It was late by the time they got back to Knight’s apartment. The whole drive home, Knight had been fielding calls from his mom and his grandparents about what had happened after seeing it on the news. It was scary to think how close the bomb had been to them. What was even scarier was the thought that someone he knew could have easily been inside that hotel.“Are you okay?” Knight asked her as he let them inside.“Yeah,” Sue quickly answered. She ran his hand over Knight’s arm before he removed his jacket. “I’m just tired. We were at your grandpa’s hotel just a few weeks ago. I can’t stop thinking, what if it had happened there?”“I know,” Knight said. He kissed the top of Sue’s head. “The world can be a shitty and scary place sometimes.”“You think it was a humans-first group?”Knight shrugged a shoulder. “Or a werewolves-first group who objected to humans being allowed in. Or it could be something else entirely.”Sue nodded and rubbed at his arms.“Here, let me get you a drink,” Kn
Sue wasn’t exactly sure what she had expected when Knight agreed to let her come along to see Carlos in prison. Her knowledge of prisons was pretty limited to HBO shows and porn. They drove down a long road, passing two security huts along the way. There were guards all around, including on top of the walls, and they all had guns.Instantly Sue felt on edge. The large building up ahead was a depressing gray structure with high walls all around with barbed wire on top. She still hadn’t completely gotten over the shock of the bombing last week and her nerves had been on edge since—not that she would ever let Knight know that. The werewolf had enough on his mind without Sue adding to it.“You always take me to the nicest places,” Sje said in attempt to lighten the mood.“You sure you want to do this?” Knight asked. “We can turn back.”Sue looked over at the werewolf and saw that he, too, was uneasy. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise, given that Knight was about to face the man he had
“I’m starting to think this is a bad idea,” Sue said as their car sped down the highway.“You’re just nervous,” Knight tried to appease her. “You’ll be fine.”“I’m not nervous,” Sue insisted in a petulant tone. “I just think we should do it another day. My mom might not even be home. Joey’s probably out with friends or something. We should just go home and come see them another time.”Knight glanced over at his passenger with a concerned frown. As someone who loved his family and never went more than a few days without seeing them, Knight couldn’t really understand why Sue was so freaked out by the fact that they were about to visit them.“What’s really going on?” Knight asked. “Is it me? Are you nervous about me meeting your mom?”“No,” Sue said a little too quickly. “She’s just never been completely okay with the way I've live my life.”“What do you mean?”“Well, any time it comes up, she changes the subject and acts like nothing happened,” Sue explained.“Well, it’s going to be pre
Sue had thought the worst part of their day was going to be facing her kidnapper and Knight’s abusive stepdad. Learning that her brother had been living like that was far worse. Sue felt like a terrible sister because Joey hadn’t felt he could tell Sue the truth when he showed up at her apartment.“She’s not always like that,” Joey said from the backseat of Knight’s car, his voice uncharacteristically small. “It’s only when she drinks.”“I’ve seen humans react in various different ways when they’re drunk,” Knight said. “Some people can’t even drink a little without it changing them into something else.”Sue thought about her dad and how, not for the first time when leaving that house, she wished he was still alive.“My dad used to have a beer when he got home from work, every day. Just the one. Sometimes on the weekend he’d have more, but it only ever made him even friendlier,” Sue told them. She smiled as a memory she hadn’t thought about in a long time came to the surface. “One Chri
Sunday family dinner at the West pack house was crazy on a typical Sunday, but throw in the fact that the women in the house were in full-on wedding mode, and that Joey was with them, and things got a lot crazier.“You’re grilling?” Knight asked his grandpa as he came out onto the porch with a couple of bottles of beer in his hand. It wasn’t unusual for his grandpa to fire up the grill, but usually Sundays meant a roast of some kind from his grandma.“I needed an excuse to get out of the house, and your grandma’s busy,” Lenard explained. He held his hand out for the beer that Evan had brought him. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy for Jared, I just don’t want to have to give my opinion on napkins and chair covers.”Knight smiled at that and perched himself on the railing. “I don’t think Jared does, either.”“Oh, really? You’d be surprised,” Lenard told him with an amused twinkle in his eye. “I heard him arguing with a florist the other day on the phone, saying that if the peonies weren’t
The drive to Joey’s dad’s new apartment was kind of out of the way, and given what they were going to talk to him about, it made for a tense car ride.“We could just wait a little longer,” Joey said from the backseat. He had seemed so carefree and happy at Knight's grandparents’ house. All the wolves had taken to him quickly and treated him like pack. Sue was glad that Knight hadn’t told most of them why Joey was with them. He really just wanted to handle this quietly.Sue turned in her seat to look at Joey. “I tried calling Mom a bunch of times. She isn’t answering.”“Maybe something happened,” Joey said, his voice tinged with panic. “Maybe she’s hurt. We should go and see her.”“I already called Mrs. Daniels from next door and asked her to go check on her. She said that she was there but wouldn’t answer the door.”Joey’s face fell. “I shouldn’t have left. It’s just going to make her worse, being all alone.”Sue felt some measure of sympathy for her mom—she wasn’t a monster, after al
Knight wasn’t someone who was used to waiting. As the boss of his own company, people waited for him, not the other way around. He supposed it was good for him, every now and then, to get a lesson in patience.While he waited in the car, he tried to train his hearing, to find Sue and listen in, but the apartment must have been at the back. All he could hear was a baby crying with a woman singing to it and a lot of different TV sets blaring different things.He tried not to think about his real dad, but it was hard. He had the name in his head now, and he felt as though he at least needed a face to go along with it. He pulled out his phone and pulled up his browser app before typing in the name, Charles Garcia. He felt a swell of nerves go through him as he waited for the page to load but it soon turned to dread as a thousand or so different Charles Garcias showed up.Thankfully, he was spared having to think on it any further. Sue and, surprisingly, Joey came out of the apartment bloc
After a late second dinner, Joey went straight to bed, the emotional turmoil of the last few days no doubt finally catching up with him. Sue went out onto the balcony that was accessible from the living room and the main bedroom. It had a great view of the city but neither she nor Knight spent much time out there.It had been the gentle sound of the rain falling, hitting the awning above and running off over the side, that had drawn Sue out.“What are you doing out here?” Knight asked as he came out. The werewolf closed the door behind him.“Just getting some air.”“Are you okay?” Knight asked as he circled his arms around Sue from behind and rested his chin on her shoulder.“Yeah, are you?” Sue asked. “What did you and your mom talk about?”Knight sighed and placed a kiss on Sue’s neck. “She told me who my real dad is.”Cold turned sharply in her arms. “Are you serious? That’s huge.”“I’m trying to pretend like it’s not.”“Right,” Sue said with a nod. “The typical West way of doing
Christmas had never been a time Sue looked forward to. While most people were with their families, having fun and enjoying each other’s company, Sue was with her mother, making small talk and feeling like she didn’t belong. She would try and get to her house as late as was acceptable and leave as early as she could. Her mom certainly never tried to talk her into staying any longer.It wasn’t until the year before, her first Christmas with Knight, that she had actually started to look forward to it. Christmas Day was spent with the family, but Christmas Eve meant another pack party. Although Eden and Julia had taken care of most of the planning, as usual, Sue had asked them to give her one thing to do. She didn’t care what it was, she just felt like she should make a start on being a better alpha mate.This year she had been put in charge of Christmas-themed cupcakes and cookies. It was easy enough. She had found a good bakery and all she had to do was pick them up on the day. As she m
By the time Sue and Joey got back to the apartment, Sue was feeling a lot better about things. Spending time with her little brother tended to have that effect on her. It was funny, considering that Sue used to hate him when he was a spoiled little brat of a toddler messing up Sue’s room.“Knight’s not here,” Joey said disappointedly. Sue followed Joey into the kitchen when Joey found a note and held it out to Sue.I have some things I need to take care of. I’ll explain it all later. Meet you at the hotel.I love you.Knight.XxxSue sighed and folded the piece of paper up. “I guess he had to work.”Joey frowned at her and sat down at the breakfast bar. “Things are okay between you, right?”Sue watched her little brother grab a banana from the fruit bowl and unpeel it. Knowing Joey as she did, Sue knew he was probably just eating it because it was there, rather than the fact that he was actually hungry. She didn’t really know how much to tell Joey about what had been going on between
Knight hadn’t been to see his grandpa’s grave since the funeral. He hadn’t thought it was something he would take solace in. Yet, there he was, on his own, in the dark.It took a little while to find the grave. He remembered his grandma saying that they had to wait for the ground to settle before his tombstone could be placed. Instead, there was a wooden cross with a plaque glued to it. It simply read his name.In life, Lenard West had been such a big character, to see his grave like this, with no more than a measly wooden cross on it was like a stab in the gut. Everything in life died, logically Knight knew this. Still, to him, it didn’t make any sense that his grandpa, once the strongest man he knew, was now no more than ashes in the cold ground.He dropped to his knees in the slightly damp grass and felt a wave of nausea in the pit of his stomach. He might not be able to hear his grandpa talk back to him, but Knight could still talk to him, and he could probably guess what he would
After showering, Knight got dressed and went into the kitchen to put the waffle batter in a container in the fridge so that he could use it later. On the counter, Sue’s phone gave a little trill indicating that a message had come through. Knight hadn’t meant to look at it, but the message flashed across the screen. It was from Andrew.Hey. Hope you feel ok after last night. Listen, if you want to talk any more give me a call. I’m sorry Knight’s been working so much lately, and I hope things get better between you two soon. Here’s the number of the couple’s therapist we used, if you want it. Talk soon.Knight read it through quickly before the screen went black again. He felt an instant surge of anger go through him.Couple’s therapy? What the hell had Sue been telling him?He angrily swiped the phone from the counter and marched into the bedroom before tossing the phone onto the bed beside Sue.“If I didn’t like you talking to Leslie, my own cousin, about me, then why the hell would y
Knight had been feeling so bad about the fact he had been working so much the past week that he made sure to get home early. In the week since the fall gathering, Knight had hardly seen Sue. He knew it was his fault, but it couldn’t be helped. Still, he knew he had to make it up to his wife. He had spent the day working nonstop so that he could get home at a reasonable hour.What was early for him was still a full day’s work for anyone else. It was nearly seven when he let himself into the apartment. He had a bag of take out with him and a bottle of wine.“Sue,” he called out as he shrugged off his jacket. He didn’t need to wait for a response. His hearing and sense of smell would have picked up on something by now.He walked into the kitchen and put the bag of food on the counter. As he had been staying late at the office lately, Sue had been driving herself to and from work. Her car was in the underground garage, so Knight knew that his mate had come home after work.Pulling his pho
It was pretty late by the time Sue and Knight got back to the apartment. The car ride had been unusually quiet and tense. Sue had tried to make some effort at conversation, but she was tired and fed up. It was obvious that Knight was still mad at her for spilling the beans to his mom.When they came through the door, she half expected Knight to say something, to finally bring it up, but obviously that wasn’t his way.“Knight, I’ve said I’m sorry,” she said as Knight went to walk past her to go to the bedroom. “Like a hundred times.”That was obviously an exaggeration, but her point remained.“Sue, just let it go, please,” Knight said with a weary sigh. “I just want to go to bed.”“No,” Sue practically shouted. “You can’t. We’re not supposed to go to bed angry.”Knight turned on her with a look of annoyance marring his handsome face. “Where did you read that? The Big Book of Marriage Clichés?”“It’s okay that you’re mad at me.”“I’m not mad at you,” Knight practically barked.Sue found
Since his grandpa’s death, Knight had missed the old man every single day. Being at a pack party without him was a whole new kind of pain. Lenard had been so full of life. He was always at the center of every group, telling stories while everyone else hung on his every word.There was a light missing there today.Knight walked through the throng of people, trying his best to make small talk and act like he was interested in everything they were saying. After deciding he had mingled enough for the time being, he went looking for his cousins. If he was ever tired of people kissing his ass and telling him exactly what he wanted to hear, his cousins soon put it right. Particularly Leslie, who delighted in tormenting Knight.He found them over by the fortune telling machine that his grandma hired every year from a carnival supplier. As a kid, the thing had always given him the creeps. It was a glass booth with a creepy wizard-looking mannequin inside. You held on to a metal rod, and it pum
As they made their way back outside, Sue took the lead, walking faster than the others in an attempt to escape the awkward situation. She spotted Jared and Leslie over by one of the apple bobbing stations, and she made a beeline for them.The two of them were with Jared’s daughter, Marie, but it was the adults who were doing the bobbing.“Having fun?” she asked as she got closer to them. She looked behind her, sparing Knight a glance. She felt a bit bad about abandoning him to his mother and grandmother, but she couldn’t take Julia looking at her like she had taken her baby boy away from her again.“Jared made a joke about me having a big mouth,” Leslie told her. The hair around her face was a little wet, but Jared was absolutely soaking. “So I dunked him in it.”Sue laughed as Jared shook his head like a dog.“Do we win anything if we get an apple?” Marie asked.Sue didn’t know the little girl very well. She had only spoken to her a few times. While she was fine with kids, she wasn’t
The West pack had four official meetings every year, one for each season. The one they had in autumn was during the week of Halloween. A big party was thrown at the estate with games and various other attractions outside. Sue had been to a couple of their parties so far but not the Halloween one. It was going to be the first pack gathering since Lenard’s funeral and the first gathering under their new alpha.As the alpha’s mate, Sue still didn’t really know what her new role was, if any. Knight’s mother and grandmother had organized everything. If she was honest, she was grateful that they hadn’t asked for her input so far.“So, things not to mention to your mom are the fact that we got married and the fact that you’ve not only met your real dad but have also been hanging out with him and his pack,” Sue mused out loud as Knight parked the car outside his grandma’s house.Knight turned and gave her a look. “No, I’m going to tel