How could this damning secret that I'd carried with me for years come to mean so very little?
The answer came almost immediately. Because this was my pack. "Only for a second. And not recently."
"Makes sense," Branson shrugged. "I almost had the same thought. You were an annoying little shi—punk." Branson earned an elbow in the side from Riley, who was on his second plate of tacos.
Wyatt came home last. It was a rare night when he didn't have to close. "Did anyone see this note on the door?" he asked, flashing a piece of paper for us all to see.
My spine stiffened. We hadn't armed the alarms while everyone was expected to come back.
"It wasn't there when we got home," Aver said. "What does it say?"
Wyatt unfolded the white sheet. His eyes darted across the paper before he scowled and crumpled it into a small ball. "It's nothing."
I knew that tone. That tone meant it was something. I held out my hand. "Give it to me."
"Absolutely not. You're the last person who should—"
I plucked the paper ball from his hand, holding it over my head like we weren't the same height. "You can't treat me differently because I had a momentary lapse in chill."
"Is that what we're calling it?" Wyatt asked. I spotted the anxiety lining his eyes. I'd spent so much time worrying about Phin, I hadn't paused to worry about how my brother had handled today.
"I'm sorry, Wy."
He stopped trying to grab for my hand. "You better be. I thought you were going to jail. That they'd finally succeeded in splitting us up like they always wanted."
I was a dick for not addressing this sooner. Wyatt was just so good at hiding how he really felt. He'd needed to be here, at home, before he could let himself be vulnerable enough to show the toll today had taken. "They didn't. They won't. Not ever."
He nodded and stepped back, giving me space to unfold the paper. I'd figured it was a note from Paul, or maybe the blessed business had started up again. But it wasn't either of those things. It was my mother.
Please forgive me for relaying this message with so much cowardice. After today, I didn't think any of you wished to see me. John was wrong to approach your friend as he did. But he wasn't wrong in wanting you, Nash, Wyatt, and your cousins to be there during today's ceremony. Our pack hasn't had one in so long, and it will be a time of hope and joy. Please attend. We will not be going. None of the new pack members are being sponsored by us. Only Delia. I give you my word: John and I will not be there. Glendon and Clarice are out of town. But the pack will be there.
At some point, we elders forgot that. The pack. They are why we exist. Please go. I'll be sending Paul for your final answer. Please don't be mean to him. He's only doing as I ask.
Julie
Not your mother. Not Elder Walker. She'd signed it like we were passing acquaintances.
Aver grabbed the letter next, reading it over before passing it to Riley, who passed it to Phin, and so on. Branson had it last. He looked up when he finished. "Have any of you seen Julie Walker use the word please in her life? Here she does…" He tapped the paper as he tallied them. "Four times. That's a record."
"We can't go," Wyatt said. But when no one agreed with him, he followed it with, "Can we?"
"Eat first," Riley suggested. "No good making a choice on an empty stomach."
I didn't need to eat. The pleases were strange, and maybe they signified a change in my mother I hadn't thought possible, but Delia would be there. Alpha Walker would have to be there. I had an idea of who was swearing loyalty: Tyrone, Denise, and the others we'd found in the shack. Going meant I'd be able to check on the little girl. Phin would appreciate that too. But was I really contemplating willingly bringing my mate to a shifter ceremony on pack lands? Maybe I needed my head checked.
"It's too risky," Aver said, copying the thoughts in my head. "The only way I'd go is if Nana called right now and—"
Aver's phone rang.
"No fucking way," Branson muttered, and we were all too shocked to censor him for the baby.
Aver pulled out his phone and answered. "Hello, Nana. Yes, we know. Julie Walker sent us a note. No, Nana. Nana, it isn't that—yes, ma'am." He hung up.
"We're going?" Wyatt asked.
"We're going." Aver nodded.
***
For the second time in only a few months, the four of us loaded up. We had to use Aver's work vehicle. It was the only one with enough room for us, Riley, the baby, and Phin. I wondered about Branson's choice to let Riley come, but figured if he'd tried to make him stay, he'd just fight. Plus, if the pack saw how normal Bran. Jr. was—he spit up like any other baby and had diapers that would make a lesser man cry—maybe they'd cool it with thinking he was the second coming.
Paul rode ahead in a beat-up Honda. He'd been proud of the car, claiming when he pulled up that it was the first he'd ever been able to afford on his own. I couldn't muster the excitement he'd wanted. I could only see Delia's money when I looked at the banged-up four-door.
"He gets paid by the pack?" Phin asked. The fact that I had my arm draped over his shoulders like I hadn't nearly lost him earlier was a miracle.
"Not exactly. When a shifter joins a pack—voluntarily joins, not like when you are born into a pack—they swear their loyalty and service to the Alpha. Capital A Alpha, not the designation the four of us have. If accepted, an elder will then become your patron. Depending on how the elder provides for the pack, you either work for them or do work for them, like Paul does Delia." And why I could never trust him.
"So elders must be rich."
It made sense he'd come to that assumption, and elders in other packs were often wealthy like the ones here, but they didn't have to be. That we had three strong elder households was part of the reason why the pack had always agreed that a Walker needed to lead them. Elder families were provided by the Alpha in control. Unless there was a reason for them not to, relations to the chosen Alpha almost always became elders.
That was also why no one had stepped forward to assume control from our grandfather. There wasn't a single pack member prepared to assume the responsibility and care for so many people. Thinking about it gave me a headache. It was a vicious circle with no obvious answer.
I sat straighter in my seat, clamping Phin to my side as we drove through pack lands, heading for the ceremonial fields.
"Is this…?" Phin asked quietly.
"Yes," Wyatt answered him.
This was the spot our parents had brought us to. The place where we all decided that leaving the pack was our only option. It looked different now. There were still torches, but many more of them. There was music and people gathered in the circle. At our cars, heads began to turn, and when we parked, some of the people gathered there stopped speaking altogether.
"Is Nana even here?" I asked.
"There she is," Branson said. He held Riley's hand as tightly as I held Phin to my side. It went against both of our natures to bring our mates to a place that had meant danger. Right now, it looked like a place of joy.
At least Branson had claimed Riley as his omega. That would provide him with safety to anyone who still recognized us as shifters. Most of these people had referred to myself and my cousins as the disgraced ones until recently.