Page 23 of Cold Moon

13

Dante

That night was the pack meeting, and to say I didn’t want to be there was a huge understatement. Somehow, I didn’t think it’d be quite the same as the pack meetings I was used to, where Alpha Reid spoke down to the pack from on high, doling out instructions and warnings that we were all expected to follow without question. Still, I was sure there’d be no place for me.

As soon as we got to the bar downtown, Alexis bounced up on the balls of his feet, grinning, and headed over to his cousin’s table. Claudia Wilson sat there, smiling and kicking her heel on the back of the booth under the table, a hand on her round belly. Beside her, his arm around the back of the bench even though he was tucked into the corner so she could come and go as she liked, was an enormous, dark-haired alpha who looked at her like all the stars lived in her eyes.

“Do you want to come sit with us?” Ridge asked, hanging back after his mate.

It was a four-person booth, but I didn’t doubt the couples would budge in close together to make room for me. They’d be polite, or warmly open, but it’d still be awkward because I’d know that they were forcing conversations that’d be more enjoyable if I weren’t there.

That’d tie me to a table full of happy wolves, to a family I didn’t belong to and people I barely knew, and the person I most wanted to find wouldn’t be there.

I glanced around and caught sight of Skye at the bar, standing almost a whole head shorter than the betas and alphas around him.

“Um...” Licking my lips, I looked up at Ridge and smiled nervously. “I think I’ll swing by to catch up later. But thanks for the ride.”

He nodded, set his hand on my shoulder, then left me in the middle of the dining room staring over at Skye like a real creeper.

When I worked up the courage and went over to him, though, it turned out I couldn’t even get a bottle of water without something going wrong. And there, spectacularly, was Skye to back me up, brandishing his own water bottle like some kind of weapon as he jammed it into another alpha’s chest.

Soon Brook and Aspen arrived to shepherd us around and take charge of the situation before any more trouble could start.

Aspen was the kind of alpha I should’ve been terrified of. Not only did he look like he could kill me, not only did he have the kind of body that had been trained for that very purpose, but he had justification on top of all that. I’d been there when my father had killed his, and with Maxim Reid dead, he had every reason to take his losses out on me.

But he didn’t. Instead, he looked down at me with something akin to pity, and guided me to the last empty table, letting me slide in against the wall before he took a seat on the other side.

“You okay?” he asked once we were sitting, his hands folded on the table where I could see them.

“I’m fine.” There was a napkin on the table with utensils on top—not a cloth one, but a thick sort of paper napkin. I twisted up the corner while Aspen held my gaze.

“It’s okay if you’re not. The Groves are an accepting pack, but after everything that happened with Brook and my dad—”

I shrank down in my seat. “I know.”

It wasn’t that I didn’t realize I deserved to be shut out. There was no place for me in this pack. I’d pay my debt to them, then be gone. That was the best thing for everyone.

Maybe if I’d stepped in and stopped my father, or done more or acted faster. Or hell, maybe just if I’d more effectively gotten away.

I ripped the napkin and jerked my hand back, smoothing the soft paper back into place at once.

Aspen frowned. “They’ll ease up once they realize Brook’s got your back. I do too. And Linden, obviously. But he’s like Captain America or some shit—always trying to do the right thing even when it hurts him. It’ll help when they see you’ve got us too. Get a couple Iron Mans on your side just to prove it’s not all about good old American concepts of justice.”

“Like... the comics?”

He laughed. His canines were awfully long there in the dark of his mouth. “I was thinking more like the movies, but sure. Comics work too.”

Brook and Skye came over then, Brook carrying a tray with mugs of apple cider and a couple baskets of fried onion rings. The Hills really had been over the top with lunch and dinner, but the rings smelled amazing. As soon as Brook spread them out on the table and returned the tray to the bar, I leaned in toward them.

“May I?”

Skye beamed at me, his light eyes squinting with his smile behind his glasses. “Of course. They’re for all of us.”

I snatched one up and stuffed the whole thing in my mouth. A second later, there was a low, blissed out groan right beside me.

Heat rushing into my face, I turned and saw Skye leaning back against the booth, chewing slowly.

“Good?” I asked.

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