“So?”
“That’s young to remembersomething.”
Liam’s gaze dropped to my collarbone as though not daring to meet my eyes. “My father advised your dad to take a paternitytest.”
I gasped. “My mother wouldnever—”
“It gets worse, Ness.” Liam palmed his hairuneasily.
Worse than implying my mother had betrayed myfather?
“He also told your dad that he should take you out into the woods”—the volume of Liam’s voice dropped so suddenly I had to strain to hear the rest of his sentence—“leave you there, and then tryagain.”
“Leave me in the forest? To do what?” I frowned but then I didn’t. Then I opened my eyes so wide my lashes hit my brow ridge. “Oh… He told my father tokillme?” I all but shouted. “Because I was agirl?”
Liam’s gaze finally climbed back to mine. “Your father was outraged. My mother,too.”
“And you?” Isnapped.
“Why do you think it’s my earliest memory, Ness?” His voice was as thick and dark as the fur that cloaked his wolfform.
Heath had made my father doubt my mother and then suggested I should be murdered because of my gender! If Liam’s father weren’t already dead, I would’ve found a silver blade and wrenched it inside his black, blackheart.
“What’syourearliest memory?” Liam asked, whisking my mind off my homicidaldeliberations.
I racked my brain. When the memory slotted into my mind, I blinked. It couldn’t possibly be my earliest recollection. I hunted through my mind for another but foundnone.
“Your mother’sfuneral.”
Heflinched.
I’d been five at the time. I could still remember what I’d worn—a scratchy black wool dress with thick white stockings and black patent mary-janes. The air had smelled of overturned earth and tears, and there hadn’t been a drycheek.
ExceptHeath’s.
He didn’t weep, but Liam cried enough for the two ofthem.
Liam had been a gangly boy with features too large for his face. He’d grown into his body, grown into his features. He didn’t even resemble the narrow-faced sixteen-year-old boy I’d last seen on the winter day I begged the pack to acceptme.
“I remembered wondering if you had a hole in your heart,” I said as we crossed the street toward a little park. “But now I know.” Mom’s gaunt face flashed into my mind. “I’msorry.”
He glanced down at me. “Forwhat?”
“For reminding you ofher.”
“Because you think I forget? Not a day goes by where I don’t think about her, Ness.” His voice contained the same shadows that had collected over hisface.
We carried around the same pain, he andI.
“You never forget the people you love, but I guess you know this now,” he saidsoftly.
A snare snapped around myheart.
I thought about my mother, about my father—who wasmost definitelymy father—as we passed by the playground of my youth. It had changed, gotten a shinier swing set, but the monkey bars I spent hours scaling were still there. Dad would swing alongside me sometimes, while Mom looked on, shaking her head and laughing, telling him he looked ridiculous—a gorilla in a hamstercage.
I didn’t realize I’d stopped walking, didn’t realize I’d started crying, until I felt the swipe of a thumb over mycheek.
I drew in a sharp breath when Liam did itagain.
