“Get dressed. Now.”
Lina sat up immediately, alert despite the early hour. “What’s wrong?”
“My parents are here.”
Her face went pale. She’d heard enough stories about Marcus and Serena Raven to know this wasn’t a friendly family visit. “The ones who eat humans for breakfast?”
“They’re not that bad,” I lied through my teeth. They were worse. So much worse.
We threw on clothes in record time. Lina’s hands shook slightly as she pulled on jeans and one of my shirts. I wanted to tell her it would be fine, that my parents would love her, but I couldn’t lie to her. Not anymore.
By the time we made it upstairs, my parents had already let themselves in. Because of course they had. Locked doors were merely suggestions to Marcus and Serena Raven.
They stood in Noah’s living room as if they owned it, examining everything with the kind of critical assessment that had made grown wolves piss themselves. My mother ran a finger along the mantel, checking for dust. My father studied the family photos Noah kept on the walls, his expression unreadable.
Marcus Raven looked exactly as he had for the last thirty years. Tall, broad-shouldered, with the kind of presence that made alphas from other packs bow their heads. His dark hair was perfectly styled despite the early hour, not a strand out of place. The suit he wore probably cost more than most people’s cars.
Serena matched him in every way. Where other wolves aged, my mother seemed frozen in time, beautiful in the way a blade was beautiful. Her blonde hair fell in perfect waves, her makeup flawless even at dawn. She wore a cream-colored dress that managed to look both elegant and threatening.
“Hello,” I said awkwardly, not sure how to handle my parents appearing unannounced in Noah’s house.
They turned to face us with synchronized precision, and I fought the urge to step back.
“Knox,” my mother said coolly, her voice carrying the kind of authority that had shaped pack law for decades.
Before anyone could say more, the twins chose that moment to come down the stairs, rubbing sleepy eyes and dragging stuffed animals. They froze when they saw the strangers in their temporary home.
My parents’ gazes locked onto them with an intensity that made me step forward instinctively. I watched emotions flicker across their carefully controlled faces. Calculation first, always calculation. Then disgust as they registered the human blood. Surprise at the clear resemblance to me. And finally, buried deep, what might have been excitement.
“You’ve been keeping secrets,” my mother observed.
“Mother. Father.” I pulled Lina against my side, needing her close for what was about to happen. “This is Basilinna. My mate. And our children, Rowan and Thea.”
“A human,” my father stated. Not quite a question, more an observation of disappointing fact. The way he said it, you’d think I’d brought home a particularly intelligent houseplant.
“The mother of my heirs,” I corrected firmly, putting steel in my voice. I might be their son, but I was also an Alpha. My mate and children would be respected.
My mother tilted her head, studying Lina with the kind of focus she usually reserved for political opponents she was about to destroy. “Winters. The bookshop family from Pine Valley. Both parents killed by rogues when she was fifteen. Raised by a human neighbor. No pack connections, no political value, no bloodline worth mentioning.”
Of course she’d already researched Lina. My mother never walked into a situation without knowing everything about everyone involved.
“Well,” she said, that calculating look I knew too well crossing her face. “This changes things, considering the rumors we’ve been hearing. Tell us about Mary’s pregnancy. Is it true?”
I shouldn’t have been surprised they already knew. Marcus and Serena Raven had information networks that would make government agencies weep with envy.
“The pregnancy may be real. The child isn’t mine,” I stated flatly. “I haven’t touched her.”
My father’s eyebrow rose in that way that used to make me confess to every childhood crime. “Yet you didn’t deny it publicly. Allowed the pack to believe you’d bred with Alderic’s daughter. Why?”
“Because she threatened my mate and children. I was buying time to prove the truth.”
“Buying time,” my mother repeated, tasting the words. “How... cautious of you. Not the approach Marcus would have taken.”
“I would have ripped out her throat the moment she lied,” my father said conversationally, as if discussing the weather. “Along with anyone who supported her claim.”
“Times have changed,” I said through gritted teeth. “We can’t just murder pack members who inconvenience us.”
“Can’t we?” My mother sounded genuinely puzzled. “How limiting.”
