Page 41 of Pack Witch
Julian rolled his eyes. “Go get some more seats and plates, and sit down. You’re family. We’ll eat as a family.”
Neither one of the boys moved, until Leroy whispered, “Family?”
Bo swallowed hard and rasped, “On the mountain. You… you called me son.”
“I did,” Julian said, his eyes shining with… remorse? I wasn’t sure. “I was looking for you last night, you know. To apologize for the way I’d treated you.” Bo flinched. “I was too harsh with you, and not just yesterday. My only excuse is the pain I was in. I was afraid I would die before I’d taught you everything you needed to know about being Alpha.”
Bo let out a shaky breath. “I don’t know enough. I don’t know how I’m gonna go back to the pack and do what you did. They won’t want to follow me.”
“You’re feeling the pull to go back?” Bo nodded. “That’s good. That’s the pack calling you. That means they do want you; they’re wanting to pledge to the new Alpha.”
“I told you, Bo,” Leroy murmured. “You’re gonna be a great Alpha. You’ll see. They all will.”
“I… I don’t want to go,” Bo whispered brokenly. “I don’t want to leave y’all.”
Leroy wrapped his arms around Bo and whispered something in his ear. Whatever it was, it had Bo hugging him back and nodding fiercely. When he let go, Leroy moved around the table, a sweet, secret smile on his face as he pulled two morelogs close for seats, then went back into the cabin for plates and food.
Bo and Sergeant stepped away, into the shade of a nearby pine. I could make out some of Julian’s words, a story about the Moonblessed Warriors. Bo was listening intently.
Leroy’s eyes met mine as he came back out, and I smiled. “I’m glad you’re okay, Miss Zinnia. Thank you for fixing up Sergeant, too,” he murmured, but his voice caught.
“I couldn’t fix everything. His wolf is with mine.” I knew he would understand. “It might be hard…”
“Don’t fret, Miss Zinnia. Bo knows he’s got to go back to our pack. He told me last night I’m his—well, what used to be called Head Enforcer, right? But we need a new name for second wolf.”
“Beta?” I offered.
He wrinkled his nose. “Maybe? I dunno. Pickin’ a name is weird.”
I nodded, and he sat down beside me, helping himself to some food when Bo called out, “Y’all start. We’ll be there in a sec.”
“Hey, Sergeant. What name would you pick if you had to decide on a new one?” Leroy asked as Julian and Bo returned to the table.
“That’s just what Bo and I were talking about,” Julian said softly. “I’m not Alpha anymore. But?—”
Bo broke in. “He’s not Alpha, but that ain’t all he was, even before. Leroy, you remember what we talked about at the river? About how we don’t got family anymore, besides my sister Delia, and how neither of us ever had a dad worth a can of spit? So I told Sergeant what we wanted.”
“What we wished for,” Leroy whispered. His head snapped to Julian. “We can—I mean, you’ll let us?—”
“I’d be honored if you’d call me Dad,” Julian told him. “I can’t think of any other title I’d like more.”
Leroy tackled both of the others in a group hug, the two boys crying and smiling and shouting, even howling, before they both looked at each other and pulled away.
Then they dropped to their knees beside my stool. Leroy handed me a napkin, and I wiped my own tears away. “What are you doing?”
“We’re family, right?” Leroy’s eyes sparkled with flecks of gold in his deep green irises. “If Sergeant’s our dad now, that means me and Bo really are brothers. But… my mama died when I was little bitty, and Bo’s passed two years back. We could sure use a mom, if you could think of us that way. I know we’re not little, but?—”
Something inside me broke at his stammered request. I’d learned to stop hoping for a mate and children of my own long ago, telling myself I was content with the life I’d carved out here in solitude. I’d packed that dream away, the same way I’d buried my sadness at losing the ability to shift. To have it now… I felt my heart crack open, but there was no pain.
It was opening to let them in. Somehow, I managed to answer, tears coursing down my cheeks. “If I could choose any sons in the world, I would choose you, both of you. If the moon Herself gave me one wish…” I was crying so hard by then, I had to stop.
I couldn’t see, but I felt the steady strength of the earth underfoot, and the arms of these two dear boys wrapping around me, and thenhisas well, my mate, after all these years of loneliness. It was as if every whispered prayer at night, every piece of dandelion fluff I’d blown into the wind, every birthday wish I’d ever made, had all come true, all at once, a flowering of joy in the middle of pain.
“This would be my wish. To have you as my family.”
Chapter 22
Julian
