“The pack comes first,” I said, reciting the lesson that had been drilled into me since childhood. “Always.”
“Always,” Dad agreed. “Even when it costs you everything else you want.”
I stood to leave, pausing at the door with my hand on the knob. “Dad? Do you think we'll be ready? When whatever's coming finally arrives?”
Dad was quiet for a long moment, staring out at the afternoon light that slanted through the mill's high windows, illuminating dust motes that danced like spirits in the golden air.
“I think we'll do what Callahans have always done,” he said finally. “We'll stand our ground, protect our people, and find a way to survive what tries to break us. Even if it breaks us in the process.”
The afternoon passed quickly after that, the familiar rhythm of loading and organizing and checking orders providing welcome distraction from uncomfortable truths about inheritance and responsibility. By closing time, we'd completed both deliveries and made significant progress on tomorrow's orders, but the work felt different now, weighted with knowledge of threats that could end everything we'd built.
I should have gone home.Should have collapsed into bed and tried to get enough sleep to face tomorrow's list of responsibilities with something resembling competence. Should have done the expected thing, the responsible thing, the thing that fit the carefully constructed image of Evan Callahan, future pillar of the community.
Instead, I climbed into my truck and drove toward the outskirts of town where Gideon kept his workshop.
The truck rattled and wheezed like it was held together by hope and automotive prayer, which wasn't far from the truth. But it ran, and it got me where I needed to go, and it didn't care if I was living up to anyone's expectations as long as I kept feeding it gas and fixing the parts that broke.
Simple. Honest. A relationship I understood.
Gideon's place sat at the end of a gravel road that wound through second-growth pine, isolated enough that neighbors weren't a concern and close enough to town that he could still pretend to be part of the community when it suited him. The workshop squatted beside a small house that looked like it had been built by someone who valued function over form, all clean lines and practical windows that let in maximum light for working.
Light spilled from the open bay doors, and I could hear voices mixed with the metallic percussion of someone working late. Not just one person—multiple voices, laughter, the sound of beer bottles clinking together. I parked beside Cal's beat-up Chevy and Mason's pristine Ford, understanding immediately what I'd walked into.
“Thought you might show up tonight,” Gideon called out without looking up from the transmission he was rebuilding. “Town council run long?”
The scene inside the workshop was exactly what I'd needed without realizing it. Cal sat perched on a workbench, beer in one hand and a wrench in the other, regaling Mason with what sounded like another one of his legendary near-death experiences. Mason leaned against a tool cabinet, shaking his head with the long-suffering expression of someone who'd heard this story before but didn't mind hearing it again.
“Three hours of listening to grown men argue about fence height regulations,” I said, accepting the beer Cal tossed my way. “I'm starting to think democracy is overrated.”
“Democracy's got nothing to do with it,” Gideon said, setting down his tools and turning to give the group his full attention. “What you've got is a room full of people who've forgotten that sometimes problems need fixing instead of discussing to death.”
“Like that time Cal tried to fix the community center's furnace,” Mason added dryly, taking a sip of his beer. “Remember how that discussion went?”
Cal straightened up indignantly. “Hey now, that furnace was a deathtrap. I was performing a public service.”
“You flooded the basement,” I pointed out, settling onto my usual stool.
“Minor water damage in service of preventing a gas explosion,” Cal corrected. “I call that a win.”
“The fire department called it a disaster,” Mason said.
“The fire department has no vision,” Cal declared. “No appreciation for creative problem-solving.”
Gideon snorted, reaching for the bottle of whiskey that lived on his workbench for nights when beer wasn't strong enough. “Creative problem-solving. Is that what we're calling it now?”
The easy banter washed over me like a balm, settling some restless part of my chest that had been wound tight since the town council meeting. This was what I'd been missing without realizing it—belonging that didn't come with expectations, acceptance that didn't require performance.
My wolf paced restlessly beneath my ribs, agitated in ways I couldn't explain to people who thought the biggest predators in Hollow Pines were the occasional black bears that wandered through garbage cans. The animal part of me had been on edge for days, ever since catching Nate's scent again, like some fundamental part of my biology had been waiting for him to come home.
“Speaking of creative problem-solving,” Mason said, studying me with those perceptive eyes that missed nothing, “you look like someone who's got a problem that needs solving.”
“Or discussing to death,” Cal added cheerfully. “We're good at both.”
I took a long pull of beer, buying time while I figured out how much I was willing to admit. These men had become something like family over the months we'd worked together, but family could be complicated when you had secrets you couldn't share.
“It's nothing major,” I said finally. “Just trying to figure out how to balance what people expect from me with what I actually want.”
“Ah,” Gideon said, pouring amber liquid into clean glasses and sliding them across the bench. “The eternal struggle of anyone born with a famous last name.”
