Chapter 32 Wyatt
WYATT
Elijah picked me up on his way to Heath and Aiden’s house, rescuing me from the two weeks of torture I’d endured at the hands of my four little sisters.
Willow in particular had been a real problem, sneaking out of the house three different times in the middle of the moondamned night.
I’d had to hunt her down and remove her from two college house parties and what had been basically a drunken orgy in a field.
I was too young for gray hair, for fuck’s sake.
But I was reminded once again that dealing with Willow was nothing in comparison to what Heath and Aiden were facing when it came to Clara.
We’d arrived at Blackwell Manor half an hour ago, and we’d spent most of that time sitting in Heath and Aiden’s living room, staring at one another like a bunch of morose fuckers after Heath explained that Clara’s time was officially about to run out.
We only had about six months until she turned seventeen.
“I can just kill them,” Elijah suggested with all the seriousness of someone throwing out an idea for what to eat for dinner.
Instead of taking a chair or section of the huge couch like a normal person, he was sitting on top of the dining table, his long legs swinging aimlessly.
“The Nelson boys will be at Proteus in the fall. I’m certain one of those little cretins will manage to provoke my beast, and I can keep the reins extra loose.
” His expression hardened. “There won’t be any more of our female family members harmed on my watch. ”
Heath rubbed the back of his neck, worry heavy on his face. “You know we can’t let you do that, man. Not only will they expel you, but at some point, the Council may decide you’re too dangerous to let live. We aren’t Guardians until we graduate.”
“I’ll do it, then,” I said with a shrug. “Bear rage is unpredictable. My dad will probably still let me into the Guardians, and I don’t give a fuck about my degree.”
Aiden rolled his eyes skyward. “As much as I share everyone’s desire for murder, it doesn’t solve the problem. Dad will just sell Clara to the next-highest bidder.”
Clara sat on the couch cushion next to mine, hugging her knees into her chest, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. She’d been staring at the wall in a daze the entire time we’d been here.
George, who Elijah had snuck into the house in a duffle bag, was curled up at her feet like a docile puppy. It appeared his joint combat adventure with the wildcat had extended the list of people he tolerated to include Clara.
“I’ll just run away,” Clara said tonelessly. “Maybe Avery’s dads will take me in. I can be a city girl.”
Heath frowned. Elijah suddenly found a rip in his jeans very interesting. Aiden pursed his lips.
Avery’s flushed face, her moans, the taste of her skin, the feel of her tits in my hands—it all flashed through my brain. She was a wet dream and my own personal fucking nightmare.
And now that her name had been spoken aloud, we were going to have to address that beautiful, infuriating elephant in the room.
“No, Clara,” Heath said. “First of all, there’s nowhere you could run that Dad and the power of the Council couldn’t find you. Second, you deserve to be able to live your life free and happy. I’m going to get that for you. We all are.”
He cast a look around at each of us, but he didn’t have to. We all knew.
We had a job to do. One that hadn’t exactly felt like a sacrifice until a few months ago.
“We’ll bond before your birthday, and then I’ll formally challenge Dad for custody of you,” he told her.
She sucked in a surprised breath. Heath had promised his sister he’d protect her, but this was the first time he was admitting our plan to her.
“It’s the only way, Clara,” Heath continued. “There are strict rules set by the Council for intra-family disputes, and custody is one of them. But once I win, it’s ironclad. No one—not our other dads, not Mom—can take you away from us unless they want to challenge me directly.”
“You’re going to bond so you can be more powerful,” Clara said, eyes widening. “You should bond with Avery.”
It was a brick landing in my gut, the feeling so visceral that bile rose in my mouth. My bear snarled.
“Avery has a beast,” Aiden told her, his jaw so tense, his teeth might’ve cracked.
Clara shrugged. “I know. She told me.”
What?
At our incredulous looks, she frowned. “Why are y’all looking at me like that? You just said she has a beast.”
“She’s never admitted it,” Heath said slowly. “To us or anyone, as far as we know. Though it’s obvious if you’ve seen her fight.”
“Or her eyes go electric,” I added wistfully.
“Or her intriguing aura,” Elijah said, his irises shining yellow-gold before he snuffed them out.
“But she’s been insisting on keeping up this charade that she’s latent,” Aiden said, “presumably because it’s why the school let her in and gave her scholarship money. I can’t believe she just told you outright.”
Clara just shrugged again. “Well, she did it so I wouldn’t be scared when Paul and Harrison were coming for me.” She scrunched her brows, tapping her chin with a pink fingernail. “Do you think she’s a Prime? Is that why she’s so secretive about it?”
I barked a laugh. “Yeah, right.”
“We did consider it,” Heath told her. “Female Primes are exceedingly rare—as rare as mythics. But it wouldn’t make sense for her to hide it if she was.
She’s been attacked multiple times by Prime males, and if shifting into her animal would’ve helped her win those fights and avoid injury, she would’ve done it by now. ”
“Not to mention the fact that her lack of Prime beast is the real hurdle to her becoming a Guardian, much more so than her being female,” Aiden added. “And she wants that badly.”
“For some unknown reason,” Heath muttered, “she has a death wish. A reckless streak. An insufferable hero complex.”
I patted Clara’s knee. “She’s probably a fox like her brother. Or maybe a wolf or cat. She can still be your hero, princess.”
She narrowed her eyes at Heath. “But she can’t be my sister.”
His face was an emotionless mask. “No.”
Whatever these feelings were, they were slowly fucking poisoning me. The worst of them all was this miserable, nagging guilt I felt no matter which direction I turned.
I let the bear’s rage seep in, and I’d keep doing it until I couldn’t feel anything else.
Clara shrugged off her blanket and stood up. Her eyes glistened, but she sucked in a breath and blinked the tears away. “I wish I was strong enough to insist that you not do this for me, Heath.” She looked around the room. “Any of you. But I’m not. I hope you find what you’re looking for.”
She padded out of the room, her bare feet silent on the wood floors as she went.
Elijah whistled. George uncoiled his thick body and slithered away, following her out.
None of us felt compelled to ask what George was up to. We had other shit to deal with.
After a long, tense silence, Heath rose from his chair and made his way to the French doors that led to the apartment’s stone patio.
The Moon was huge tonight, just a few days past full, its rays skimming the forest of trees below.
He studied the scene through the glass like he was begging our deity for answers.
“This thing with Avery has to stop,” he said, his voice a pained rasp.
“It needed to stop a long time ago,” Aiden muttered. “Why is this so fucking hard?”
I snorted a humorless laugh. “Because she’s sexy. And wild. And fearless.”
“Talented,” Aiden added with a wistful sigh. “Smart.”
“A gorgeous and intriguing soul.” Elijah grinned wickedly. “And I could listen to her sweet moans all day.”
“Fuck, that’s enough,” Heath groaned. “This is what I’m talking about. We all lose our fucking heads every time she’s even mentioned. But there is zero question she has a beast soul. Are we in agreement about that?”
We all grunted an affirmative noise.
“We need to cut this obsession out at the roots, unless we want to roll the dice with a weaker, unstable central bond.” Heath banged a fist against the thick glass of the door.
“And I can’t do that.” He sounded so crushed, and it only fanned the flames of my bear’s rage.
“I can’t risk Clara. I have to take on my dad with every advantage I can muster. ”
Aiden watched his brother crumble, wearing his own heartbreak on his face. “That’s it. Avery Baxter is nothing to us from now on.” He swallowed roughly. “And we need to treat her as such.”
Elijah’s yellow stare pierced our jaguar. “No. She doesn’t deserve that.”
“Of course she doesn’t,” Aiden snapped. “But it’s better if she hates us.”
Dark-red fur rippled down my arms. I shook my head violently. “Fuck. This sucks.”
“I won’t do it,” Elijah hissed. “I agreed to bond with whatever girl you three managed to agree on, but I won’t hurt my dove.”
Aiden shook his head. “You have to stop calling her that. She agitates your beast and threatens your control. Out of all of us, you’re the one who should’ve steered clear of her a long time ago.”
Elijah hissed at him, his grip tightening around the edge of the table. He sucked in a slow, deep breath. When he exhaled, all the fight drained right out of him. His shoulders slumped, and he went back to playing with the rip in his jeans.
“And it’s going to hurt her anyway, Elijah,” Heath added, his voice a sad rasp.
“Better for her to want nothing to do with us now before we’re waltzing around school bonded to…
Phoebe Atkins.” He had trouble getting that name out, which was rich, considering she’d been among his top contenders only a few months ago. “Or whoever.”
Aiden cleared his throat and slanted a chastising look my way. “And if Avery steers clear of us, the less likely one of us is to end up threatening guys who talk to her at parties with bodily harm and then groping her tits in a laundry room.”
“Oh, fuck off, asshole,” I spat. “Like you’re the king of control, Mr. ‘I held her while she came all over Heath’s face.’ At the fucking front gates of the school, I might add.”
“Yes,” Elijah said softly, the mention of our little tryst in the laundry room rousing him from his daze. He looked at Aiden like he was dinner, his pupils slitting dangerously. “Watch where you throw those stones, Professor.”
“Enough,” Heath barked. “This shitshow ends now. When we get back to campus, we are actively on the market for a bond. A Prime-blooded, latent female, preferably between our age and Aiden’s. We will act like it.”
“Which means we can’t all be panting after the wildcat, or it sends the wrong message,” I drawled. “Fine.”
I could pant after other chicks. It was a particular talent of mine, but Avery’s mere fucking existence would suck all the fun out of it.
I sank deeper into my bear.
We sat in silence for several long minutes. The tension slowly leeched from the room, and the jagged bite of anger and beastly dominance dissipated, leaving a colorless void of empty fucking nothingness.
Heath went back to staring at the Moon. “We all know what we have to do,” he said finally.
I had so much fucking respect for Heath, as a leader and a brother. If it were my sister in trouble, he’d make the same hard decisions for me, without a doubt. My bear pressed against my skin, his fury a comforting blanket. “Yeah,” I said darkly. “No more fucking around.”
“Agreed,” Aiden said. His expression would’ve been bored but for the turquoise rings glowing around his irises.
Elijah stared off into the distance, his eyes unfocused and his face placid, devoid of all his earlier agitation. “All good things must end, as they say.”
Fuck that. We’d make them good again. Someday. Somehow.
We were the most powerful quad in our generation. We deserved to have the things we wanted in this finite fucking life—power, freedom, and the ability to keep our loved ones safe.
And we were going to get those things by whatever means necessary.