Page 60 of Unclaimed Bonds
“Anders notified them you were with him. All is well, Princess.”
My tension and anxiety over disappointing them ease. I can focus on eating my breakfast. Anders and Nathan enter the kitchen, and after bidding Anders farewell, Tater lays a plate of breakfast in front of Nathan. He sits at the breakfast nook with me.
“So today is my favorite day of the week. It’s the one day I follow up on business with the pack. Would you be interested in tagging along with me.”
I nod enthusiastically.
“Great. Duck will join us, and he can share all about the pack’s history and how we came to be in the dairy business.”
We spend the entire day together. I fall in love with the territory, the pack members, the dairy, and the farms. I love listening to the two men share their beloved history of the pack business and its expansion into sustainable agriculture. By the end of the day, I also fall in love with two more men, who accept me and love me as if I am truly one of their own.
Chapter 28
Anders’s Past
JESSICA
PRESENT DAY:
March 31, 2025
My father sits next to me and squeezes my hand.
“I remember that day as if it was yesterday,” he says, eyes shiny with unshed tears. He looks back to the camera. “I must admit, I wasn’t sure what it would be like adopting a child, especially an older one. Both the twins and my mate were so adamant that I would love her like she was my own. Even though I agreed to it, especially since she won the hearts of the three toughest men I know, I was still apprehensive. Maybe some of it was my ego, and I worried that she and I wouldn’t bond as well as she did with the others.”
He looks down at our intertwined hands and smiles.
“At the end of that day, when my mate and I left your room that first night, all my reservations and fears evaporated. My heart swelled with so many emotions, the same ones I felt when I laid eyes upon my boys—love, fear, excitement, andprotectiveness all rolled into one big ball. When you hugged me good night, it hit me right here.” He brings his hand, still holding onto mine, and rests it over his heart. “That’s when I knew—even though I didn’t create you—you were mine.”
I let go of my father’s hand, lean over, and give him a hug before wiping the tears from my eyes.
Carmen lifts her hands, forming a T for time out. “I have a few questions.” She glances down at her notes and then at Anders. “For you.” She points a ballpoint pen in Anders’s direction.
He frowns. Somehow, Carmen convinced him to join us for this portion of the interview. She wanted all of my parents, including Anders, to be present. He protested at first, insisting that he didn’t need to be involved.
My mother wouldn’t hear of it and insisted, along with my father, that he join us. I agreed with them. I hadn’t known all these years who he really was to me, but he has always been there, just like a father, legal papers or not, blood or no blood. I always thought of him as a father figure. I want him by my side, secrets and all, because that is where he belongs.
Carmen raises her pen to her lips and hums. “I think giving the viewers a more in-depth look into your position as a head guard and how is it that she is your biological daughter is a more intimate approach. We already covered the relationship and the bond she made with the Luna Queen and Alpha King. I want to learn more about you, Anders.”
Anders sits stiffly next to me, hesitating. He stares at Christian, who in turn watches Anders. Do they know each other? He finally takes his eyes from Christian and looks at me.
“You don’t have to. I know that you like to keep your personal life private. Carmen, I don’t want?—”
Christian interrupts, “I think Jessica should hear your side of the story. You never really gave her much of an explanation fromthe sound of it. You can’t just drop a bomb, a big one in fact, and then expect her to fill in the blanks on her own.”
Anders remains silent. Finally, my father speaks. “Anders, it’s time. I have been telling you for years that your secrets will eat you from the inside and will catch up to you one day.”
Anders squeezes his eyes shut and sighs. “Fine. What do you want to know?”
Carmen beams like she won a prize. “How did you become the head guard? It’s obvious from the history books that a Black Obsidian guard was the original head guard, but now he’s second lead. How did you earn your position?”
Anders turns his head to look at my father. He nods, giving him permission to share his story. “In order to tell you that, I have to start with the beginning. After the great war, many of the white wolf shifters fled the LS territory. Some stayed under the protection of some of the packs, and some became rogues. My grandmother, Alpha Agnus, was a baby at the time. She lost her mother in the war. It was her father who fled the LS territory, raising her in secret.
“The resistance formed a white hunt after the great war, searching for any survivors and killing them. Then, they killed anyone who showed signs of either magic or white wolf characteristics. Even though the history books claim this period passed, it didn’t. The Resistance just became more secretive in their dealings, especially after the new monarch was established. When my grandmother was a young adult, she met her true mate, another white wolf shifter, and they had a daughter. The white hunt caught up to them. Her mate was killed, and my grandmother, protecting her only child escaped.
“The risk was too great to keep her child and stay hidden and alive. She had met a family in the Asian territory and sent her daughter to be raised by them to keep her safe. My grandmotherset out to find the white wolves in hiding to figure a way to return home.
“Her daughter grew up and met her true mate, another white wolf shifter raised in the Northern A territory. They also had a daughter, and a couple of years later, they had me. I was two, maybe, at the time—too young to remember any of it. Our home was broken into, and my parents were murdered. My sister, just five years old, was killed in her sleep.
