“Skye,” he called softly. “Wait.”
Damn I didn’t want to, but I did. Some sick, hopeful part of me was praying there was any other explanation. Or maybe an apology that would take the sting out of his betrayal.
“There was one last test I wanted to run,” he confessed. “Your mother … when she bonded to your father, she was young. But it triggered her estrous cycle. It's why she became pregnant. It frequently happens to mates when they bond.”
Everything in me went cold. All I could do was blink.
He smiled softly at me. “I would say, due to your age and the rapid acceleration of your bond with Remy, there’s a decent chance you may also be pregnant.”
22
Skye
“Breathe,” Tate told me as the door closed between Elias and me. She grabbed my hand, pulling me deeper into the small room she had been watching in. The only other door in the room was hanging open, and I could still hear the sounds of Dimitri and Alexei as they tried to calm Nikolai.
I could vaguely make out the sounds of something crashing over the pounding of my own heart.
“Skye.” Tate squeezed my hand hard, bordering on painful. “You’ve gotta focus, girl.”
I met her gaze, focusing on the intense swirls of green and gold in her hazel eyes.
“He’s wrong, right?” I said, the words coming out twisted and rough as breathing became difficult.
Her lips thinned. “I don’t know. I mean, do you feel” —her voice dropped to a barely audible whisper—“pregnant?”
I glanced around nervously like someone might have heard as Nikolai let out another ground shattering bellow that made me tremble.
“I have no idea.” It was the truth. It had been less than a week since Remy and I had been together like that. Was it possible to find out that fast?
It wasn’t like I could go to the store and grab a pregnancy test.
“We’ll figure this out,” Tate said quietly, her calm taking the jagged edge off my panic. “Just stay calm, okay? Hold it together.”
I sucked in a deep breath, filling my lungs and focusing on steadying my nerves as the voices in the hall grew louder.
Seconds later, Nikolai appeared in the doorway, his gray eyes cold as metal.
“Leave us,” he ordered Lulu.
“Dad,” Dimitri said softly behind him.
Nikolai whirled, fixing his glare on his son. “Take the old man back to his cell. I need to speak with my daughter.”
Dimitri looked at me, concern in his eyes even as he nodded. “Okay. Alexei, can you take Tate back to her room?”
“I’m not leaving unless Skye tells me she’s good,” Tate announced, squaring her shoulders.
“It’s okay,” I assured her, my eyes on Nikolai. I wasn’t entirely convinced he wouldn’t have her bodily removed if it came to that. Right now he looked slightly unhinged.
Tate exhaled hard. “Fine.”
Alexei followed her out, almost putting a guiding hand on her back.
“Touch me, and I’ll break that hand off,” Tate snapped, tossing him a glare over her shoulder as she stalked away.
“I’ll make sure Elias gets back to his cell,” Dimitri told Nikolai.
The Alpha nodded, his gaze jerking to me. “Follow me, please.” He turned on his heel and started to walk away, not bothering to see if I was following.
“He’s pissed, but not at you,” Dimitri said in a low voice.
That was mildly comforting.
I trailed behind Nikolai, stepping into the elevator with him. Neither of us spoke until we were inside his office.
He walked across the room to the wet bar, pouring a generous amount of a clear liquid into a tumbler before throwing it back and refilling it again.
“Please, sit,” he told me, gesturing to the seating area by the fireplace.
I made my way to the overstuffed couch and sat down, perching on the edge in case I needed to put distance between us. My wolf was agitated, not sure if we should be engaging our fight or flight reflex.
The Alpha in front of me was throwing off all sorts of violent waves that I could smell in the air.
“I need the truth, Skye,” he started, his voice a low rumble like the beginnings of an earthquake set to destroy a city.
His eyes met mine, pinned me down with churning intensity. “What happened to your mother?”
I swallowed. “I really think that’s her story to tell.”
His body went freakishly still. Like he wasn’t even breathing. “While I respect you wanting to protect her, I need answers.”
I clenched my teeth together, digging in stubbornly. It wasn’t my place to tell Mom’s story. What she had been through and endured had left scars, both physical and mental. It felt like a betrayal to bare them to Nikolai.
“Let me ask you something,” he started softly, his voice barely rising above the crackle of the fire. “If someone had hurt your mate, would you want to know what had happened?”
My fingers felt like ice as I twisted them together.
If someone had hurt Remy?
My wolf rose up, fierce and snarling at the idea of our mate being hurt.
My hands shook as I fought to keep her controlled.
“I don’t know everything,” I admitted finally. “There’s a lot Mom wouldn’t talk about. Stuff from before I was born and when I was a baby. I don’t know the details you want.”
He moved with a fluid grace to sit in the chair across from me, much as he had done hours earlier after we had finished with Linden.
“When I met your mother, she was drunk,” he said, catching me off guard.
I looked up in surprise.
A sad sort of smile twisted his lips. “I told you that we met in a bar. She was there drinking, alone. Something about her called to me. Called to my wolf. She was so sad, I felt compelled to ask her why.”
He stared into the fire. “She told me that she was to be married in a few months. Her parents had arranged it when she was a child, and something her intended had done upset her. I had just lost my mother, and Natasha suggested I get away for a few weeks. I wandered aimlessly around America until I found her in that bar outside of Albuquerque. We talked until the bar closed.”
“What was she like?” I asked, craving to know more about my mom from before Long Mesa had destroyed her.
“Smart, beautiful.” He grinned. “Passionate. There was a fire in her that drew me in. We never spoke much of our packs. I was thankful to be in a place where for once I didn’t have to have all the answers. Your mother wanted to forget the life that was waiting for her.”
Nikolai leaned back in the chair, taking another sip of alcohol. “I offered to drive her back. I wanted to spend a few more hours with her as I was leaving to come home the following day. We were somewhere in the desert when she asked me to pull over. She wanted to run.”
He rolled his bottom lip between two rows of even teeth, sighing. “The moment my wolf saw hers, I knew she was mine. Nothing else mattered. Adalynne was my mate.”
“You bonded.” I touched the hollow of my throat where my necklace should have been. I remembered that feeling. Like being struck by lightning and being resurrected. The moment I knew Remy was mine changed everything.
“We spent the night under the stars,” he added, the look in his eyes haunted and far away as he remembered. After a beat, his lips curved into a smile that creased his cheeks. “I’ll spare you the details, but since you’re here, I’m assuming you can imagine how it went.”
My cheeks heated, and I couldn’t help but giggle nervously. Yeah, clearly my parents hadn’t waited months to consummate their bond the way Remy and I had.
He set the glass down on the table with a heavy sigh. “I let her go. She wanted to go home and pack her things. She needed to tell her parents she had met her mate. Then she planned to come back to my pack with me. I left her a mile outside of the gates of her home with a plan to return in a few hours. Possibly even meet her family.�
��
“She just agreed to leave with you? After only knowing you for a few hours?” I pressed.
“Yes,” he answered simply. “She wanted a fresh start, and … Well, you have a mate. You know how intense those first days can be.”
Remy and I hadn’t had the most normal bond in mated wolf history. I’d fought it, unsure if I wanted it. I doubted I would have followed him across the world after the first night.
Then again, Mom was a different person than I was. And she also didn’t have the baggage back then that I’d carried into my bonding.
My stomach twisted painfully.
“I was in my hotel, packing my things and planning our lives together when I felt the bond break.” A shudder rolled down his body, his expression turning dark. “It was like being stabbed and drowned in the same breath. There was just this gaping, exposed part of me that had been torn away.”
I sniffled and blinked, not too surprised when a tear rolled down my cheek. I wiped it away quickly.
“My entire life I was taught the value of honor and family,” he went on woodenly. “I assumed her parents convinced her to continue with the marriage they had arranged for the sake of their pack. So, I left. I returned home to Russia to be the Alpha my pack needed.”
“You never told anyone?” I asked hesitantly.
“Tasha knew,” he replied with a grim nod. “I told her of your mother as I was packing. She was excited to meet her when we arrived.”
“But weren’t you two married?”
He smiled at me. “Yes, but you must understand, the marriage I share with Tasha is one of convenience for us both. The pack expected we would marry unless we found our true mates. Tasha did just that.”
“Dimitri’s father?” I guessed.
“They bonded when she was around Dimitri’s age, a few years older than you. Sadly they were only together a few years before he was killed. She found out she was pregnant the day after his funeral.”
“And you married her?” I frowned, not sure how that worked itself out.
“Sweetheart, you don’t understand the way of things here,” he said quietly, but not unkindly. “Natasha was the strongest female apart from my mother, who was aging herself. I was at an age where I was preparing to take over for my father as Alpha. Tasha was one of my dearest friends, but she was pregnant and in a world where offspring are few and far between. Many men offered to marry her. I offered because it allowed her to grieve without a parade of men posturing and chasing her. Besides, her mate was also my beta and best friend. I owed it to him to ensure Dimitri had a father.”
“So, you adopted him,” I murmured.
“Yes. He is my son in every way but blood,” he said fiercely. “I love him as much as I love you. You are both my children.”
Emotion nearly swelled my throat closed. I had waited so long to find this man, and while I knew we had miles to go, the little girl in me who always craved being wanted was happy.
“If I had known you existed, I would have come for you,” he swore, his gray eyes holding mine. “I would have protected you and your mother if she would have only told me.”
“She couldn’t,” I said with a helpless shrug. “You don’t understand what it was like there.”
“Then tell me,” he coaxed gently, leaning forward in earnest. “Please, Skye. After hearing what you said to your uncle and then what Elias told me, I can only draw the most horrific of conclusions.”
I sighed and leaned back. “I promise you that whatever horrors you’re imagining? What Mom endured was worse. Why did you never go back and just ask her what went wrong?”
“Because I was young and hurt and proud. Too proud.” He hung his head in defeat. “I wasn’t a man given to his emotions, and in the few hours I was bonded to your mother, I was more vulnerable than I had ever been. It was terrifying and exhilarating all at once.”
I remembered that feeling when I first bonded to Remy. I was scared as hell that fate had thrown me another curveball that would only end in pain.
I had been so blessedly wrong.
“I did hear that she didn’t marry into the other pack she was supposed to, but the reasons were vague and conflicting. And at that point, we had our own troubles on the borders again. I threw myself into dealing with my pack, and I ignored all reports from the American packs. I vowed I would never return there again.”
“The marriage was called off because they found out Mom was pregnant,” I said after a long pause. “It was a huge mess that ripped apart the southern packs.”
He nodded and lifted his glass, taking another sip.
“I’m not sure how it happened, but what I said to Linden was true. Mom said that she didn’t choose to break her bond. It was broken for her.”
Nikolai swallowed like there was glass in his mouth. “And what Elias said? About her being raped?”
I looked down at the carpet. “It was her … punishment. For betraying her pack.”
His hand tightened around the glass.
“Long Mesa never treated omegas well. They were often used for manual labor or other menial tasks. They were treated like slaves.” I drew in a steadying breath. “That changed when Mom was sent there.”
Nikolai’s head snapped up. “Your mother was not an omega.”
“No,” I agreed, “but they treated her like one. And then it wasn’t just … cleaning and shit work that she was doing. The omega house became something different. Something worse.”
His jaw clenched, the muscles in his throat working as he tried to stomach what I was alluding to.
Shaking, I lowered my head. “Yes, she was raped. Daily. Multiple times a day. By pack members, by people who visited the pack. And then my mom wasn’t enough, so they moved more omegas into the house.”
“And this is where you grew up?”
I nodded with a trembling breath. That fear I had lived with was still potent. “They made it abundantly clear that I would live my life as my mother had. The night we escaped, Linden had announced I would become an omega the next day. His father had just died, and he took control of the pack. It was the first law he decided to change.”
I flinched at the memory of what had happened next. “He nearly killed Mom when she started to argue with him.”
The glass in his hand shattered, shards exploding from his palm as blood dripped down the side of his hand.
I jumped, my eyes flying to him as he stood and grabbed a towel. He wrapped it around his hand.
“Are you okay?” I started to get up.
He waved me back down. “I’m … Please, continue.”
I gave him a wary look, not sure if I should.
He sat down again beside me. The fierce expression carved into his face softened. “Please.”
I gave myself a quick mental shake, trying to remember what I had been saying. “Um, yeah. When we got home, we walked in on another omega, Maisie, being attacked. And I … I lost it,” I stammered. “I shifted and ripped out his throat.”
His eyes snapped to mine, glittering with pride. “Good girl.”
Some of the tension in my shoulders eased. “Mom and I ran that night. Zara, my mom’s best friend helped us. We made it to Blackwater where they took us in and protected us.”
Nikolai was silent for a while. “Thank you for telling me,” he finally said.
I was emotionally done for the day. This had been just as hard as testifying to the Council. Maybe worse since the Council was a bunch of stupid old men who didn’t have a stake in this.
Nikolai did. And based on the way he looked, he was just as destroyed as I was.
I tucked my hands together on my lap, trying to hide the way they were shaking.
He cleared his throat and blinked a few times. “I received word earlier that the storm is lifting sooner than expected.”
My eyes went round as my heart thumped painfully in my chest.
“You’ll be able to leave tomorrow evening, if you like.”
“Yes,” I said qu
ickly. “I need to get home.”
He nodded. “I’ll make the arrangements, but I have one request.”
“Okay.” I folded my hands in my lap and waited.
“I have some things to attend to today, but tomorrow I would like to spend the day with you,” he said softly, looking at me once again. The hope in his eyes was fathomless. “I would like the chance to get to know my daughter before she leaves. There’s much here you haven’t seen that I would love to show you.”
“It won’t make me change my mind,” I said, feeling like he needed to really understand that. “I’m still going home.”
“I know. I would never separate you from your mate,” he assured me. “I understand that you have a family there that needs you, but you are also my family. And I would like to know you as well.”
I licked my lips, blinking back the sudden rush of tears. “I’d like that, too.”
23
Skye
I opened the door to my room and stopped short when I realized Tate was sitting inside, and she wasn’t alone. The curtains had been pulled back to reveal the picturesque snowy town below as snow continued to fall, but the flakes were smaller and faster now as the storm tapered off.
“Hey,” I said slowly, closing the door as I warily eyed Lulu.
She smiled up at me from where she sat across from Tate, her gray eyes bright and kind. “I ran into Tate on the way here,” she explained with a shrug that made her oversized sweater slip off one shoulder. “I offered to bring her back for Alexei and we got to talking, but I can go if you want privacy.”
I gave Tate a look to make sure she was okay before answering Lulu. “No, it’s fine.”
Honestly, Lulu seemed cool. Or at least she had when she went off on Dimitri for blocking my bond to Remy earlier. I hid a smile at the memory.
“Skye, you need to hear this,” Tate said while openly staring at Lulu. “So, you can do, like, spells and stuff? Curse people?”
Lulu laughed and shook her head. “It’s a little more involved than that. Think less Charmed and more Lord of the Rings. My people can access the power of the earth. Well, the elemental aspects of it.”
Legacy (Blackwater Pack Book 3) Page 18
