find him.”
Aileen patted my knee. “We will.”
I wished I could believe her. And not just for Carter. For all of us.
I turned my thoughts to better things. “How’s Brodie?”
“As well as can be expected,” Aileen said. “He’s hurting, of course. But your little friend Tony refuses to let him sleep anywhere else but in his room.”
“He’ll be safe with Tony and his parents,” Patrice said. “We’ll make sure of it.”
“We’re heading back in the morning,” Aileen said. “We just came out here for—”
“For me.”
She shrugged. “You weren’t ready before.”
“Am I now?”
“Are you?”
I looked back at this pack of mine. This ridiculous, wonderful pack. At the way they moved in the moonlight, the way they sang together, the way they loved each other with their whole hearts.
I had known that love once, or so I’d been told.
I knew it now, yes, but I thought it could be different.
I thought it could be more.
I said, “Okay.”
Aileen nodded, satisfied. “Then we’ll begin.”
“You’re going to spit on dirt and leaves and make me eat it, aren’t you.”
Patrice chuckled. “Someting like dat.”
It was exactly like that.
I left them in the clearing.
I walked through the woods, knowing I wouldn’t be alone for long.
My path was lit by the moon and stars.
I trailed my hands along the trunks of trees, the bark rough
against my skin.
I thought of my mother, so fierce and wild, telling me that I was the guardian of the forest.
I wondered what she would think of me. Of who I’d become. Of what I’d made for myself.
I heard footsteps behind me, and I fought back a smile.
I was being hunted.
I took off running.
A howl rose up behind me, and the chase was on.
I ran as fast as I could, branches slapping against my arms and chest, the wind whipping through my hair. I didn’t shift. I didn’t need to. I was alive, alive, alive, and in this place, in this magical territory, the blood of all those who’d come before me sang in my veins.
I burst through the tree line, the lights of the houses bright.
I barely made it halfway to the blue house when a great weight landed on my back, knocking me to the ground. I hit the ground with a crash, a growl at the back of my neck, the breath hot. I gasped as a wet nose pressed into my hair. “Asshole.”
There came the grind of muscle and bone, and I closed my eyes.
“Got you,” Kelly whispered. “Got you, got you, got you.”
“You did.”
He rolled off me, panting at my side. I turned my head, grass poking against my ear. His eyes burned orange as he looked at me, searching for something.
I nodded.
He sighed. “You’re sure?”
I was. Now more than ever. “Yeah. For you. For them. For myself.”
He grinned, wild and beautiful. His teeth were sharp.
It was so simple, wasn’t it?
This.
Him and me.
So I said, “I love you. No matter what happens.”
His expression stuttered and broke. He turned his face toward the sky. His chest hitched, but he got it under control. “Me too.”
I rose slowly, pushing myself off the ground. I looked down at him spread out on the grass, naked and comfortable.
I held out my hand.
He didn’t hesitate.
I led him toward the house.
He followed me up the stairs to our bedroom. It was just as we’d left it. His duty belt hung off the back of a chair near the desk. The closet door was open, our clothes hanging together, our scents mingling. Two stone wolves sat on the windowsill, pressed together.
