She stirred in the onions and said, “Robbie, is it?”
“Um,” Robbie said. “Yes?”
“Are you sure? You don’t sound sure.”
“Yes,” he said. “I’m sure.”
He still didn’t sound very sure.
“Robbie what?”
“Fontaine.”
“Fontaine,” she said, glancing at him briefly before looking back at the stove. “Ah. Your mother was Beatrice.”
“You knew my mother?” he asked, sounding shocked.
“We went to school together. I was sorry to hear of her passing.”
He shrugged awkwardly. “It was a long time ago.”
“Still. She was a smart woman. Very kind. We weren’t as close as I would have liked to have been. Different paths.”
“Yeah,” he said hoarsely.
“Do you have a pack?” she asked.
I heard the weight of her words, even if he didn’t.
Robbie shrugged again. “Sometimes? Nothing permanent. Given my job, I tend to float around a lot. Any bonds I form are usually temporary.”
“Temporary? That can’t feel good.”
“It is what it is, I guess.” He looked uncomfortable. Nervous. I remember feeling that way around her at the beginning.
“But you’re here.”
“Because I was told to be.” His eyes widened. His next words were hasty. Rushed. “Not that I wouldn’t want to be here or anything.”
“Of course,” she said smoothly. “Someone has to report back to Michelle over our every move.”
He blushed furiously. “Not every move.”
“Oh?”
“I haven’t told her about. You know.”
“About?”
“How… you’re back.”
“Why?”
He looked at me for some reason instead of answering her right away, eyes darting over my face. Elizabeth caught it and chuckled quietly.
“It just didn’t seem right,” he finally said, looking back at her.
“Interesting,” she said. “Be a dear and get the vinegar from the pantry?”
I watched as he was invited into her space. He seemed just as surprised as I was. But he moved quickly and without hesitation.
“He fits,” she said as I arched an eyebrow at her.
“Does he?”
“You don’t feel it?”
“I don’t know.” Because I didn’t know what I felt anymore.
“What an odd creature you are, Ox,” she said. “I’ve always thought so. It’s such a wonderful thing.”
I looked away.
WE LEFT Thomas’s seat at the head of the table empty.
Because it was now Joe’s.
I moved to take my seat, but Mark shook his head and pointed to where Elizabeth usually sat at the end opposite the Alpha.
Elizabeth didn’t even try to sit there, moving instead to my old seat as she spoke softly with Rico. There was no hesitation. She didn’t even look at me.
I didn’t understand what was happening, not completely.
Sure, I had the basic idea of it.
I was the mate of the Alpha.
I had a place in the pack, higher than it’d been before.
But I wasn’t a wolf.
We hadn’t yet mated.
And Joe wasn’t here.
The food was served.
Everyone waited. So I did too.
Until I realized they were waiting for me.
I looked at each of them in turn.
They held my gaze steadily.
I knew I should say something. But I’d never been very good with words.
I needed to try, though. For them. Because they needed it. And I think I did too.
I said, “We’re pack. It’s time for us to start acting like one again.”
And even though we weren’t whole (and the thought that we ever would be was a hope that I didn’t dare believe, not yet), and even though the absence of those we loved throbbed like a rotted tooth, I took the first bite.
The rest followed suit.
It wouldn’t be until later that I realized that had never happened before. That even when Thomas had been missing at dinner, we never waited for Elizabeth to eat first before we did. It was only done for an Alpha.
AT THE end of the first year, I received a message in the middle of the night.
I didn’t see it until morning.
I’m sorry, it said.
I didn’t understand.
about what
A response came almost immediately.
Failed message delivery. The number you are trying to reach has been disconnected or is no longer in service.
A cold chill crawled up my spine.
I called the number.
It rang once.
An automated message.
Disconnected.
No longer in service.
It was okay, I told myself. It was okay because these were burners. The phones. They’d just gotten a new one. Joe had forgotten to get me the new number. Like he always did.
I just had to wait.
I set my phone down, pulled Joe’s comforter up onto my chest. It didn’t smell like him. Nothing did in his room. Not anymore.
But that was okay.
Because I just had to wait.
the second year/song of war
IT WAS partway through the second year that the Omegas came.
They weren’t prepared for us.
JESSIE SAID, “Hey, Ox.”
We were at the garage. Tanner, Chris, Rico, and me. Robbie was there too, having decided he was bored enough that he wanted to learn his way around. It was slow going because he was absolutely terrible when it came to cars, so much so that I barely trusted him to do an oil change by himself.
But he tried.
I learned a lot about him. He was a year younger than I was. His mom had been killed in a turf war between rival packs when he was just a kid. His father lived in Detroit, a human that he only saw every now and then, given he didn’t want anything to do with pack life after the death of his wife. But they were two separate people, and their paths had no real reason to cross. It saddened him, sometimes, but he didn’t want to do anything about it. He didn’t have a mate. He’d had a boyfriend once, a long time ago, and a girlfriend later, but he wasn’t focused on that. He had a job to do.
He confused me. It wasn’t a good thing.
“Why are you still here?” I’d asked him.
He’d just shrugged and looked away. “I’m told to be.”
I didn’t believe him. Not anymore. Not when I’d overheard him on the phone, talking with those faceless people in the East, saying he didn’t want to be replaced, that he was fine out here with us, that he wanted to stay. Nothing had happened since he’d been here and he wanted to make sure it stayed that way.
He made it sound as if it was just a job when he spoke to us.
He was lying, but I didn’t think it was a bad thing.
Still, there was only so much a person could do to watch over us before boredom set in.
So he came to the shop.
He didn’t need to be paid, given he was already making an unknown amount just for being in Green Creek.
We just made sure to keep it off the books.
It was good, though. Having someone else to talk to.