Chapter 25
Reid
Ireached the bottom of the staircase and exhaled. You can do this, Reid. You’ve already met June and she was lovely.
She was. As was Evan. There was no reason to expect his father to be anything different. So why was the thought of meeting him far scarier than anything I’d faced here so far?
I think I knew the answer. Jameson was a male shifter who was also a father. In my limited experience, those two combined didn’t equal good things for me.
Evan greeted me first, his face lighting up as he stepped out of the kitchen. “Feeling better?”
I pasted on a smile. “Much, thank you. You were right—the shower helped.”
“Good,” Evan said softly. “I’m glad.”
June appeared at Evan’s shoulder, smiling at me. “Hullo, Reid. I hope you’re hungry.”
“Starving, especially with the smells coming from your kitchen,” I answered honestly. “Can I help with anything?”
June wagged her finger in my direction. “Do we need a repeat of this morning?”
I suppressed a grin. “No, ma’am. I’ll behave.”
A deep voice chuckled from the kitchen doorway. “Aye, lad, you’re learning already.”
I stiffened instinctively. Evan stepped to one side and I found myself reaching out to take his hand in mine.
He glanced at me questioningly, but I was too busy trying not to hyperventilate.
What the fuck is wrong with you? You didn’t react this way to any of the other shifters here.
Maybe I should see a therapist.
That was when Jameson stepped out of the kitchen and I found myself releasing a breath. It wasn’t his easy grin. Nor was it how he spotted my tension and paused several feet away.
No, it was because he looked so much like Evan. Everything from his height and build to his hair colour and dimples…all of it had been passed along to his son.
Everything, that was, except his eyes. Those he’d got from his ma.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Jameson said, rubbing the back of his neck. It was such an Evan move that my walls descended a little further. “I want ye to know that yer very welcome here.”
Evan tilted his head, speaking in a mocking whisper. “That’s the equivalent of a monologue for Pa. He usually lets Ma do the talking.”
I tensed, waiting for a rebuke or a punch to follow. Instead, Jameson just smirked. “Aye, because my mate often knows better. A lesson it’d behove you to learn sooner rather than later.”
I was too caught on the first part of that sentence to focus on the second. “Mate? The two of you are mated?”
It wasn’t as common for shifters to take mates as it was other supes. At least, it hadn’t been in the Clarkson Clan. They were too self-centred to consider tying themselves to another for all eternity.
“Aye,” June said fondly, her arm going around Jameson’s waist as she grinned up at him. “Going on five hundred years now, and every single one happy.”
A lump formed in my throat. Imagine being so certain about someone you were willing to bet eternity on them. I could see myself doing it, but having someone take that bet on me?
It wasn’t a risk I could imagine anyone wanting to take. Not even Evan. He might think he knew me, that he wanted me, but that could all change.
Watching me was one thing. Spending time around me was another entirely.
“They are sickeningly happy,” Evan drawled, pulling his hand from mine. I tensed, but relaxed again when I realised he was just moving it to my shoulder. Tucked into his side, all my fears calmed. “And not at all prepared to embarrass me during this dinner.”
There was a threatening note in Evan’s words that his parents either didn’t hear or chose to ignore.
They exchanged a conspiratorial look before June waggled her brows at me.
“Reid, come take a seat. Now, has Evan told you about the time Hamish convinced him he could change the colour of his wolf’s fur by eating nothing but blueberries? ”
Evan’s groan had a laugh bubbling out of me.
Maybe this would be okay after all.
It turned out to be far better than okay.
June told countless stories of Evan’s childhood.
There were no photos this time, but they weren’t needed.
Not with how she painted with her words.
I had no trouble picturing Evan’s face as his pa fished him out of the frozen lake after he’d forgotten his wolf was heavier than his human and taken an unexpected dip.
She described his expression down to the tiniest detail.
Evan spent half the meal covering his face, weakly protesting at the start of each new story. But there was no real conviction in it. If anything, I thought Evan shone a little brighter with each morsel of his life that his parents chose to share with me.
Or maybe it was just my perception of him.
Because, in each of these memories, there was something new to learn about him.
How he’d broken his father’s trowel digging up carrots to sneak to a rabbit he thought looked too lean.
How he’d set fire to his ma’s kitchen because he’d wanted to surprise them with dinner on their anniversary.
Even the tale of how he’d ended up in the lake had started altruistically. Hamish had slipped and snapped his leg. He’d screamed in such pain that Evan had shifted on instinct, wanting to get him back as fast as possible.
By the time Jameson had pulled him from the icy waters, Hamish was healed and Evan was very, very cold.
I think he caught me staring at him a few times, shooting me questioning looks whenever he did. I didn’t have an answer for him. Not one I was prepared to say in front of his parents, anyway.
You’re a fucking special male, Evan McCarthy.
The realisation didn’t make me feel lucky to be the one sat at the table with him. No, it made me feel guilty and ashamed.
I’d been punishing Evan for one misstep made over a decade ago. I’d thought him selfish and uncaring. I knew already that was wrong, but hearing his parents lay it out in such stark terms?
My past behaviour weighed heavily on me.
We didn’t only talk about Evan. Both of his parents peppered me with questions.
First it was about my job—why floristry?
What’s your favourite thing about working with flowers?
Do you get any rude or awkward customers?
Do ye like working in Chester’s shop?—then my life in general—what do you do in your free time?
What’s your favourite TV show? When’s your birthday? What’s your favourite flavour of cake?
I managed to fall down a rabbit hole with that final question.
I must’ve talked for a solid five minutes about the origins of chocolate fudge cake before realising what had happened.
My stammered apologies had been summarily dismissed, before Jameson encouraged me to continue by asking what else I knew about the history of baking.
By the time dinner was over, my throat was hoarse from talking, but I couldn’t find it in myself to be embarrassed. Evan’s parents had put me at such ease that it had felt…natural. I’d been able to be myself around them.
That was the most shocking part of the entire evening.
June hadn’t let us help during dinner, but had relented after both Evan and I insisted on cleaning up. The two of us were now at the sink, Evan washing and me drying.
“They didn’t go out for our sake, right?” I asked as I ran the towel over a plate.
“Nah.” Evan scrubbed at a stubborn stain on a pan. “It’s a real community here. It’s rare to stay in your own house of an evening. In the summer there are barbecues, bonfires in the autumn, and picnics in the spring. It’s only in the depths of winter that they give up and meet indoors.”
I glanced through the window at the thick snow now carpeting the ground. “Yeah, even for shifters I have to imagine sitting out there would be freezing.”
We fell into a companionable silence as we made our way through the rest of the dishes. Right up until Evan suggested I sit while he put them away, but I glared at him until he caved.
“I don’t want you feeling like you have to do this,” he grumbled, lifting a heavy stack of plates into a cupboard. “That’s not what this is about.”
“Ev, there’s a difference between wanting to help because it’s kind and being made to do so. You keep telling me I need to find the difference, but you need to, too. I won’t know what it’s really like to be here if you don’t let me act normally.”
“You’re right.” He sighed, grabbing a cloth to wipe down the sides. “It’s just hard. I don’t want to screw this up.”
I studied his profile as he meticulously cleaned. “I don’t think that’s possible, Ev.”
He raised a brow. “Did the wine make ye forget the past?”
“I might be on the smaller side, but it still takes more than one glass to make me tipsy.” I drifted closer to him, my fingers twitching slightly. “The dinner did reinforce how wrong I’ve been though.”
He dropped the cloth, leaning against the side as he faced me. “What do ye mean?”
“I mean, I’m sorry,” I said, the words rushing out. “I know I’ve said this already, but I’m really sorry, Ev. I should never have asked you what I did.”
A blazing heat filled his eyes as he cupped my face. “Yes, you should have, Reid. You were a child asking for help. You did the right thing. I was in the wrong.”
“No, you weren’t,” I whispered, my vision blurring. “It wasn’t right to put all of my problems on you.”
“Sweetheart, stop.” He gathered me into his arms. “I don’t like this. You were the victim, and the thought of you not asking anyone for help? That guts me almost as much as knowing I didn’t give it.”
We could agree to disagree on that point, but not the next. “I had no right to hold it against you all this time though. You didn’t mean to come back into my life, and I’ve done nothing but punish you for doing so.”
“As you should have.”
“No, Ev.” I pulled back to see his face. “I shouldn’t have, especially with how you’ve been looking out for me. You said you want us to find the way back to the light together, but I’m the one who put you in the darkness. It’s not right.”
He used his thumbs to stroke away tears I hadn’t even realised had fallen. “No, sweetheart. I was in the darkness because you were unhappy. My wolf wanted to help you. I wanted to help you. I’m not going to stand here and pretend you’re not important to us when you are.”
“But you didn’t even know me.”
“I knew enough,” he said. “And everything I’ve learned since then has confirmed we were both right. You’re important to us, Reid.”
I clasped my hands behind his neck. “You’re important to me too, Evan. I think that’s why I hate what I put you through so much. You’re kind, caring, funny, and so goddamned decent. That I accused you of being anything else makes me want to cry.”
“No more tears,” he whispered, rubbing his nose against mine. “I don’t judge you for how you behaved.”
“And I don’t judge you for the choices you made.”
“Okay.” His teeth flashed at me as he grinned. “So now we’re officially not judging each other, how about we forget the past and just focus on the future?”
“That sounds good to me.” If I was being honest, there was another thread in my mind that was demanding attention. “We’re not very good at keeping things casual.”
Evan’s hands froze where they’d been stroking my back. “Um, want me to back off?”
“Fuck no.” I tightened my grip. Not that it would have stopped Evan if he really wanted to pull away. Even if he were human, he’d probably be stronger than me. “I was just thinking…seeing as we suck at being casual, we should get some of the other benefits, right?”
Evan purred, his face dropping against my neck. “I told you already, we can keep things casual and still have sex. I’m just your personal stress relief toy.”
I tugged at the short hair at the back of his head until he lifted his head. “Look me in the eye and tell me you weren’t feeling all messed up after what we did earlier.”
His gaze turned wary. “I already said it was weird.”
“Because I was insisting we keep things casual. You can tell me it’s fine all you want, but it’s not, is it? Your wolf doesn’t like it, and neither do you.”
Evan winced but didn’t speak. I could tell he was struggling, wanting to communicate but knowing what the truth might do.
It was time to allay his fears the way he’d been doing with me. “Ev, this isn’t casual for me. It’s not a relationship either—I stand by everything I said this morning, but…I don’t want you to feel like this is all one-sided. It’s not.”
“Thank fuck,” he breathed, his chest expanding shakily. “I know I shouldn’t be relieved to hear that, but fuck, I am.”
“I get it,” I said simply. “I can’t promise you anything, but…”
“But you’re giving me a chance. And that’s all I want, Reid.”
Mischief zipped through me as I took a few steps backwards. “That, and fucking me through the mattress before your parents get home, right?”
We might’ve just had dinner, but there was only one word to describe the expression on Evan’s face.
Ravenous.
I winked at him. “Race ye upstairs.”