Page 54 of Wolf Bound

I laugh when I see Penn round the corner in a frilly apron with a spatula in one hand and the biggest smile on his face. We all need each other. We’re six pieces that make a whole and once we’re all in place, nothing will be able to get to us.

“A big plate of chocolate chip, please!”

“You got it, baby girl.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Forrester

Standing at my mother’s grave, I trace her name with my eyes over and over again trying to connect the woman I knew and the one that was just revealed to me. It feels like my memories are lies now. My mother, my father, my uncle… Drayton. None of them are who I thought they were.

Talia’s magic revealed the manipulation behind so much of what I thought was real and I don’t think I understand much of my life anymore.

Dropping to my knees in front of her grave, I punch the ground as hard as I can, screaming in anger as I do. There’s so much pent up anger inside of me just clawing to come out. Mywolf howls in anger and pain as I unleash years upon years of rage all at once.

Eventually the anger drains out of me, leaving only pain in its wake. Before I know it, tears pour down my face, obscuring my vision as I cradle my busted up hands at my sides. I wait until the tears slow down, before I try once again to address the things I can’t say to my mother and have to say to her gravestone instead.

“Why?Why would you do this? You’re the reason for so much of the hate and pain in my soul,” I growl into the wind, my anger renewing once again like a tidal wave, fuelling every word that spews from my mouth. “The fucking things you did to everyone around you while twisting it so you looked like a victim.”

I scoff, the harsh sound stolen away by the winds picking up around me.

“You’re the reason I’ve said despicable things to Drayton. You made me believe so much fucking bullshit and I lost my brother for years because of it. It’s still nothing compared to what you said to him, what you madehimbelieve for YEARS!”

The rage from before comes back full swing. My wolf pushes against my mind, wanting out to release his own anger.Not yet,I tell him.I’m not done yet.

My fist flies out at her gravestone, cracking the granite of it and breaking my knuckles completely open. My blood now decorates her broken name and I laugh mercilessly. “I fucking hate you!Do you hear me, mother?! I fucking hate you. If you were still alive, I swear to fucking Adessa, I would kill you myself.”

Back and forth, I go between screaming profanities and cursing my mother to crying years worth of tears that have been hidden behind lies and more lies. The sobbing wins out over my anger, wracking my body with over twenty years of pain needing to be felt. There’s a new hollow feeling in my chest where so much anger and resentment has lived for the past year. Thosefeelings were never even mine. They were put there by selfish people with hidden agendas. People I thought I loved, that turned out to be monsters who ruined so many lives with their lust for power.

I guess they had a lot in common with the Croises in that way. They tried to kill a four year old for the mistakes of adults. They turned him into a pariah in the pack to make me the pack alpha so they could control them and keep the power to themselves.

Four fucking years old. What the actual fuck?!

What kind of shifters do I come from? And what does all of it say about me? I fell for all of it so easily, it’s almost laughable. Fucking hell, I bet they loved that they didn’t have to do much to make me into their perfect little puppet.

“Forrester.” Drayton’s hesitant voice comes from behind me. “Talia told me where you went. Can we talk?”

A broken laugh comes out that quickly turns back into a body-shaking sob. At this moment, I can’t manage more than silent screams and tears, let alone a conversation. I owe him so much more than a talk, I owe him a thousand apologies and yet I can’t say anything.

He moves beside me, sitting down in the grass and plucking a couple pieces out. It’s almost laughably easy to see so many signs of the abuse he dealt with when we were growing up. I missed so many of them while I was being treated like a fucking prince. Drayton made sure he sheltered me from what happened behind his closed door. If only I had really looked, though, I would have seen what was really there.

“You don’t have to say anything, I’ll do the talking. Please, Forr,” Drayton begs, his own unshed tears making his voice deeper and muffled. At my nod, he lets out a relieved sigh. “Thank you.”

Dropping my head in my hands, I sit in silence waiting for Drayton to speak. It doesn’t take long, his words coming out justas dark clouds block out the sun. A storm must be blowing in with the wind. Fucking great addition to this moment.

“The day you were born, my mother came to me and sat me down. She told me that things were about to change and it wouldn’t be good for us. Your mother had given our father another heir, one that wasn’t from their forbidden affair.” Drayton pauses, looking up at the dark clouds above us. “I was only four years old, but I remember looking into my mother’s eyes and wiping the tears from her cheeks. She was scared for us, scared of what was about to happen. Still, she also knew we had no choice but to stay.”

Drayton shakes his head, recalling his own memories.

“You were a threat, not only to me, but my mom as well. I wanted so much to hate you from that moment on,” Drayton confesses, looking at me with sincerity in his eyes. “That hate never came. Instead, I loved you like the brother you are to me. Life did get bad after you were born, yet at the same time, it got better.”

Scoffing at that, I shake my head in disbelief. “I don’t know how years of abuse could ever be defined as better.”

Drayton laughs at my reaction, leaning back on his hands. “Do you remember when Alaric came to live with the pack? You, me, Penn, and Wes took him out to the cliff overlooking Rampage Drop.”

“Yeah. You told me that nothing scared him, he was a badass through and through. I bet you ten gummy worms that you were wrong,” I recall with a snort. Shaking my head to release the humour, I look over at him in confusion. “Where the fuck are you going with this?”

Drayton rolls his eyes at my sudden snarky tone and pushes my shoulder lightly. “Always so impatient.Anyways, you said he was afraid of heights and would piss his pants at Rampage Drop. I took that bet because I knew you were full of shit, Alaricwasn’t afraid of anything, let alone a cliff. We got to the cliff, your smug ass face dropping into panic when, lo and behold, he wasn’t scared at all. He looked at us like we were stupid for going to a cliff that was basically a barren, boring drop off. He even complained we couldn’t jump off of it into some water or something.”

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