Eternal Mourning

by Carrie Ann Ryan

  “Everything’s fine,” he said, knowing it wasn’t quite the truth.

  She gave him a look that told him she clearly didn’t believe him, but before she could say anything, one of his wolves walked past them, his nostrils flaring as he sniffed in Aimee’s direction before frowning.

  The bond between him and Aimee was far too new for an unmated male to be so close to them, and for whatever thoughts went through the other man’s mind as he tried to figure out what was off about Aimee’s scent. Walker couldn’t help the growl that escaped his lips.

  The other wolf, Allen, immediately lowered his head. Allen was a dominant, but he was still slightly lower in rank than Walker. “Sorry, Walker. Didn’t mean to offend. I know the mating bond is new, I just thought Aimee was human. Didn’t know that had changed, and it’s not my business I guess. That’s all.”

  Walker forced himself to calm down since Allen hadn’t done anything wrong except be a little too curious. If Walker weren’t careful, he’d start a dominance fight that he didn’t want to be in the middle of since he already had enough to deal with. Plus, he was their Healer and had no right forcing others weaker than he was into any position they wouldn’t feel comfortable in.

  Walker inclined his head, knowing his wolf was far too jumpy to use his words at the moment. The other man graciously bowed his head again before walking away, leaving Aimee and Walker alone on the path once more. There were others around them, he could feel them watching, their gazes intent on Aimee—or rather pointedly anywhere but on Aimee. They might have stared blatantly at her before, but with his little show, they were doing their best not to. How could he blame them for their curiosity, though? She didn’t smell like a wolf, nor did she smell human, not any longer. And it wasn’t as if their Pack were that big. They’d known that Aimee, Cheyenne, and Dhani were Dawn’s human friends and were a Pack in their own right. The fact that Aimee was no longer human changed things, and everyone would need to be let in on exactly what that meant. It was safer for them all if they knew the facts.

  Before he could once again slide too far into his thoughts, Kameron stood next to him, frowning. “Are we just soaking in the sun before we head to Gideon’s? You know we have dinner in like four minutes so we can be ready for the Pack meeting, right? Get a move on.”

  He didn’t say it unkindly, but Kameron’s wolf helped Walker get his head out of his ass where he wanted to stop and growl at anyone who looked at Aimee funny.

  “I’m fine, Walker,” Aimee whispered, her voice so low that he wasn’t sure that even Kameron could hear. “Just breathe, okay? No one is going to get me while I’m standing by you—and now Kameron.” She scrunched up her nose. “And, eventually, I suppose you’ll teach me to take care of myself as well, right? Because that would be amazing. Just saying.”

  Once again, she smiled, her way of calming him even as she leaned into him. He wasn’t sure what kind of shifter she’d be on the dominance scale, but he had a feeling, either way, she’d be the kind that needed to take care of those around her for her to feel like she was doing something important. That was the type of shifter—wolf or cat—that anyone would be proud of. And he hoped the others saw that when they eventually realized what kind of shifter she was—in all aspects.

  He kissed the tip of her nose because he’d found that he loved the way she scrunched it up, then took her hand once again and headed toward Gideon’s with Kameron walking behind them.

  Soon, they were once again sitting in Gideon’s home, this time around his large dining room table that one of the other wolves in the Pack had made Gideon and Brie as a mating present. It had come with spaces for extra leaves as the family grew, and they’d still almost run out of room just with the immediate family—and that was without children included. The next generation of Brentwoods was still in diapers with more probably on the way as the years passed, but one day, they’d be grown and ready to join them at the table.

  The Pack just needed to make sure they stayed alive and well until then. Hence one thing they were here to talk about: the attack on Parker and what to do about Blade and the Aspens. And since Audrey had put herself at risk to save Aimee, it was all interconnected—and worrisome to say the least.

  “We’ve been tracking a few of their sentries to try and see if we can figure out what the fire witch was doing, but they’re on complete lockdown right now,” Kameron said after he swallowed a mouthful of potatoes. “Audrey’s email said the witch is named Scarlett, and that she’s the only fire witch with that kind of power near them. And the only one at all within their Pack. She’s mated to another cat shifter—though Audrey didn’t specify which kind. So the fire witch could have had decades to hone her craft since her life is tied to that of her mate rather than her normal lifespan.”

  Leah rested against Ryder, a frown on her face. As a water witch, she would have had the lifespan of a human, but when she mated Ryder, she became tied to him. When he died, she would also in most cases, but as they were learning, the way bonds worked these days had changed, and no one knew if that would be the case in the future. The moon goddess’s plans were in flux, and they were all forced to wait to see how it settled even as they worked to save their own futures.

  Walker leaned forward while Aimee gripped his hand. “You’ve gotten ahold of Audrey then?” He’d been so focused on getting Aimee healthy after breaking her curse and her change into a shifter that he hadn’t been in the loop when it came to the major thing going on within his Pack.

  While his attention had been on his mate—and Parker’s full recovery—the others had been on the hunt.

  Kameron sighed. “Okay, this is what we have. We’re not going to the whole Pack with every detail. While they need to know the danger, unless we actually have a plan that uses all of us to take down Blade without harming the innocents within the Aspens, it just leads to too many mistakes and possible stresses that will hurt us more in the end.”

  Gideon continued for Kameron, a frown on his face and his wolf in his eyes. The two of them worked together against outside forces when it came to the Pack, but everyone within the hierarchy and in the Brentwood family worked as one. “Blade is trying to attack our Pack subtly, something we didn’t have full proof of but we were still pretty certain. There is only one Alpha near us that has that kind of power and hates what we are doing within our Pack. The Aspen Alpha has been dissatisfied—for lack of a better word—with how the Talons and the Redwoods dealt with the Unveiling.”

  It wasn’t as if the Pack had been able to keep the humans from discovering that shifters were real. There had been an all-out battle, with some changing into their animals on camera. They hadn’t been able to hide who they were anymore. The government sure has hell hadn’t been able to conceal them since many in key places already knew. The resulting war had hurt the Talons, but they had been at peace for over a year now.

  Kameron continued. “It still doesn’t feel like long enough, though. This peace. And, frankly, we haven’t had it since before the Centrals came into being.”

  Walker held Aimee’s hand as he listened to his brothers explain to him what he already knew, but he didn’t say anything. Every single one of them needed to be on the same page, and because he’d been so focused on mating bonds and Healing, he’d been left out of some of the other decisions. It was how the Pack worked, but he didn’t want to be the weak link.

  Blade hadn’t been happy when Dawn’s former Pack was blessed by the moon goddess and allowed to officially become a Pack. Her brother, Cole, had become the Alpha and now joined in on meetings with Gideon and Kade, the Redwood Alpha, to discuss who was sending rogue wolves to the Talon den and, now, using magic to burn them one by one. Scarlett, the fire witch, had even killed one of Dawn’s friends from the Centrals, as well as kidnapped Dawn and tried to make her fate a lesson for others. If Dawn were dead, she would only be the beginning unless they learned what Blade wanted and what reprimand he thought they deserved.

  “So now the bastard
is trying to take out Parker,” Mitchell bit out. “Which makes sense in a sick way.”

  “Why?” Aimee asked, then hid behind Walker’s arm as everyone turned to her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to speak out of turn.”

  Gideon shook his head. “No, ask questions, it’s why you’re all here. And you’re Pack, Aimee. You’re supposed to ask questions. We kind of jumped into this discussion today because that’s all we’ve been talking about, but later at the full Pack meeting, we’ll welcome you in and make sure you feel that, okay?”

  Brie gave them an apologetic glance. She sat by her mate and had been taking notes the entire time though Walker was pretty sure she knew as much as Gideon did at this point—probably more since she was one of the smartest people he knew. “I’m sorry we’re pushing all of this at you all at once but, apparently, when we mate into the Pack, we hit the ground running.”

  Those who had been mated in—every single female family member in the room since Brynn wasn’t there—gave a soft, nervous laugh. Walker met Kameron’s gaze, then Max’s, who shrugged. They were the only two unmated wolves left in the family, and he had no idea what they thought about that.

  “It’s okay,” Aimee said. “Walker’s been trying to teach me things, but it’s a lot.”

  “And then there’s the whole shifter thing,” Avery said wryly. She’d been changed against her will at the end of the war with the humans and knew full well what it meant to be a new shifter in a Pack that had been around for ages. Though she wasn’t a cat, she’d been able to help Aimee adjust, and Walker was counting on that going forward. Hell, he was relying on a lot of his family.

  “Yeah, not to mention the whole cat thing,” his mate agreed, and he squeezed her hand.

  Gideon gave him a wary look, and Walker held back a growl. There was something going on that he didn’t understand, but he’d get to the bottom of it. “But back to your question, Aimee. Parker is the Voice of the Wolves and has met every single Alpha in the country, as well as many in Europe. Parker is a symbol to the other Packs. He always has been with his lineage and position. He’d be even more so if the attack had ended the way Blade wanted it to.”

  The man in question let out a growl. “Walker Healed me, but it was a close call. What good would my death do Blade?”

  Both Brandon and Avery, Parker’s mates, growled low at that, and Parker leaned into one, then the other.

  “If you’re gone, maybe Blade can step in?” Kameron asked, then shook his head. “Not that he’d be the Voice since the moon goddess gave you that job, and he’s already an Alpha, but maybe…”

  “Maybe he wants to be the one true Alpha or something as equally disturbing as that,” Walker finished for him, and the rest nodded.

  “So, if Parker is out, then that cuts the connection to the other Packs,” Aimee said slowly. “At least symbolically.”

  “Right,” Gideon said, his wolf once again in his gaze. “And since we’re all learning to live in this new world alongside humans, that connection is beyond important. I don’t know what Blade’s end game is, and yeah, we haven’t proven it’s him, but something’s coming.”

  They talked a bit more and tried to gather as much information as possible, but the problem was, they didn’t have that much information. If someone hadn’t pieced together every attack made over the past few months, it would have just seemed as if rogues and witches had mounted random attacks against them. But if they were connected, there was something far greater at play.

  What, Walker wasn’t sure, but he knew his family and Pack would figure it out. They had to.

  They ended the family meeting and planned when the full Pack meeting would be, and Walker found himself walking next to his Alpha.

  “Be careful,” Gideon whispered on their way out of the house.

  “What?” Walker asked, his gaze on Aimee as she walked alongside Avery. “What aren’t you saying?”

  “The Pack is just getting used to her scent, Soon, they’ll know exactly what she is, even if we don’t know the hows of it yet, or know what it will mean in terms of her strength and abilities. We’re all on a steep learning curve here, and you know some of the old Pack members are resistant to change.”

  Walker stopped where he was, aware that some of the family was looking at them, but he kept his attention on his Alpha. “Is there a problem that I need to know about?”

  Gideon crossed his arms over his massive chest, looking like the Alpha he was. “I don’t know yet, but there’s been some rumblings according to Ryder and Mitchell, and since their bonds and duties bring them closest to the Pack when it comes to tiny shifts and changes, I tend to take what they say seriously.”

  Walker growled, and his brother let out a sigh.

  “I don’t know, Walker. She’s new. She was changed after the government made those proclamations. And she’s your mate, so we’re covered if they find out she’s now a shifter instead of a human. Hell, even if they hadn’t said mates were allowed, it would have been covered. You know we Alphas won’t let that not-quite-a-law stand for much longer, no matter how much pull those in government have.”

  “But it’s the fact that she’s a cat that’s the real issue,” Walker bit out.

  Gideon nodded. “They’re going to find out and, frankly, we can’t keep it from the Pack. We shouldn’t. That’s how distrust between the Alphas and among the rest of the family turns into chaos. But there’s been so much change recently that this might be the final tipping point. Hell, I was as shocked as you when Audrey changed, and now we have a lion shifter within our den. I know nothing about how cat shifters operate, and now we have one connected to us through the Pack bonds. I already changed the way the bonds worked when I added Shane into the Pack to save his life, and now we have this.”

  Shane was a former human soldier who had been forced into changing not only with a bite but also with a human drug that hadn’t quite worked. He’d saved many of their Pack along the way, but his science-based change instead of the usual magic-based one had altered the Pack—and mating—bonds forever. Hence why Walker was so focused on figuring out how to change mating bonds back to how they were, or at least learning how to function properly with the current ones. He knew others were missing out on their futures because of how the bonds were now, and Walker wanted to change that, but along the way, he also had to protect his mate in this new life of hers. No wonder he was so behind on what was going on with Blade and the Aspens. Shane was now a Talon wolf, mated to two former Redwood wolves, and guarded the Alpha on most days.

  Gideon ran a hand over his face, and Walker saw Brie walk toward them with Aimee by her side, worry evident on both of their faces. “Aimee is a Talon now, and she’s yours. The Pack will figure how what to do, and we’ll find a way for Aimee to know who she is and how she can fit into the Pack. She can’t go back to her old life, Walker. At least, not right now. She’s already different than she was, and the humans around her might figure that out.”

  Walker bit off a curse but nodded. “Yeah, we figured that out already. She still has her family, though.”

  “And if you can trust them, they can know, but since she’s already unemployed in the human world, find her a place within the den until things settle down. The others will learn to live in this new world where there are things other than wolves. Hell, we’re learning, too. I know it’s a lot, but we’ve got this. Just one step at a time, right?”

  Walker nodded and then held out his arm as Aimee made her way to his side. He held her close, and Gideon did the same with Brie. He vowed to himself that they would figure it all out, but hell if he knew what the next step was.

  He knew they were on the verge of something significant. A decision that would change the way their Pack functioned. He just prayed to the moon goddess that his mate finally had time to heal and be. Because if not, well, he wasn’t sure either of them would survive what was coming.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Aimee sucked in a breath and kept her eyes glue
d to the very, very naked chest in front of her. The pecs she recognized as hers among the vast number of unclad torsos.

  She didn’t know why the Brentwood brothers and cousins enjoyed playing football with their shirts off to blow off steam after a hard day, but she was truly grateful that she’d been invited to sit and watch. While many of Pack had joined in, there were more spectators than she’d expected.

  And, at least in her opinion, the sexiest one on the field was hers. She wasn’t sure whether this irrational jealousy she felt when some of the single women in the seating areas around the field stared or gave Walker hungry looks was because he was hers, or because she had this new cat inside her fighting for control.

  Either way, she wasn’t sure she enjoyed having to hold herself back from knocking into some of the woman panting after her mate. It was a new feeling, this irrational need for her to mark and claim him as her own.

  It had been six days since she was changed.

  Six days since he’d stripped the curse from her soul, and gave her a new chance at life.

  And in those six days, they hadn’t truly touched.

  They’d talked, learned, researched mating bonds and large tomes of text to see if there was any hint about what kind of shifter she was and what she could expect. They’d slept next to each other in his bed every night, and she had relished how he held her close. She’d understood that she’d be forced to stay within the den for a while until she figured out how to live this new life and not let the outside world know what she was now, but that was fine by her. She didn’t have much left for her beyond her friends outside of the den anyway, and it wasn’t as if she were truly close to her family. They hadn’t called her once, and she knew they probably wouldn’t unless they needed something. It was how they worked, and how she was used to living.