CHAPTERFIFTEEN
“What is that man doing?” I mumbled.
“Who?” Finn asked around a mouthful of vanilla bean ice cream—and a spoon. His head whipped from side to side, searching the area.
It was pretty adorable for a monster, really.
The sun was high in the sky now and our ice cream was melting too swiftly in the heat of the day. So we were eating it as quickly as possible. I didn’t bother to explain I normally ate ice cream like this. It was a favorite of mine.
I pointed with my spoon. “Up there.”
Finn’s eyes narrowed to where I had indicated.
Then they widened almost comically. “Good fuck.”
Confused, I spoke slowly, “Is he…naked?”
“I believe so,” he spoke quietly, almost in a whisper, as if he were afraid of being caught. “We should go.”
“We should report him. There are children here.”
Finn’s lips thinned, and in the oddest move, he ducked behind a tree. He peeked around it for a beat, hissing, “That’s Theron. God’s dad.”
“What?” I shouted.
My eyes flew to an outcropping near the top of the waterfall where the gentleman was sunbathing in the nude. The man certainly didn’t appear old. In fact, he looked to be in the prime of his life.
Oh, yes. Immortality kept the body pretty.
“Really? That’s his father?”
“Keep your voice down. He’ll hear you.”
My head jerked back to Finn. I whispered, “Is there a reason why you’re hiding behind a tree like a child?”
“Theron is…,” he shuddered, his whole body shaking with it, “…different. He’s not horrible right now with God as the alpha king, but before that, when he ruled, he was scary as fuck. He’s over two thousand years old.”
I stared at the cowering beast. “What…”
My mind just couldn’t. It just couldn’t.
Today had been hard enough.
“Exactly. A person that old is allowed their oddities. We accept those things like we do any of the Ancients. But he ruled the shifters with an iron fist. No one, and I meanno one, stepped out of line.”
My eyes burned. I hadn’t blinked in a while.
I did so and swallowed. “There are still children here.”
“Theron will do as he pleases. He’s on vacation.”
“What does that even mean?” I hissed, keeping my voice lowered. I even tiptoed across the grass to stand behind the tree with a grown man. I peeked around the other side of it to stare at the apparent Ancient.
Finn sighed. “There’s only supposed to be one alpha king, the shifter with the most power to control them. But God was born…and he has just as much power as his dad. It’s all because of a curse—or a shifter behaving badly—but it still happened. So Theron and God decided they would take turns ruling to give each other a break. Theron is currently on vacation.”
“From ruling his people.”
“Yes.”
