After all this time…Why would she do this?
He reaches into his jacket pocket and retrieves an envelope. I snatch it from him and tear it open.
The documents inside are thick, several pages folded back at the header. My eyes find the top line and stop.
Petition for Custody of Minor Child. Ethan Wolfe.
Chapter Fifteen
Grayson
Petition for Custody of Minor Child. Ethan Wolfe.
I read the line three times. My grip tightens until the paper tears at the corner. “What the fuck is this?”
“Grayson,” Coach begins, but I lift my head, my blood boiling.
“She has no fucking grounds. The Council ruled against her!”
“She’s not going through the Council.” Sterling holds my gaze. “She’s going through the human judicial system.”
The bird somewhere in the tree line keeps singing. I want it to stop.
“What?” Something cold drops through my stomach. “She can’t do that. Can she, Coach?” My eyes swivel to the older man who raised me and Gabriel since we were ten. “She can’t do that. The Council won’t allow—”
“They are displeased,” Coach says carefully. “But technically she’s not breaking any laws. Even our kind is known to use the humans’ law systems sometimes. But it’s unprecedented in this case.”
He clasps his hands in front of him. “When those photos went public, Ethan’s existence became known in the human world. Under the Accord, that’s a breach. Wolf pups must stay hidden from human society until they are ten years old or they have completed their first shift.”
“I know the law.”
My jaw works around the words. Better than any of them. I wrote that law into Ethan’s life from the day he was born. No crowds. No public spaces. No outings in human areas. And the one time I bent the rule, four years in, four goddamn years of holding the line, she found a way to use it.
“She’s put Ethan in danger,” I snarl. “She leaked the photos. She—”
Sterling and my alpha exchange a look, and Sterling says, “We know that she leaked them, Grayson, but the Council doesn’t believe it. The man we tracked last night has disappeared. He was the only link between her and the photographs. Alpha Ramirez has already been to the Council.”
I look between the two of them. “Why is she doing this? She doesn’t even want Ethan! She never wanted him. You know what she put him through! He was six months old when she left. She never cared for him—”
“Her husband wanted him. His pack, the Crimson Rock, wanted her to bring Ethan over with her,” Coach Ramirez reminds me.
My heart is pounding, anger and fear warring within me. “But the Council said no. They had proof she was a neglectful mother! Why would they allow something like this? The Council governs all the packs. They can stop this!”
“Sit down, Grayson.” My alpha forces me to sit in one of the lawn chairs and sits down across from me. Sterling lowers himself into the third chair, briefcase open across his knees. “They don’t want this. But she has chosen to take the humanroute. Their hands are tied. Like I said, they’re not pleased over this matter, but the Council also considers this a trivial domestic dispute. They’re not willing to step in. It’s up to you how to navigate this scenario.”
“Navigate?” I look between the two men, stunned. “You think there’s a chance she can get her hands on my son?”
“You took him out in public, Grayson.” Sterling shakes his head. “You should’ve known that given your recent rise to stardom, you would be photographed.”
I stare at him. “Shifter parents take their children out. Coach, you told me I had to. He was wearing a cap. He wasn’t shifted, he wasn’t exposing anything. He was four years old and spending time with his father. Maybe the park was a stupid place to take him, too crowded, but it was the closest to the estate, and it was his first time.”
I pause as something occurs to me. “There’s a game coming up between us and Crimson Rock in a few months.” I look at the document in my hand. “She’s married to one of the hockey players on it, right? Brent? Brent Taylor? What if she’s trying to throw me off my game and none of this means anything?”
I’m desperate at this point, and I know I’m reaching.
Coach sighs. “It could be the case, but I don’t see why she would risk Ethan over a game.”
I get to my feet, my blood heating again. “You don’t know her like I do. She despised Ethan. She blamed him for our marriage breaking up.”
