He turned to leave, but she remembered something. “Oh! Hey Vic? Your shirt.”
“Keep it. Sleep in it. Live in it. Send me pictures in it,” he said through a wicked grin as he walked backward.
Lyric hugged the basket to her stomach to try and control the fluttering sensation she felt there and watched him open his driver’s side door and gripe at Bridger and Tabian.
Lyric got into her car and got a glimpse of herself in the rearview mirror.
She liked the way she looked right now. Her smile was stretched across her whole face, her eyes were bright, and her cheeks were a rosy pink.
She looked happy, and she knew it was all because of him.
Chapter Five
Lyric couldn’t stop smiling.
She pursed her lips against it and checked her face in the rearview, but her eyes gave it away. She was happy.
Eden was going to be so mad if she saw her joy.
Lyric blew out a steadying breath and closed her eyes, thought of the awful day Aro had been killed, and the melancholy washed through her once more.
Lyric got out and locked her car door, then made her way to the front of the house. She’d lived in Pack houses on government land before, but this time was different. She was staying in a spare bedroom in her newly mated sister’s home, and it wasn’t fun. Now she knew there was a different way to live—as a Rogue without owing money or fealty to the Elders—and it made it harder to appreciate her homelife here.
Plus, it was all still so new to her. She wasn’t bonding with this Pack like she was supposed to.
She barely remembered half of their names. Part of that was Eden’s fault. She’d lost her last mate in a battle with the Rogues, and while she’d barely known him and hadn’t cared for him, he was supposed to be the one building up this Pack. Now, she was newly paired up again to a dominant asshole named Traydon, but he traveled like crazy, and building this Pack was now on Eden’s shoulders. Unfortunately for all, she wasn’t a natural born leader. More like a tyrant. She told people what to do, and if they disobeyed, she was extreme in her consequences, and she punished with the backing of the Elders. Even though her father was deceased now, the Elders still revered Eden as a she-wolf of power. She was manipulative and creative and could sink her claws into a mind with such ease, just like her father, Aro.
Lyric had never possessed those traits, and now she understood why.
Aro wasn’t her real father. That revelation had been eating her alive lately in the days since Eden had blurted it out during an argument.
She’d searched her memories of when she was a child, but there was nothing there. It was as if her mind had been cleaned. Her first memory was of when she was ten years old, and she was at Eden’s thirteenth birthday party, sitting right beside her, singing happy birthday. Aro had stood behind them both with his hands on each of their shoulders. There was a picture of it. Before that moment, nothing else existed in Lyric’s memories.
It was such an unsettling sensation. Before, she’d never even noticed that she didn’t have any memories of when she was a young child. She’d had no reason to reach for memories of when she was a small child. Not until she’d found out her childhood had been a lie.
Did she have parents somewhere out there? Had they searched for her? Had she been an orphan? Where had she come from, and more importantly…who was she?
Vic made her feel more like herself than she had perhaps ever felt before.
Vic was addictive.
She pulled her keys from her purse to open the front door, but her phone vibrated in her purse. Heart stuttering, she pulled it out and checked Vic’s text.I had a lot of fun with you tonight. Home safe?
Her smile was back.
She typed quickly.Just got here. You? How is Earl? I had fun with you too.Send.
A picture of Earl in a beach themed cage, complete with blue shavings, and two little islands with plastic palm trees, ahammock, and a big plastic shark with its mouth open where Earl had apparently made a nest were involved.
She snickered.How many cages do you have for him?Send.
Eight. This one is for when he needs some mental health days at the beach.
She moved to type out a response, but the front door flew open.
Lyric jumped hard, expecting to see Eden standing there ready to yell at her, but the person who was actually standing there was much, much worse.
Cian Morgan.
