Chapter 6 The Truth We Owe the Living
THE TRUTH WE OWE THE LIVING
GIDEON
The pack house should have been full of noise. Instead it felt muffled. Like everyone was holding a breath and waiting for things to break.
I'd been sitting in this chair for six hours. Maybe seven. Time got slippery when you were exhausted enough that blinking felt like an effort and every breath reminded you that your soul was torn open and bleeding somewhere you couldn't see.
Mason lay in the bed across from me, still pale and still too quiet, but breathing.
His chest was rising and falling with the steady rhythm that said Nate's healing circle had done enough to pull him back from the edge.
Not enough to make him comfortable, and not enough to erase what happened, but just enough to keep him alive.
I watched him. Cataloged every micro-expression, every shift in his breathing, every sign that consciousness was surfacing. Because when he woke up, I'd have to figure out what the hell to tell him about a world he didn't know existed until Omega Rogues tried to rip him apart.
His eyelids flickered. Twitched. Then they opened slowly, squinting against the light that probably felt like knives after hours of darkness.
“Don't move,” I said before he could try.
Mason's gaze found me. The confusion came first, then recognition, then the pain slamming into focus as his brain caught up to the fact that his body was wrecked.
He tried to sit up anyway. Because of course he did. Because Mason had never met a reasonable suggestion he didn't immediately ignore.
I was out of my chair and beside him before he got more than a few inches off the pillow. My hand landed on his shoulder, firm but gentle, pushing him back down with just enough pressure to make the point.
“I said don't move.” I kept my voice level. “You've got stitches holding you together in places you don't want to tear open. So lie still and let me check you over before you try being a hero.”
Mason settled back with a wince that said moving had been a terrible idea. “What happened?” His voice came out rough. Raw. Like his throat had been scraped with sandpaper.
“What do you remember?” I asked instead of answering. Because his memory would tell me what I needed to explain, what I could skip, how much of the truth he'd already seen.
“The shop,” he said slowly. “Back bay. I was working on that transmission rebuild and...” He stopped. Swallowed. “There was a sound. Wrong sound. Metal twisting when it shouldn't.”
I waited. Let him piece it together at his own pace.
“Cal yelled. Then there were wolves. Big ones.” Mason's eyes went distant. Not seeing the pack house room. Seeing yesterday. Seeing teeth and blood and things that shouldn't exist. “And Ronan was there. But not Ronan. He was—fuck, he was bigger. With fur. And he was fighting them and I don't...”
He stopped. His chest was heaving. Panic climbing up his throat in ways that would make his injuries worse if I didn't shut it down fast.
“Breathe. Just breathe. You're safe. You're in the pack house. Cal's fine. You're fine. Everything else we can deal with.”
Mason breathed. Ragged at first, then steadier as his nervous system remembered that the immediate threat was gone and panic wouldn't help.
“Pack house,” he repeated. “What the fuck's a pack house?”
I sat on the edge of the bed. Careful not to jostle him. Tried to figure out where to start when the truth was bigger than anything he'd ever imagined.
“Omega Rogues came after you and Cal. Corrupted wolves.”
“No shit.” Mason's attempt at humor fell flat. “The teeth kinda gave it away.”
“Ronan kept you alive.” I watched his face. Watched him try to reconcile what he'd seen with what his brain wanted to believe was possible. “He fought them off until Evan and I got there. Then we ended it.”
“Ronan turned into a wolf.” Not a question. A statement. A fact he was trying to force himself to accept. “I saw him. He was a man and then he wasn't and I'm not crazy, right? That happened?”
“That happened.”
Mason stared at me. Processing. His brain was working overtime to find a logical explanation that wasn't there.
“You're telling me werewolves are real.”
“Shifters,” I corrected. “Wolves. Pack. Yeah. They're real.”
“And you knew.” His voice went flat. “You've known this whole time.”
Guilt twisted in my chest. “Yeah.”
“How long?”
“My whole life. I'm a witch, Mason. I was born into this world.”
He blinked at me. “A witch.”
“Yeah.”
“Like pointy hat, broomstick witch?”
“Like magic, wards, can throw power around when I need to.”
“Huh.” Mason processed that for a moment. “Does Cal know?”
“He's probably still spiraling, just quieter about it.”
“Is he okay?”
“Physically? Yeah. Mentally?” I shrugged. “You can ask him when he gets here.”
Mason was quiet for a moment. Then his mouth quirked. “This explains so much weird shit about this town.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Like that time Mrs. Henderson's cat came back from the dead.”
“That cat never died. It's just really old and really mean.”
“The lights flickering every full moon at the diner.”
“Faulty wiring.”
“The fact that you can fix literally anything without looking at a manual.”
“That's just skill.”
“Evan lifting the front end of a truck by himself.”
I paused. “Okay, that one's supernatural.”
“Knew it.” Mason shifted slightly. Winced. “Fuck, everything hurts.”
“Yeah, well, that's normal.” I checked the bandages. No fresh bleeding. Good. “You took a lot of damage. The healing circle pulled you back, but it'll take time for everything to knit properly.”
“How much time?”
“A week. Maybe two. Depends how fast you heal.”
Mason's face fell. “I can't be out two weeks. Bills don't pay themselves.”
“Don't worry about the bills.” I stood and moved to the small table where the supplies were laid out. “I'll cover the garage expenses. You just focus on not dying.”
“Gee, thanks. Great pep talk.”
I reached for the magic I didn't have reserves to use. But Mason was hurting and I'd put him in this position by not protecting the garage better, by not seeing the attack coming, by not being fast enough to stop it before he got hurt.
The least I could do was ease the pain.
I laid my hand on his shoulder. Let the magic pool in my palm, warm and careful, woven into an intent that said heal faster, hurt less, hold together better.
The power flowed out of me. Into him. Found the torn tissue and encouraged it to knit. Found the inflammation and coaxed it down. Found the pain receptors and gently muted them enough that breathing wouldn't feel like knives.
“What're you doing?” Mason asked. His voice was quieter now. Some of the pain easing from his expression.
“Helping you heal faster.” I pulled my hand back. Let the magic settle. “You'll still need rest. But it should hurt less.”
Mason looked at me and saw the exhaustion I couldn't hide, saw the way I swayed slightly when I stepped back, saw the evidence that whatever I'd just done had taken a toll I couldn't afford.
“You look like shit,” he said quietly.
“Thanks. You're a real confidence booster.”
“Seriously. When's the last time you slept?”
“I'll sleep when you're stable.”
“I'm stable now. Go pass out somewhere.”
“Can't. Cal's coming soon. We need to make sure you're both handling this.”
Before Mason could argue, footsteps echoed in the hall. Quick and purposeful. Cal's gait—I'd heard it enough times to recognize it.
Cal appeared in the doorway. Stopped. Took in the scene—Mason propped up on the pillows, bandaged and pale but definitely breathing, me standing beside the bed looking like I'd been hit by a truck.
“Tell me I didn't get jumped by a werewolf, mate,” Mason said, trying for levity and almost landing it.
Cal's eyes warmed. “Pretty sure muggers don't usually shift into apex predators mid-robbery. Kills the whole anonymity thing.”
“Right. Good point.” Mason gestured at the room. “So Gideon just told me he's a witch. You already knew?”
“Evan gave me the rundown while you were playing Sleeping Beauty.” Cal stepped inside and pulled up a chair without waiting for an invitation. “Shifters are real. Magic's real. Our boss throws fireballs or whatever when he's not rebuilding carburetors.”
“Not fireballs,” I said. “That's pyromancy. Different discipline.”
“See? He's got disciplines and everything.” Cal looked at Mason. “We work for a nerd wizard.”
“Witch,” I corrected.
“Tomato, tomato.” Cal leaned back in the chair. “So yesterday was what, exactly? Werewolf turf war?”
“Omega Rogues,” I said. “Corrupted wolves. Dark magic twisted them into weapons. Someone sent them to kill.”
Mason's face went through several expressions. “Who the hell sends murder wolves to a garage?”
“Someone who wants us dead.” I leaned against the wall because standing was getting harder.
“Great. Fantastic. Love that for us.” Cal dragged his hands through his hair. “So what else is real? Vampires? Ghosts? Is Bigfoot filing taxes somewhere?”
Despite everything, I felt my mouth twitch. “Vampires are real but rare. Ghosts are complicated. Bigfoot's a myth. Probably.”
“Probably,” Cal repeated. “You hear that, Mase? Bigfoot's probably fake. What a relief.”
“Real weight off my mind,” Mason said dryly. “I was worried.”
Cal's mouth twitched, but his eyes stayed serious. “Okay. Cards on the table. How deep in this are we?”
“Deep enough that you both got targeted.” I met his gaze. “You weren't supposed to get dragged into it. I hired you because you were good at what you did. Not because of this.”
“But we are now,” Cal said. Not accusing. Just stating a fact.
“Yeah. You are.”
Silence settled over the room, heavy with the implications.
Then Mason laughed. Rough and painful but genuine.
“What?” Cal looked at him like he'd lost it.
“We work for a witch,” Mason said. “In a garage that apparently doubles as supernatural Switzerland. And yesterday I got saved by a werewolf while murder wolves tried to eat my face.” He looked at me. “My life's a fucking urban fantasy novel.”