Chapter 23

Vera

When I get to the kitchen, I push the door open and find dishes all over the counter, bits of food on the floor, and cracked glasses in the sink. My mother, a beautiful gruff woman shook her head in front of the stove. It had been years since my dad passed and she’d gotten harder, rougher, meaner. She had to keep this pack running, protect not only her children, but the members that looked up to her, and earn the respect of packs led by men. She wasn’t the soft, caring woman I remembered and my eyes watered at the memory of who she used to be. Our relationship was obviously strained. Had been since my father’s passing. I’d been forced to grow up, and I turned to things a child shouldn’t have even known about.

“You’re an adult now, you should get up and clean on your own,” she hissed as she cut vegetables.

I walked toward the sink and started pick