Chapter 12: Chapter Twelve

Grant lived in the heart of Roseburg. His apartment was situated above a bakery on the main street of town.

I tried to hide my surprise as he led me through a side door and up a narrow flight of stairs to his studio apartment that was mostly bare.

He let go of my hand for the first time the entire walk as he reached above the door to fetch the key he kept on the lip of the frame.

He unlocked the apartment and held the door open for me, his eyes careful and guarded.

I wasn’t surprised to see that the apartment was mostly empty.

Grant had a few dishes strewn along the countertops of the kitchen and a T-shirt clinging to the back of the sofa, but other than that, the space was completely spotless.

The walls were a muted light-gray color that offset the dark furniture and white trim.

It was a masculine space, and given its location over a frilly bakery, I was surprised to discover that it felt like a modern bachelor pad.

Grant’s eyes followed me as I appraised the space. “I haven’t lived here long,” he admitted, “only a few weeks. I was born in New Hampshire and then lived in New Jersey for some time.

“After I joined the Pura Lupus, I was mostly traveling from pack to pack as we were needed.”

I turned to him and raised an eyebrow. “Pura—what?”

He smiled and led me farther into the apartment, setting me down on the couch and handing me a blanket before wandering to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee.

“Is there anything you need? Are you tired?”

I wasn’t tired. In this new space, I was wide awake. “Coffee is fine,” I said, waving a hand at the pot he had already started.

I hadn’t ever really given coffee a try in its true form, I’d only ever had it mixed into hot chocolate.

Grant smiled and then disappeared into what I presumed was the bedroom. He came out in a hoodie and sweatpants, discarding Ben’s clothes.

He handed me a pair of his shorts and a sweater, which I took gratefully.

Once we were both settled, Grant sat on the opposite side of the couch and opened his arms. “What do you want to know?”

“Start with the pure-whatever thing,” I insisted.

A small smile picked up his face. “Pura Lupus,” he corrected gently, “the White Wolves. The Pura Lupus is a small pack of gifted wolves, meant to be stronger and faster and more agile than regular wolves.

“The mark of a Pura Lupus is pure white fur.” He gestured to himself and laughed. The sound of his laughter nearly took the wind out of me.

“Once I shifted, I was supposed to be sent to the pack, to New Jersey.”

“What happened?”

“Their alpha died around the same time I was shifting,” Grant explained. “Tate Peters—he was killed by his mate.

“It was a huge scandal, broke apart the Pura Lupus for a while before they were able to piece it back together. I joined when Livy Emmerson took over, a Luna from a pack in Oregon.

“She did her best, but she wasn’t meant to lead the White Wolves.”

“Why aren’t you with them now?” I asked.

Grant ran a hand through his hair and jumped up to make us coffee.

I watched him work, watched him puzzle over how to make mine after I insisted I had no preference. He carried our mugs with grace, setting a steaming mug in front of me.

He drew in a long breath. “I had to take a hiatus from the pack,” he admitted.

“The last mission we went on... it didn’t go to plan. Livy and I butted heads a lot behind the scenes. I was challenging her leadership, she was challenging my obedience. In the end, I had to leave.”

“Where did you go?” I prompted, wanting to keep him talking.

Grant hesitated as if he wasn’t sure how much detail to go into. “I started hunting,” he said. “There was this one human who had gotten away at the end of everything.

“He had a few months on me, but I decided to try and track him down. I ran into Cerberus when I was in the thick of things, and they’d promised to help me find him if I helped them out.

“So far it has only been the latter.”

“Where do you think that guy you were hunting ended up?”

Grant’s expression was clouded. “I think he figured we’d come after him and was smart enough to change his identity.

“Humans have an easier time disappearing than werewolves do, they can go to any metropolis and become virtually invisible there.

“Following a scent doesn’t work too well when there are millions of trails.”

I took a sip of my coffee and found it hard to swallow at first but then strangely addictive. “If you know Cerberus isn’t going to help you, then why stay with them?”

Grant shrugged. “I guess traveling with them feels like I’m a part of something again. I had a lot of regret after that last mission with the White Wolves; people died, and we didn’t act soon enough.

“Livy was afraid of starting something bigger than a pack conflict and was hesitant to retaliate when wolves were being murdered.” Grant drew in a long breath. “I had to take a break from it all.

“With Cerberus, it’s different, they hunt, and they capture, and they move on. There are no big moral debates, no real responsibility beyond getting the bounty. It’s simple, and that’s what I need right now.”

I squirmed in my seat, catching Grant’s scent from the sweater I was wearing. “I don’t believe it is simple,” I argued.

“Cerberus is hunting my friends, and they don’t deserve to be hunted. They were all young when they committed whatever crime they did, they’re just kids.”

Grant shook his head. “However young you think they are, they’re older. Werewolves age one year for every ten they live.

“Their mistakes were calculated risks, and they have to pay the consequences for breaking our law and fleeing.”

“What did Ben do?” I asked, trying to squeeze the emotion from my voice. Grant picked up on it.

“He’s a threat to our kind,” Grant told me. “The sons of the moon are rare, yes. Partly because they are hard to make and partly because werewolves hunted most of them down centuries ago.

“They can’t shift discreetly and run around as a wolf with no human sense. Their existence leaves ours in jeopardy.

“If a human were to see Ben change, or if he were to attack a human and then shift back… the result could be catastrophic.”

“But Ben has Will and Fitz looking out for him,” I argued.

Grant shrugged. “Their system may work for now, but it won’t prevent what happened before from happening again.”

“What happened before?” I asked.

Grant hesitated, tilting his head to the side as if realizing for the first time that Ben and I hadn’t talked much about what he was.

“Ben was exiled from his pack because he let a human see his change… they had to execute her to make sure she didn’t speak.

“She wasn’t his mate, so they couldn’t rely on her word. Without that bond, humans can be unpredictable.”

I froze in my seat, the coffee turning to bitter ash on my tongue. “I didn’t know,” I said, my voice not sounding like my own. I tried to picture it, tried to understand—

“Werewolves take losses like that very seriously, for as long as we’ve existed, we have always sought to live harmoniously with humans, to protect them from harm.

“A lot of wolves find their mates with humans. What happened to that girl because of Ben… well, it was decided that he had to answer for it. He was supposed to be sent to the Royals.

“They have the only real prison for our kind, the only place where we can send those who cannot be controlled by an alpha or, worse yet, is an alpha who has lost their mind.”

I shivered. To think of Ben in some sort of archaic prison, to visualize him rotting away next to the worst of werewolf kind.

“Ben isn’t a werewolf,” I countered. “How can you have jurisdiction over him?”

“That’s exactly the problem,” Grant said, “because Ben isn’t a werewolf, he is immune to alpha rule. He cannot ever fully join a pack, he can only coexist.

“Because he is a threat to our safety, because he got that girl killed, because he ran and can’t be controlled by an alpha, he has to be sent to the Royals.”

I withdrew into myself, staring down into my mug as I mulled his words over. I didn’t know much about werewolf law, didn’t understand the consequences and rules.

I only knew that Ben wasn’t a criminal. I believed that he had to have an explanation for whatever had happened in the past.

He didn’t need a prison, he just needed a pack who cared enough to look out for him.

“The law isn’t always easy,” Grant mumbled. “It’s why I had to take a break from the White Wolves. It’s hard to punish good people who make mistakes.

“But it must be done to ensure others follow the rules and to keep werewolves as a whole safe and unknown.”

Maybe if I had met Grant first, before getting to know Ben and his friends, maybe if I had heard this before knowing their personalities, before Will worried over me and Fitz teased me.

Maybe I would understand his logic if I hadn’t felt their emotions.

“I’m tired,” I declared, eyeing the clock, which was showing the time as well after four in the morning.

The birds outside had already started to chirp, and the sky was beginning to lighten. If I didn’t sleep now, I wouldn’t for hours.

Grant nodded slowly, his eyes lingering on my face. “You can sleep in my room if you want,” Grant offered.

I shook my head. I had had enough of the beds of boys. At least until I figured out what the hell I was going to do about the boys in my life.

“I’ll sleep here,” I offered, pulling the blanket on my lap up to my chin. “I’ll be fine.”

Grant had a look of what I could only call distress on his face. “Take the bed—really—”

“No,” I refused, “I have to get up early and go home anyway. I can’t exactly strut across town in your clothes.

“If my mother caught me walking into my house with your sweater on… It’s just better to avoid all that completely.”

Grant opened his mouth and closed it. “Are you sure that’s what you want?”

I nodded and smiled. Grant sighed and took our mugs, setting them into the sink before walking back over and hesitating before me.

There was a weird charge to the air. The bond between us created a sort of built-in intimacy without the time it usually took to form it.

“Good night, witch,” Grant said gruffly, bending down to kiss the top of my head. The gesture filled me with a heavy emotion, my throat closing as tears sparked behind my eyes and nose.

“Good night, wolf,” I answered.

He disappeared, slipping into his bedroom before much more could be said. I lay down slowly, lifting my blanket over my shoulder as I turned onto my side.

Whether it was real or I was imagining it, I felt like Grant was also lying awake, thinking of me.

I don’t know when my thoughts quieted down, when my racing mind came to a halt. But soon I was asleep, and I wasn’t thinking at all.

I was dreaming of silver eyes and a dark wolf and a body morphing into something other.

And then I dreamed of nothing at all.

***

I woke up on a bed. In fact, I woke up sharing a bed.

I sat up abruptly, somehow acutely aware that my hair was knotted on one side and a thin line of drool had slipped out of the corner of my mouth.

I dragged the back of my hand against my face and used my fingers to rake through my hair before I aimed my foot at the center of Grant’s back and gave him a light kick.

He was up in an instant, grabbing my ankle and pulling me toward him while flipping over so that he was poised above me, eyes molten silver and breath racing.

When he realized that I was the only threat in the room, his breath calmed, and a look of puzzlement crossed his features.

“The couch,” I said stiffly.

“Wasn’t what you needed,” he countered, staring me down.

“I didn’t ~need~ to share a bed with you.”

Grant winked and nearly stopped my heart. “No, it’s just what you ~wanted.~”

I opened my mouth to object just as Grant slapped a hand over it. He dropped a little lower until we were chest to chest, his heartbeat thrumming over my skin.

I tried to catch his eye, but his face was tilted away from me, he was listening.

All of a sudden, I was vertical and dizzy.

Grant was rushing around, grabbing the blanket I used last night from the living room and throwing it into his closet, grabbing my mug and tossing it under the sink.

“What are you—”

“Shit,” Grant said, taking a deep breath and realizing that while he could erase the physical remnants of my stay, my scent wasn’t going anywhere.

He grabbed my shoulders and forced me to look him square in the eye. “Whatever I say, ignore it.”

“Okay—”

The door to his apartment opened.

I held my breath, reaching out for Grant and grabbing his sleeve in my hand. He cast a worried glance down at my face before taking my fingers and smoothing them out before letting them go.

Grant sauntered out of the bedroom, his body language suddenly foreign. “Dane,” he greeted, “welcome.”

I lifted my knees to my chest as if I could use them to shield the sound of my heart and lungs from the man in Grant’s doorway.

From the urgency of Grant’s movement, I was sure the wolf in his home was one of the leaders of Cerberus.

“I was told you abandoned the hunt last night,” the man—Dane—rumbled. His voice was so low it was difficult to establish one word from another.

Grant shrugged. “The other wolves had it; the rogues were outnumbered.”

Dane grunted. “They escaped.”

“You need to hire better lackeys,” Grant said, voice bored.

“~You~ are one of my lackeys, White Wolf,” Dane argued. “You should have been there to secure the bounty. You could have brought all four in alone.”

Dane stopped to take a deep, loud breath. “But you ran after a woman instead.”

“I figured you wouldn’t want an audience,” Grant explained.

“But you needed one,” Dane said. “You shifted in front of her, and from the reek of this place, she’s still here. Come out, come out.”

I squeezed my knees harder, my teeth grinding together. I kept my breath as shallow as I could, trying not to make more sound than was absolutely necessary.

“I can’t spend every night alone,” Grant drawled.

“I never knew you were the sort to—”

“With all due respect, Dane, you don’t know my sort,” Grant interrupted.

Dane laughed. “You’re right, White Wolf, I don’t.” I heard heavy footsteps, and then Dane was standing in the bedroom doorway, appraising me where I sat in the center of Grant’s bed.

His smile was animal-like as he studied me, dark eyes full of mischief. It was the same man who had shifted in the clearing last night.

A second later, Grant was standing just behind Dane, a look of unrestrained fury written on his face. He almost seemed to burn as he stared Dane down, his entire body ready to strike if necessary.

“So you’re Grant’s toy?” Dane purred. “You could be mine, too, if you wanted.”

I felt wildly exposed, like I had been turned out of my own skin.

I had never had a man look at me with that sort of primal ownership, like he was entitled to my body, like he didn’t have to ask for a damn thing.

Grant was shaking with rage, the muscles along his jaw and neck tense. “I don’t share,” he growled, sounding less like a mate and more like another entitled male. “Get your own plaything.”

Dane took a step toward me, and I swear Grant almost shifted. “Yours smells…interesting. I hope you know what you’re doing, White Wolf,” Dane warned. “I’d hate for her to be Cerberus’s new prey.”

Grant bared his teeth. “I’ll join your hunt for the rogues tonight. Until then, we are done with each other.”

Dane turned, his chest puffing as he faced Grant. “You’re right, we’re done.”

Without so much as another word, the leader of Cerberus stalked out of Grant’s apartment, closing the door hard enough to leave it shaking in its frame.

Grant was in front of me in an instant. “Don’t worry,” he assured me, “he won’t bother you again, not if he thinks you’re insignificant.”

I wasn’t sure if Grant had played the indifferent part well enough, but I didn’t want to worry him further, didn’t want him to go out of his mind wondering if he could have done more.

Instead, I stepped forward and wrapped my arms around his waist, pressing my cheek into his chest and closing my eyes.

Grant hesitated for a moment before he enclosed me with his arms, pressing me firmly against him as he loosed a long breath.

“It will be okay,” he said.

And I tried to believe him.

***

An hour later I was sneaking into my house in broad daylight, turning the doorknob on the front door so slowly it took me a minute to make a full rotation.

I slipped into the house soundlessly, turning to ease the door back into the frame all the while making no sound whatsoever.

My aunt’s cough made me yelp and whip around.

My aunt and my mother were sitting on the staircase directly in front of me, both women appraising me with the same knowing look.

My mother’s dark eyes were trained on my face, anxious to know that I was all right. My aunt’s eyes were studying Grant’s clothing, anxious to know the gossip.

I smiled sheepishly at them.

“I didn’t know Jocelyn had a brother,” my aunt said, knotting my stomach with nerves.

“Where were you, Morda?” my mother asked.

My aunt laughed. “Do you really need to ask, Lila?” My aunt turned her eyes over to me and winked. “I didn’t know you were getting friendly with Venus, punk.”

I blushed. “I’m going to go take a shower.” My aunt practically squealed.

“Just wait a second, Morda,” my mom said, “what is going on with you?”

“She’s got a boy!” my aunt cried. “An admirer, a gentleman, a ~lover~.”

I cringed. “He’s not my lover.”

“Ah!” my aunt cried, pointing a ring-clad finger at me. “But you do have a boy!”

“Enough, Robin,” my mother cut in, “I want to know that she’s safe.”

“Obviously she’s safe, Lila,” my aunt countered, rolling her eyes, “she’s standing right in front of you.”

My mother sighed and tilted her head as she looked at me.

“I know. But you look different, Morda, like you’ve grown five years in the past week. Your aunt is right as well, Venus has blessed you in some way.”

I had to come clean. Any lie would erode my throat. “I have a mate.”

Silence.

“Maybe two.”

“Your boy is a wolf?” my aunt shrieked, standing up. “I knew you had some furry friends, but I did not expect you to be gallivanting with one of them!”

My mother was ashen and quiet.

“Well,” I said, biting my lip, “I’m kind of tied up with one werewolf and one son of the moon.”

My aunt slapped her hands over her mouth, true surprise sparking in her icy eyes. She looked to my mother who was a statue on the staircase, unmoving and silent.

Then she looked at me with a mixture of shock and approval.

“I did not know you had it in you, punk,” she said. “For a girl who has never dated anyone, you’ve moved into the lifetime-commitment phase a little quick.”

My mother finally let go of her breath, tucking her face into her hands as her shoulders tensed and then sagged. “I was afraid this might happen,” she relented, “so afraid that this would happen to you.”

“What?” I asked.

She looked up at me, dark eyes framed by heavy bags. I felt a pang of guilt, wondering if I had kept her up. “Your father…” She sucked in a breath through clenched teeth.

I steeled myself for what I knew was coming. “He was a werewolf. I was charmed by him, they’re so—”

“—fucking hot,” my aunt finished for her.

My mother glared. “Their lifestyle is so alluring. They are dedicated, loyal creatures by nature. They’re protectors and caregivers.

“A pregnant witch is vulnerable, during the time I was carrying you I had little to no power. The idea of having a werewolf watch my back while I was pregnant was…

“He warned me, though, he warned me that werewolf blood is potent, and you’d be likely to have a mate, maybe shift.”

Panic closed my throat. My mother caught my look and waved my panic away. “You won’t shift, Morda,” she assured me.

“Their pack doctor assessed you shortly after you were born, and you don’t have that ability. I was promised.”

I exhaled slowly. “Okay,” I said, trying to get a grip on this information. “So I’m part werewolf. That’s why I have a mate. That doesn’t explain...the other one, though.”

My aunt laughed. “Sons and daughters of the moon have always been drawn to each other. But because sons are so rare, there haven’t been moon pairings for...centuries.

“When a son and daughter cross paths, the result is a deep bond. We are, in a way, made from the same substance. Two sides to the very same coin.

“You might be the first woman in history to be in this situation, two legitimate mates.”

I felt my heart sink until it was sitting somewhere in my stomach. “So what do I do?”

“Date them both,” my aunt said at the same time my mother said, “Choose.”

“So basically, I’m screwed.”

They both grimaced at me.

The doorbell chimed, and I turned to see the outline of a large group of people. From the sound of the shrieking laughter and constant conversation, I was sure it was women.

I turned to my mother and aunt who were grinning.

“The witches are here.”