29. Finley
Finley
The police showed up as one would expect when there’s a massacre at a public function.
My men and I sat on the edge of the stage, waiting for them to arrive.
I’d sent everyone else into hiding. They didn’t need to be held accountable for this.
I did. The only reason they’d been involved in the first place was because I asked for their help.
As queen to my people and the mate to alphas who led a well-respected pack, I would shoulder the blame for all of it.
When the police stormed in dressed in riot gear, guns at the ready, to find the floor littered with the dead, they froze. There was no point in making things look better when it was what it was and I wasn’t going to deny any of it.
“You won’t need your guns,” I announced. “None of us wish you any harm.”
The man in the lead scoffed, looking around the space. “Like any of us believe that?”
“I’m an elf, officer. We cannot lie,” I answered with a shrug. “Ask whatever you want to know and I will tell you.”
And so began the hours and hours of questioning.
We called in lawyers that Derven had on retainer, along with Morwyn and Eli speaking on our behalf.
It wasn’t until the wee hours of the morning that we were allowed to leave the precinct with the knowledge we wouldn’t be going to jail.
With Morwyn being the only living member of the United Senate, she made it clear I was hired to take out the members I did.
Then with the amount of evidence I had on the Dark Ring members, it wasn’t hard to show they were dirty.
Granted, they wouldn’t approve of killing, being the way this should be handled, but no one was willing to press charges.
The biggest question on everyone’s lips was…
what now? The United Senate was dismantled and Morwyn proclaimed that it was dissolved and that leaders of each supernatural species should choose their next leader.
There would no longer be a united front.
Each would tend to their own, creating a council of three members to govern.
It was how things should have been all along.
Our lives were chaos for months after the gala—news reporters sneaking onto the land, or should I say, tried to. The forest wasn’t having any of it and would keep them from interfering. The pack grew in more ways than one as elves created the first village within the Smoky Mountains forest.
There was a good fifty miles between the pack and the village, but they did truly coexist, helping each other out, learning new skills, and improving old ones. It was just how I envisioned things would be.
The elders came to live in the village, teaching those who wanted to learn all about elves.
The texts and scrolls the Senate had kept locked away were given back to us and a records hall was built.
All were welcome to visit the village if they had pure intentions and if they didn’t, well…
the forest had a knack of making sure they never arrived and ended up in some other odd location.
It didn’t matter how many times people tried.
They’d find themselves in a different state if they weren’t careful.
It took about six months for the world to start getting back to some semblance of normal.
It was easier for us since we hardly had to leave the pack lands for anything.
Now the holidays were upon us and the guys wanted to make a huge deal out of it.
I’d never been one to put much stock into the whole festivities, but this year, it was different since I now had a family to spend it with.
The twins wanted to bring their mom out, Morwyn was coming to stay for a few days with Peter, and Eli was even going to join us for the weekend over Christmas.
Eli and I didn’t have a father-daughter relationship, but I accepted that he was part of my life and allowed him to be part of it.
We stayed in contact through email or occasional phone calls.
If he was in the area, he’d stop by, or if we were in New York for something to do with Zander, we would do the same.
It was odd learning how to be family to someone who knew all about you and you knew nothing about them.
We disagreed on more than we agreed but soon learned how to agree to disagree.
He was of an older mindset and I had more experience in the world. We came from different perspectives.
Begrudgingly he sold the Organization to Tabitha and Ayla, who ran things vastly differently and used it to hunt down the remaining members of the Dark Ring.
Both of them were like sisters to me and they would be joining us as well for Christmas.
The pack house was now the guest house since we didn’t have any room in Zander’s house to keep anyone else there.
We’d talked about adding onto the property, maybe another wing or adding a guest house off to the side for when people came to visit.
Most people thought it was odd that my guys had their own room, even if they hardly slept in it.
We’d had to upgrade and get another king-sized bed and put it in the master suite, so we had more room.
Every night, the guys climbed into bed like a massive puppy pile with me in the middle.
If there was ever a night that I wanted to be on my own, I could stay in my nest…
not that that’s ever happened. Occasionally if one or two of the guys wanted alone time with me, then I’d stay in their room with them, but most of the time, we slept together.
None of them had any shame and would either join in or roll over if they caught us fucking.
For the most part, our days were so busy dealing with the influx of people in our pack and the funding that Cole and Lane got for their business.
So in an effort to get them all in one place before all our guests arrived, I mandated a family dinner they all had to attend, or I was going to kick them out of the bed for a week.
If any threat was going to do it, that would be the one that worked.
I still wasn’t all that skilled in cooking, even though the others had been trying to teach me, elves and wolves alike, but it was not a skill I possessed.
Thankfully this wasn’t something that the guys needed from me since Zander, Derven, and Noah could handle it, and the rest could make passable food when needed.
So for this dinner, I had Katie helping, more like I chopped things up, and she did the cooking. It was just about finished when they guys started to file into the house. They all came and greeted me with a kiss, then headed up to shower or change.
“Katie, I can’t thank you enough for helping me do this. I didn’t feel like it was right for me to ask them to come to dinner, then make them make it.” I laughed, my voice raspy from the permanent damage the iron left behind.
She smiled and gave me a tight hug. “What is a pack for other than to help out when needed? I couldn’t let my alphas starve or be forced to eat Kraft Mac and Cheese, now could I?”
“That only happened once,” I muttered, rolling my eyes as she blew me a kiss.
“All you have to do is take the bread out of the oven when the timer goes off and the rest is just keeping warm,” Katie instructed as she gathered her things. “Call me if anything goes horribly wrong, but I think you’re safe for now.”
I let out a heavy sigh after she left and pulled the apron off, hanging it up on the pantry door. Someone stepped up behind me and settled his hand on my hips. “You know, snuggles, I don’t think there is anything sexier than a woman with an apron on.”
“You mean when it’s the only thing she has on,” I teased.
Mason made a noncommittal grunt. “Bra and panties could be hot too…”
“Oh really, is that so?” I asked, turning in his grasp to wrap my arms around his neck. “Are you telling me that’s what you want for your birthday, or is there another reason you’re bringing it up?”
Avoiding answering the question, he caught my lips in a searing kiss that had me moaning as I got backed into the pantry door. The harsh sound of the buzzer had me shoving him away and racing over to the stove.
“Where’s the fire, babe?” Noah asked, his brows raised in concern.
Yanking open the oven, I pulled out the bread that was perfectly toasted, and the cheese melted just the right amount. “No fire and trying to keep it that way,” I answered, slipping it onto the cutting board.
“Little one, that only happened once. You’re gonna need to give yourself a break already.
All of us have burned a pizza once or twice in our lifetime,” Colt reminded me as he wrapped his arms around my waist, kissing my neck.
“You are amazing at so many things. It’s perfectly alright if cooking isn’t one of them. ”
“While I appreciate that, I just want to make sure all of Katie’s hard work doesn’t go to waste,” I rebutted as I cut the bread into chunks. “Can you take this into the dining room?” I asked Colt, changing the subject.
“The dining room, hmm?” Zander asked as he arrived in the kitchen. “Something special happening?”
I shrugged. “Just wanted us to have a special night just for us before all the family comes into town. We’ve all been so busy. I miss us having this kind of quality time.”
Zander stopped me and cupped my cheek. “Little dove, I told you if you don’t want me doing the Asian tour, I won’t. It’s going to be four weeks out of the country and I know you can’t leave for that long.”
“It’s not that at all,” I assured him. “I was honest when I told you that I would be fine. When you do a US tour again, I’ll come along for however long I can.
Just because you now have a mate, I don’t want you to give up something you love.
You fought hard to get back to doing this after everything that happened.
It will be an amazing way for you to start the new year. ”