Tristan sighed, “We had this whole talk and then a family run. Mel used you forgetting as an excuse to pull away from us.” Jason said, “It did feel like we had a breakthrough.” Momtold them, “Seeing how your life would’ve gone is a mind fuck. Melanie is working through it.” Mom popped away with dad.
Drake sighed, “I just feel like I’m at a loss here.” I told him, “The run was a good thing, and it meant the world to Melanie and Freya. I know we can’t all imagine how we’d feel in her spot, but I just kept thinking how any Beta pup would’ve felt. You ran together and that’s something my wife didn’t think she’d have because she thought you guys were gone, and that Jason and the remaining family wouldn’t want to. Plus, she couldn’t run in wolf form because Freya was locked away but she didn’t know that.”
Drake snarled, “I can’t believe those fuckers are dead and gone.” I asked, “Who?” Sam answered, “The girl who pretended to be Melanie’s family. Her parents were killed.” I asked, “Killed by whom?” Drake answered, “The Ring did it, Levi had your Uncle Gunner look into it. The actress pretending to my daughter thought her parents both had heart attacks.”
I said, “Then they got off easy. I wonder why the Ring killed them.” Sam answered, “Your Uncle is looking into it, but it doesn’t matter. They fucked around with the ultimate evil and found out as far as I’m concerned. They let their pup pretend to be mine. They saw Ladybug that night, they were there when she was shot and taken.” I squeezed her hand.
Jason growled, “I just want to get back to normal.” Elise offered, “You never tried to get on Mel’s schedule before. Just show up, like you always did. Melanie struggles with seeing ways forward when she can’t come up with them. Create it.” Tristan and Jason hugged Elise.
EJ walked in and snapped me a tray with steaks for dinner. My big brother commented, “You know we all forgot about your honeymoon trip, little brother.” Tristan snorted, “We didn’t know about it, or I’d have told you.”
I said, “I know those of us that knew forgot, but I’m Melanie’s mate. I’m supposed to take care of her.” EJ pointed out,“Ladybug deleted it off your calendar. It would’ve gone off and you’d have remembered.”
I admitted, “EJ, I get what you’re saying but I still shouldn’t have forgot. My wife was looking forward to it and even packed her suitcase. I made Mel feel like she wasn’t important to me. I should’ve remembered when she did.”
Elise gently said “You’ve always been important to her. Ladybug knows that she’s important to you. She was really happy when you took out that pack for her. We tried to tell Mel it wasn’t for her, but she just knew it was.”
“This is one thing, one time. I’m not saying you have an excuse or pass on forgetting. I’m saying Mel prevented you from remembering a little bit. That’s her deal. Forgetting your honeymoon though, bad move dude.” She slapped my arm.
I snorted, “Thanks, Elise.” Elise smiled adding, “You should’ve told me since I’d have remembered. Phil is lamenting about being out Beta’d. I don’t think he will let it happen again.” I told her, “I have no intention of letting it happen again. I feel like shit.”
Tristan said, “I’ll get on the damn calendar list. Melanie wouldn’t factor mine in.” Oden muttered, “Somehow, I think mate would.” Yeah, I wasn’t going to believe I could outsmart my mate unless Melanie allowed it.
Elise gently said to me, “You and EJ have had a lot on your plate. Not that either of you are sharing that with your mates, even though we share a Hackura bond and can tell it’s bothering you. That probably factored into the calendar invite being deleted.” I sighed.
EJ and I shared a guilty look. I didn’t know he hadn’t told Elise about what the Werebengal told us. EJ sighed as Elise left the kitchen after grabbing an apple. Tristan snorted, “What did you two do now?” I replied, “It’s complicated.”
Jason groaned, “No, we don’t have time for that. Uncomplicate it. It doesn’t even have to be for us. Just uncomplicate it for your mates.” Oden snorted, “Little does he know how hard that would be.” Yeah, well we could just tell Melanie about it.
I asked EJ, “Why haven’t told Elise yet?” EJ sighed, “I don’t know how to tell her.” I agreed, “Yeah, I know. I fucked up big time.” EJ said, “So, make it up big time. Mel’s not mad at you, so that’s something.”
I snorted, “I might rather her be mad and yell at me than be hurt and keep it to herself.” Tristan offered, “That’s usually the problem. Ladybug has usually kept a lid on those things until she blows up.” Interesting.
EJ tilted his head, “Well, I’m off to explain to everything to Elise. Here I thought I’d done a good job of not letting her know something was going on.” Jason snorted, “I wasn’t here, and I knew you weren’t. You’re an Alpha.”
I ignored that comment saying, “You and me both, big brother. It seems we cannot fool our mates.” EJ laughed, “I guess dad was right about that.” Tristan shouted, “You guess?! Someone give me strength to deal with Alpha bloods right now.”
I smiled saying, “Dad is often right about things.” Oden snorted, “You are riling the Beta bloods up on purpose.” I was and it was fun. Plus, they needed their focus on something else. They were upset about Melanie pulling back after making progress. EJ nodded to me and left the room.
I picked the tray up. I told the McAlister’s, “I’ll make sure Melanie understands she is my priority. Just make sure she sees she’s yours too. We’ll all navigating minefields and it’s not fair. I’ll always be on my mate’s side though. At least we know she’s talking things through with my mom.” They all nodded.
I walked back into Melanie’s office. She was rambling which had Hastein shooting me a pleading look. I bit back my laughand kissed Melanie, cutting her off. We talked a little bit longer about Kingsley before Hastein left. I was going to have to figure out what type of Supernatural my cousin’s mate was.
A thought was creeping into my mind. Melanie did know a Dragon, but no. That was actually crazy. Maybe though. No. I shoved that out of my mind. Right now, I needed to talk to my mate. Oden snorted, “Yes, I’m talking to Freya. She enjoys being in trouble. Currently, I’d call her hangry.” A goddess wolf being hangry did not even sound remotely like a good thing.
Melanie and I talked a little bit before Freya came out. I was trying not to laugh about Freya being hangry. It seemed I might have to have Zoe task an Omega to bring Melanie her food. A hangry goddess wolf really did seem like something to avoid.
I apologized but Melanie brushed it off. I could feel the tinge of hurt my wife carried in the bond though. I’d never felt so guilty as I did at this moment. I would have to take my mate on a surprise trip for this. Maybe a longer one than I’d originally planned. I wanted my wife to know she was the most important thing to me.
I explained what the Werebengals said. Oden huffed, “Now Freya is annoyed with me because I didn’t give her a head’s up. You human halves are a mess sometimes. I love you as my human, but you give me headaches.”
I replied, “I repeat, you were not given a head’s up that we forgot about the honeymoon.” Oden replied, “Good point. I had let that go. You human halves have your good moments too.” I barely held in a laugh.
Melanie got flustered about pups, but we could talk about that later. I wanted pups and so did she, but I was enjoying just us time right now. There were still some couples who wanted to start having pups immediately, but it wasn’t the normal status quo like it was when my parents met.
Knowing we had all this time meant there was no rush. I wanted to be with my mate forever. We would have a family eventually, but we had a lot going on right now. I still needed to figure out who ran the Resistance.
We hadn’t made any progress on that this whole time. I was beginning to think Melanie was just going to have to tell me herself. I just had no idea when she would confide in me about it. Or even if my wife could. If someone thought they could harm her though, they had another think coming.
