The Good Boys Club (Mythical Mishaps #2)

22. Barking Up the Wrong Tree

Barking Up the Wrong Tree

Present Day

Cian

When Clem and I arrived at the marquee with the other kitchen helpers and all the food, the banqueting tables had been moved back into the middle and the wolves were seated and awaiting their feast.

My eyes found Mash immediately, nestled snugly between Rita on his right and Dylan on his left. Opposite him were Zach and Kai, Mika and her partner Atlas, Felix and Sean, Kimmy and Juno, and Alba and her girlfriend Jade. They’d left zero space for me.

Clem caught me staring. “Don’t worry, you sit next to me at the top table. This is the way it always is, but you’ll have him all to yourself afterwards.”

“Sure,” I said, as we carried the food over to the buffet station.

I’d spent the last part of the morning and the first part of the afternoon helping Clem in her beautiful kitchens. I’d been on baklava duty, sequestered in the tiny one-person workspace again so that I didn’t have to be partially shifted for the three hours. Though I was starting to get used to the sensation of holding my ears and tail in place.

The other thing it gave me was time to think about this whole Mash alpha deal.

I couldn’t tell him the truth when we’d woken up naked in the forest this morning. Couldn’t bring myself to admit his mid-shift confession.

Mash was the next Cassidy pack alpha.

He would have known this following his initial shift at what, age eleven? Twenty-three years ago. He’d known for twenty-three years and he hadn’t said anything to me.

Not when we first met. Not at Zach and Kai’s mating ceremony when I’d asked him how the alphas and betas worked. Not in the car on the way over here. Not any time.

I tried to be mad at him. He was my closest friend, the person who knew me the best. The person who I knew better than anyone. I tried to be annoyed that he’d kept this from me, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t muster the anger.

Mash would not have held this secret for as long as he had without good reason. I knew that much. It would have been eating away at him like a sickness. He told me everything.

Everything.

No matter how mundane or repugnant.

He’d tell me about his sexual escapades. In unsolicited detail. He’d tell me about his grocery lists, and how he could eke another four washes out of his shower gel before he had to replace the bottle. He told me about his fear of latex balloons. How the squeaking made all the hairs on his body stand up, and his balls shoot up inside his groin. He’d tell me about his bowel movements—the frequency of them, the volume, the viscosity. One time, he called me in the middle of shitting to brag about the size of it.

“It’s gonna touch the water, and it’s still coming out of me,” he’d boasted.

“Mash, do you remember that conversation we had about selecting which information was suitable for sharing?” I’d replied.

There was no way he wouldn’t tell me about the alpha thing unless it was really, truly hurting him.

He’d spent so much of his youth avoiding Howling Pines, returning only during summer and the Winter Fest holidays, and studying far enough away from his hometown that going back and forth for full-moon shifts wasn’t feasible. It was all making so much sense now. He hadn’t been running from the small-town life like I’d assumed.

He’d been running from responsibility. From being tied to a certain life in a specific place with no wiggle room for choosing another path. It was his destiny. And he’d been avoiding it now for almost a decade. How much longer could he keep doing that?

I remembered thinking about how selfish Clem was for refusing her destiny. But it was different now that I knew it was Mash.

Now I knew that at some point I’d lose him.

Not permanently, but we’d be a seven-hour drive apart.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

I’d wished I was cutting up onions instead of nuts. I’d needed the cover for my tears.

Across the marquee, Mash spotted me. His face instantly lit up with a grin. He waved, and his tail swished wildly behind him. I smiled back, since my arms were still full of baklava. My own tail began swaying.

We put our dishes down where Clem instructed. She picked up an empty plate. The other kitchen wolves followed her lead. I copied them.

“In the grand tradition of things, because werewolves love traditions,” Clem said to me, her voice kept low so the others didn’t suspect I was an impostor who knew nothing about were culture. “The chefs get the first serving. We’ll fix ourselves a plate each and then take it over to the top table up there. Then folk will come up to the buffet in groups according to rank.”

Clem piled chicken thighs and veggies onto her plate. “The alphas will start. After them, the alpha successors. Then the betas, and then after them, everyone else including the unshifted wolves and the cubs. Don’t ask me why, that’s just the way it’s always happened. When I was eleven, I started helping in the kitchens so I could eat first, because back then sometimes what was left over was . . . meh.”

“Work smarter, not harder,” I said.

“You got it.”

We took our plates up to the top table and sat down, Clem to my right.

“So now the alphas will help themselves.” Clem picked up her fork and began tucking in.

Without any kind of announcement or fanfare, seventeen wolves rose from their seats, including Rita. They made their way over to the food.

Clem swallowed her mouthful and continued to narrate the event. “These post-shift banquets date all the way back. They used to be so that folk could smooth out the waters after a night of shifting and often fighting. They fought a lot back in the day. Not so much any more. You still get fights, obviously. People can’t help themselves sometimes, and when you get a hundred wolves all shifting at once and inhibitions being lowered, it’s to be expected. There aren’t nearly as many fights these days, but we still hold these buffets. Mostly because the elders love tradition. And they especially love anything that’s particular to were culture.”

I nodded. I enjoyed listening to Clem’s little history lessons. Mash had always shrugged and said, “It’s just what we do.”

The alphas had finished scooping food onto their plates and were heading back to their places. On the way, Rita smiled and winked at either Clem or me, or both of us.

“And now the successors will eat,” Clem said. Her mouth immediately froze in an “oh” as we both watched Mash push up from his bench. “Oh, fuck,” she hissed under her breath. “Nooooo. No, no, no. There wasn’t any chance you didn’t hear that, did you?”

“It’s fine,” I said. “I already know.”

“You know?!” She pulled on my arm until I turned to face her.

“He sort of told me last night when he was a wolf. He doesn’t know I know, though. I couldn’t . . . I didn’t want to spoil his mood.” Not what I wanted to say.

At that moment, Mash looked over at us. Clem gave a too-obvious wave, and Mash smiled back, without a single modicum of knowledge about our discussion, or about Clem’s crash course in werewolf-feasting hierarchy. He made a heart gesture to me and I flashed him a lazy half smile.

Someone yelled, “Leave some food for the rest of us, Mash.” People laughed.

“What happened? Tell me everything,” Clem said.

“Well,” I began. “There’s not much to tell. He said something to the effect of I know I’m supposed to be this big old alpha dude . . . ” I didn’t finish his sentence. That he couldn’t do it alone. He needed me.

Clem looked at me for a moment, her features travelling from concern to . . . a different kind of concern. A softer worry. Like she was worrying about me. “How do you feel about it?”

Not quite what I expected her to say, and I really didn’t know how to answer that question.

Sad. I was feeling sad. Heartbroken. Mash was more than a friend. More than a kindred spirit. He was my soul mate. My other half. My ride or die. But he didn’t have a choice.

And maybe I wasn’t as important to him, but he loved me.

He was moving seven hours away from me. I would be demoted from daily visits to once in a blue moon weekends. I was going to miss him so fucking much.

Clem seemed to glean whatever she needed from my silence. “You’ll get used to it here.”

I nodded. Wait—

“What do you mean?”

The successors were now seated again, Mash’s plate piled so high it almost mirrored the shape of the mountains at the end of the reserve. He held up a piece of my baklava in one hand, pointed to it with the other, then made a sex face.

“Howling Pines . . . it’s not such a terrible place to live. It might not have the same amenities as the city, but you’ll never breathe cleaner air, or eat fresher fish. And the view from the house across the forests and mountains . . . you can’t beat it.”

It took a few moments for the pieces of the puzzle to slot themselves into place. “You mean me living here?”

“Of course.” She said it as though there was a duh at the end of her sentence.

“That’s an option?”

Clem frowned at me. “No, it’s not an option. It’s literally the only option.”

Oh. Sure. I was Mash’s mate. Of course it was the only option. “Yeah, shit, sorry.”

We continued eating as more than half the remaining wolves—the betas—formed a queue for the food. The only people from Mash’s pack not joining them were the kids, Felix and Juno, and Mash’s sister Alba and her partner.

“Is Alba not a beta?” I asked.

Clem swallowed her mouthful and shook her head. “She didn’t want the responsibility, so she rejected the call. Like your mate, she moved away to the city. She returns to Howling Pines for the big holidays, but she’s not bound to them. But unlike your mate, she had options.”

Suddenly, I didn’t feel much like eating. I should have encouraged Mash to talk about it before. Maybe I could have helped him somehow. Or maybe we could have run away together.

I watched Mash, happily munching on his food, and my heart ached. For a million different reasons. Occasionally, he would look over at me and wink or salute. One time he mouthed, “What?!” and then flipped me off.

Felix pointed at something over Mash’s shoulder and Mash turned to look, and both Felix and Juno stole baklava from Mash’s teetering hoard. Mash laughed and noogied Felix’s head.

“Felix didn’t shift last night, then?” I said, realising he was still sitting with the other unshifted wolves and non-betas.

“We were all expecting it, but no. It’ll happen soon, though, I’m sure,” Clem said. “Thank you for telling him you were sixteen when you shifted for the first time. You eased a weight from his shoulders.”

“That’s no problem.”

“How old were you really?” she asked.

“Six.”

“Wow. You’ll have to tell me all about it at some point. It’s fascinating.”

“First time I did it, I destroyed the living r—” I started to say, but cut myself off as Dylan sat back in her seat, leaned close to Mash and whispered in his ear. Mash laughed and picked something invisible from her collar. She playfully pushed him away, but her hand lingered on his shoulder.

Clem followed the line of my sight, but said nothing.

Riley came to sit down as the other betas began filing into their seats, but Dylan was still touching Mash.

I shouldn’t be annoyed. I didn’t have any claim on him beyond the one we were faking. He was free to flirt with whomever he wanted, though within limits in front of his pack.

I tore my gaze away, but the sound of Mash’s bassy laugh drew my sights again. I had no right to be jealous of her—of them. No right whatsoever. And I ought to be thinking about how Mash’s flirting could actually benefit my job application . . .

Yet . . . if that woman didn’t get her paws off my fake mate this very instant, I was gonna lose my shit.

I cracked my knuckles one by one, starting with my thumbs.

“It’s totally normal to feel like this,” Clem said, placing her hand over mine, stopping the crunching. “I know the feeling well. When the mate bond is as new as yours is, you’re prepared to rip throats. There’s never been anything between them, though. Mash and Dee-Dee, they’re just very good friends.”

“Hmm?” I murmured, not taking my eyes off them.

“I went to school with her. Dee-Dee was in my class at Lykos Academy. If my memory serves me correctly, you have nothing to worry about. Mash is very much the opposite of her type.”

“She keeps touching him,” I said through clenched teeth.

Clem leaned a little closer to me. “I’m not saying this is the cause,” she whispered. “But it certainly couldn’t hurt to reinforce your scent markings again. To ward her off him.”

I raised an eyebrow.

She pointed to my neck. “My theory is you guys are peeing into jugs and then wiping it on each other”—gods—“which is fine. Loads of wolves do it that way, and I guess it’s especially weird for you not being werefolk. You’ll probably never understand all of our bizarre customs. But if you want people to know he’s yours, undeniably and incontestably yours, you’ll want to . . . apply it straight from the tap, if you catch my drift.”

Oh, I caught her drift alright. I made a face. “I don’t think that’s gonna happen.”

She shrugged. “It’s personal preference for sure, but if you want everyone to understand they can’t go around manhandling your mate, you’ll wanna get him nice and covered in your scent.” She drew out the word covered. “There’s nothing wrong with doing it; it’s a natural and ancient werewolf custom. But this generation do it less and less. Everyone’s so happy to eat ass these days, but not piss on each other. Tell me what the difference is.”

I’d chosen a really bad moment to swallow my baklava. I choked. Chopped syrupy nuts shot dangerously close to my nasal cavity. I put a hand over my mouth in case of flying debris. My ears retracted with the momentary lapse of focus.

Clem slapped me on the back.

I slipped out of my chair and onto the floor so people wouldn’t stare, but they were anyway. I could feel all the eyes on me.

“Gods, I’m sorry,” she said, still massaging my back.

I cleared my airway as best as I could, felt my ears to make sure they were still there—still fluffy, still werewolfy—and straightened into my chair.

Mash was there, hovering over the table. “What’s wrong? You dying?”

“No, I’m okay,” I wheezed. “Your sister was talking about eating ass.”

“Clem! Not before dessert, for crying out loud. Also, get your grubby paws off my mate,” Mash said. Clem whipped her hand away from between my shoulder blades. “For that, I’m taking your sweets.”

He piled Clem’s three pieces of baklava into his palm. She side-eyed me but smirked at her brother.

Mash leaned closer to me. “Seriously, babe, are you okay?”

Babe? I wanted to call him on it. I didn’t. “Yes, I’m fine . . . babe,” I said, adding extra emphasis to the term of endearment.

Mash had called me a lot of things in our fifteen years of friendship—mate, buddy, bestie, darling, sweetheart, the light of his life, his sun his moon his stars, the angel of his paradise—but never babe. I knew it was all for show, but it didn’t stop my heart from fluttering.

“Good.” He blew me a kiss and walked back to his seat with Clem’s stolen baklava.

“Damn, I was looking forward to that,” she said.

“You just let him take it,” I said.

“He’s my littlest bro. He could murder someone, and I’d ruffle his hair and tell him how cute he was. Besides, did you see how protective he was of you?”

I did see that, and I fucking loved it. I placed my last two baklava slices on Clem’s plate. “You have them. I still have clumped nuts on my uvula.”

“TMI!” she whined.

“It’s the dangly thing at the back of your throa—oh, you’re just taking the piss.” I laughed, rolled my eyes. I had thought it was a bit rich crying TMI when she’d been the one to bring rimming to the dining table.

It was at that moment I decided I really liked Clem. And maybe if Mash was going to be stuck in this tiny town he hated so much for the rest of forever, at least he’d have his sister.

“Can I be real with you for a sec?” she said, her expression morphing from sibling rivalry to motherly affection in a heartbeat.

“Sure,” I replied, even though panic was flooding my system.

“You should just tell him you know about the alpha thing. It would make his life much easier. He’s so worried that you’re going to turn around and leave because this isn’t the life you chose, it’s been forced upon you.”

Oh boy, my instincts had been right.

I could admit to Mash that I knew, but . . . how? I’d never been very good at admitting things to Mash, and I couldn’t see that changing any time soon.

Or I could pretend I was none the wiser and enjoy the ignorance.

Clem and Rita and Kimmy all had the wrong end of the stick. It wasn’t a case of me rejecting Mash, it was simply that we were never meant to be together in that way. Because if we were, well, wouldn’t it have already happened by now?

“I’m going to give him the opportunity to tell me himself. I think I owe him that much—or . . . he owes me—but if the chance comes up, I’ll let him know I’d never reject him. He’s my soul mate. I’d follow him to the ends of the Eight and a Half Kingdoms.”

“I know.” Clem placed her hand on the back of mine. “Now, the tricky part is, because you’re not werewolf the pack will have to vote on whether to accept you as one of us.”

“A vote?” I said, pretending like it mattered either way.

“Yes, but no, because it has to be unanimous.”

“What, really?”

She nodded solemnly. “Because once you’re welcomed into the pack, you become family. Everyone who is already part of the pack has to agree.”

“Does this happen with werewolf partners?” It seemed awfully speciesist.

“It can do. If you were full were, but say I had a problem with you, I would take that to Alpha and she would decide. So let’s say we vote for your acceptance, and everyone but me votes yes, ultimately Alpha gets the choice.”

“So even if someone says no, your Nana could still override them?”

Clem grimaced. “Yes, in theory, but my nana is the one you’ll struggle most to get approval from.”

“Noted,” I said, but I didn’t bother to think about it any more. It wouldn’t reach the point of a pack appraisal vote.