Waving him off, she continues, “But I’ve got to hand it to her, she could keep up with Acheron better than any of them.” My ears perk up at that, Sabrina stiffens, and nobody interrupts her this time. “If it was a matter of selection instead of the luck of the draw, I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d chosen her as the first female beta.” Tapping her finger against her chin, she shakes her head with a chuckle. “Scratch that, Anni would never be able to follow orders without pushing back. I suppose it’s a good thing we don’t need to worry about making those sorts of decisions.”
Preparing to go off on another tangent, I cut her off. “Wait, Annika was part of Ash’s pack?”
She looks at me for a brief moment before the familiar flash of pain darkens her features and she glances away. Though she’s staring at Sabrina, she answers, “Of course. Her arrangement to be given to the Slaughters was what kept them in line when they had that big scuffle with him all those years ago.”
Jason clarifies, “You’ve seen the sort of carnage the Slaughter’s are capable of, and that’s without even factoring in their pack. Sure, Wilder has numbers, but his men act on his orders out of fear. The Slaughter’s men are bitter enough that they’ve attempted to overthrow their alphas several times. That sort of drive is dangerous. Ash may be able to wipe them all out if he so chose, but not without taking a massive hit to his ranks, and with as few wolves as are left, it’d take a hell of a long time to recover from that blow. Sacrificing Annika to them was a political move to get the Slaughter’s to back down.”
Voice soft, Sabrina asks, “Then why’d she kill her parents instead of Ash?”
Please, no. If there are any gods left in this world, don’t let it be because Annika was in love with Ash. They’re both awful enough people I could see how they’d be drawn together, but if Adrian was obsessed with Annika to the point he took out his frustrations on Sabrina in her place, what would someone as cruel as Acheron Wilder do to hold onto a piece of the woman he loved and lost?
Or a more horrific possibility, what if Annika ran because Ash is Sabrina's father and she was actually trying to keep things from devolving into an all-out war?
Mom releases a cruel, incredulous laugh. “I take it you haven’t met the man yet, sweetheart. Many men have tried to kill Acheron Wilder over the years, and you know what they’ve gotten for their attempts?” She finally meets my eyes, unflinching, and allows me to see every bit of resentment in them. “Their families killed.”
Holding her gaze, I take her condemnation and hatred like it’s my due, because... she’s right. Damian, Hunter, and I thought we could break the cycle by refusing Ash’s commands, and all we managed to do was make everything worse. For our families, for Sabrina. No matter what we do, it’ll never be enough to change something that better men than us have failed to accomplish.
“Excuse me for a second.”
Sliding Sabrina off of my lap and onto Damian’s, I stride directly out the door, needing to get some fresh air and my head on straight before I do something I’ll absolutely regret. Letting the door slam shut behind me, I lean against the cabin and thump my head back on it, closing my eyes. One breath turns into ten, and if anything, I feel less in control than when I came out here.
“You left her,”my other half condemns.
I didn’t leave her, I’m saving her from getting caught up in more stressful drama, taking a second before I do something that I’ll regret.
“Like defend yourself?”His words are a taunting purr, getting deeper in my head than he already is.“Remind her that she takes her security for granted, thinking she’s free to say anything she wishes without consequence?” My chest lurches as he writhes around.
Like letting you take over so I don’t have to deal with it anymore,I admit, even the thought whispered like I’m afraid someone will overhear. Sighing, I pinch the bridge of my nose.I don’t want to hurt her, I just want her to stop hurting me. It’s my fault for continuing to come here and expect it to ever be better than the last time. I’m done, though.
The door opens, Cinjin preceding Sabrina onto the porch, and the cool declaration she shoots over her shoulder can be heard clear as day. "You’re not the only one who lost them, you know. But either you’re so caught up in your own misery that you don’t realize how you’re hurting everyone around you; Kaigeandyour mates, or you don’t care. For someone pushing me to have kids, you’d think that you’d at leastactlike you cared about yours.”
The door slams behind her, yet, rather than join me, she sits down on the top step. Resting her elbows on her spread knees, she ducks her head and runs a hand through her hair with a sigh. Cinjin tosses me a quick, grim look before settling in at her side. A few seconds pass, but the others don't emerge from the cabin, and I furrow my brow, staring at the door.
"They're giving us a minute," Sabrina answers my unspoken question, "since we weren't sure if we were storming out of here in a huff, or cooling off and coming back inside." Grimacing, she adds, "But I can't imagine it going better after some of my comments; sorry."
Smiling softly at her back, I take a seat behind her, caging her between my legs, and reclining back on my hands. "Sorry? Are you kidding me? I'm thrilled you said something; gods know I couldn't."
My smile fades as the air steadily takes on an electric charge, and I crane my head for a better view of the sky. "Fuck, this is going to be a long night of putting out fires."
Cinjin cants his head. "What are you talking about?"
Extending my arm as evidence, I show off the fine hairs standing on end before gesturing to the pale gray clouds. It's still daylight, but there's an ominous air of foreboding quickly building, the calm before the storm. "Lightning storm. With as dry as the trees are around here, all it takes is a couple of strikes and they go up like matchsticks. If we don’t act fast, it’ll spread like wildfire."
He grimaces. "Have I told you lately how much of a hypocrite you are for talking shit about our home when yours is the epitome of Hell?"
Sabrina leans back, resting her head on my shoulder and watching the small flashes of lightning high in the clouds. "Bright side, Hunter's fireproof now, so if he gets stuck again, I could take my good sweet time rescuing him since he’s conveniently forgotten about those foot rubs he owes me."
A muffled, "And you keep callingmean asshole," can be heard as Hunter calls out a retort, bringing a smile to her face.
Wrapping an arm around her waist, I kiss her temple before following her line of sight. "I'm okay with a dramatic exit, but you didn't need to get that upset on my behalf. I told you, love, I did this to myself and I know it."
Cinjin cracks his knuckles. "I vote for leaving. Pretty sure we've all reached our limits of parental interaction for the day."
Sabrina wordlessly reaches out to take his hand, and it finally clicks what's been going on with him today. From what I've gleaned in my time with them, it sounds like not only did the Hawthorne's parents keep them in the dark about anything supernatural outside of Shadow Ridge, but they were abusive bastards that drove Cinjin into ceding control to his wolf for the majority of his life. After expecting them to be a similar kind of assholes, seeing the Slaughters able to still be brutal bastards, but ones that embraced their kid with open arms and act like fathers should? That'd hurt like a bitch and bring plenty of old memories to the surface while still needing to make peace with the conflicting fact that he's genuinely happy for Sabrina. Add in my mom endlessly prattling on about stories of Annika, then throwing barbs at me wherever she could? It's been an agonizingly long day, and it's not even five o'clock.
"Yeah, I think you're right. Can't do anything about the next round of questions Sabrina will be having to deal with when we head back to the Slaughter's cabin tonight, but we could at least take a couple of hours to-"
A massive crack of thunder drowns out the rest of my words, and for a brief moment, I’m convinced that it was another warehouse explosion. It’s loud enough that the others actually emerge to investigate with varying looks of wariness. Standing up, I take Sabrina with me as I step out of the cover of the porch, extending a hand palm up. Seconds pass without anyone taking so much as a breath, nothing happening. But just as I begin to shake my head, lowering my hand like the hopeful idiot that I am, I feel it.
