16. Caden
16
CADEN
We continue up the trail, my mind wandering. All these years, her family’s betrayal has eaten at me, hardening my ability to trust outside of those that prove themselves to me. Loyalty means everything to shifters.
So how can walking beside the girl I swore never to trust again settle the restlessness that’s always plagued me once I learned I was named Alpha heir?
For the first time in a long time, I look beneath the blow to my pride at a fear that I keep locked deep within me.
Callie and I were young when our mother disappeared, and because her mating was arranged as a chosen mate, our father didn’t suffer the blow the way Clark Morgan did when his True Mate went missing. Losing her was my first taste of having those important to me that I care about ripped away from me, only to go through the hurt again when my father died before his time. It destroyed me to face my father’s beta—a second father to me—and his daughter’s betrayal because they weren’t just pack, they were ingrained in our lives.
I’ve lived and breathed for the pack and only the pack since that is my duty as Alpha. But maybe it’s important for me to look past what it needs for once, because before everything happened…Avery was my happiness.
Around her, I always felt just like myself. Not my title or my duty.
I’ve felt empty for years without her to fill the void torn from me when I lost her friendship.
“You don’t need to follow me all the way back. We’re within the perimeter now,” she points out once we cross into pack territory.
True. And yet, until I see her home, I have trouble pulling myself away again. The compulsion takes hold, refusing to be swayed by any logical reasoning I reach for.
“You have my shirt. And this is my territory. I’m simply walking it in the same direction as you.”
She laughs, a too-short puff of air I want her to make again so I can capture it and breathe it in with the taste of her lips.
“Sure. If that’s what you want to tell yourself, Alpha Blackburn.”
I massage my forehead and temple, remaining her silent shadow the rest of the way to her cottage. In daylight, it leaves much to be desired for a proper home. At night, it’s so much darker than the cabins populated by the rest of the pack.
When my father made sure everyone in the pack got electricity, he stopped the power lines at the furthest occupied buildings because this place wasn’t inhabited. I haven’t thought about taking them further or expanding it to the edges of Silver Falls Pack territory. Tomorrow I’ll put an extension project on the assignment schedule.
At her door, she blocks the way with a wary expression that rankles me. I sidestep her and she growls in warning.
“Aren’t you leaving?”
I stare her down. “No. Let me in, then I’ll go.”
She mutters a curse, motioning to the side of the cabin. “Be useful, then. Put another log on the fire.”
I get two of the best looking pieces of wood from her chop pile. There isn’t enough in it and half the stockpile is little more than kindling. If I don’t go on my usual morning run, I’ll have time to chop good fresh wood.
Inside, I pull up short. There’s a bed shoved into the corner and a rocking chair that’s seen better days by the fireplace with Lena bundled in threadbare blankets. Beatrix sits at a table crammed in the corner that seems to double as a counter next to a wood burning stove.
A rough-hewn workbench by the latticed windows takes up the other half of the small room. It’s clearly Avery’s space, covered in pots and jars of ground powders and pastes. Plants and dried clippings hang from rafters that will need replacing soon to fix the dry rot.
Avery’s planted herself in front of her sisters, flashing her teeth at me. Her protectiveness over them against me knocks the wind from me. Her sisters are her own little pack the same way Callie and Liam are mine.
“Caden!” At Avery’s throat clearing, Beatrix bends her neck. “I mean Alpha Blackburn. Sir.”
“Hello, Beatrix. I brought in some more wood for the fire. Soon you won’t have to worry about it,” I say.
Avery tenses, her sweet scent sharpening with anxious worry and defiance. “What do you mean?”
I hold my hands out to set her at ease. “I’ll be bringing electricity up here.”
Her eyes widen. “You will?”
At my nod, she slides her lips together and watches me as she goes to lay out the primrose on her bench. She returns my shirt by tossing it at my head without warning. I catch it before it falls to the floor, then shrug it back on.
Struck by the paleness of Lena’s cheeks, I kneel beside her chair, debating how Avery would take it if I scooted her closer to the fire. Lena smiles warmly, welcoming me despite everything I’ve put her family through.
“I remember you. ”
Fucking Fates, she was only seven when my father forced them from the Morgan cabin. A child. They all were, even Avery.
The pit of my stomach burns. “You do? You’ve grown up since I last saw you. It’s good to meet you again, Lena.”
She pokes a frail hand out from her blankets, fingers cold to the touch. Avery stops plucking leaves, holding a small knife in a white-knuckle grip, the blade pointed at me when I seek her out.
Unlike when we met at the edge of the territory last week, shame washes over me instead of the anger I’ve clung to for so long.
Lena’s smile falters with a hacking cough, and she’s unable to catch her breath. I stiffen, unsure how to help. I rub her back until Avery comes over with a fresh leaf and shoos me out of the way.
“Chew on this,” she instructs.
The worry lining her face doesn’t ease until Lena’s breathing evens. She kisses the top of her head, tucking a lock of blonde hair behind her ear.
“She’s sick.”
Avery serves me a hard look. “I told you.”
“How?” I demand under my breath, following her to the workbench.
She blinks when her eyes turn shiny and keeps her voice low. “She’s always been prone to illness.”
“I remember when she was born. The healer said she was a healthy?—”
“She got pneumonia,” she whispers harshly. “It happened during our first winter here. I—I almost lost her. I didn’t know what I was doing. I had to learn how to make my own medicine.”
My stomach clenches and I ball my fists as a distant memory hits me square in the chest. This is my fault.
Not simply because I’m the alpha and it’s up to me to make sure my pack is cared for, but because I remember when Avery was poking around for extra handouts. It was under my order that the pack ignored her or turned her away.
Fuck .
My wolf agrees with an angry swish of his tail. His judgment tastes like bile in the back of my throat.
You don’t deserve our perfect mate , he rumbles before giving me his back.
I don’t. Not after pinning her and her father’s betrayal to my family all on her after his death because I was seventeen and blinded by anger.
I’m beginning to question if I was right to make her pay such a heavy price for the last seven years.
No, I’m beyond questioning. I know I was wrong to blame her. To think she was part of her father’s challenge. To put her through a punishment she didn’t deserve.
This isn’t the type of alpha I want to be.
The hatred I’ve held on to with both fists crumbles to dust and slips through my fingers.
I’ve been a damned fool. Blind to the truth in front of me this entire time. I need to make it right.
I toss the logs into the fire and stoke it until I have the burning wood rearranged to allow the flames to breathe better. Within minutes, the temperature becomes more comfortable in the tiny cabin, though it’s still chillier than it could be. I search the room, not finding any furs to help Lena warm up. There are too many sitting around the lodge in winter I can send over.
Beatrix sprawls in front of the fire with a content hum. “How’d you do that? No matter how much I add , it never gets this warm.”
“See how I moved them so one is propped up instead of stacked? The flames can get bigger like that. The trick is not to smother it with the firewood.”
“Would you bring me my book, please?” Lena motions to a stack on the floor by the bed. I pick out the top one. “No, the one with the blue cover. Third down. I’m between three books and I’m in the mood for that one.”
She beams when I hand it over, scooting lower in the rocker to curl up with it.
Avery concentrates on her task when I prop a shoulder against the wall. She strips every part of the plant, setting aside the leaves in two piles. One she adds to a pot of boiling water on the stovetop. The other she divides onto a tray that goes in the oven, and the rest she chops finely.
Her hands are so nimble. It’s impossible not to get lost watching them.
“Are you a witch after all?” I murmur the question without any of the heat I intend at the idea of a shifter learning magic.
She smirks humorlessly. “No. I’m not a witch. I can’t do any real magic.”
I pick up one of the assortment of jars and sniff the tan powder. The spiced tang is a surprising tickle to my nose.
“That’s ground ginger. Put it back. Don’t touch anything else, I have it organized.”
I return it, eyeing the labels on other tins and phials for herbal roots, seeds, extractions, and salves. Her annoyance with me is palpable, creating a zinging buzz in my chest, yet with her sisters her attitude is completely softened.
She brews tea with the fresh wildflower leaves for Lena, laughing with her when she shows her a passage from her book. Beatrix perches on the arm of the rocker and Avery combs then braids her hair with gentle, nurturing care.
Unbidden, my mind conjures the idea of Avery caring for pups in the same way. My wolf knows she’ll be perfect, and I don’t know what to do with the unfamiliar longing unfurling within me.
A worn journal pokes out from a lower shelf. I thumb through it, brows rising at years’ worth of notes on the mountain’s vegetation along with lists of uses, some with question marks that are scratched out. Those have a tiny scrawl in the margin to note ineffectiveness or have poison written at the top of the page with several underscores.
It amazes me how much she’s learned.
At the back, she’s logged pack members she’s traded remedies for their ailments or tracking who she’s noticed has a problem she could solve and how it would benefit her. This isn’t only for her sister, she’s seen to a surprising number of females in the pack.
She snatches the journal from me with a gasp. “Why are you still poking around?”
I open my mouth to tell her it’s my right as Alpha. The panic flaring in her eyes makes me snap my jaw shut with a shrug. The buzz moving around behind my ribcage gets worse. I massage it and gesture to the table.
“I was interested to see your work. You're helping the pack in your own way. That’s a good thing. I’m grateful.”
Her cheeks color and she narrows her gaze before going back to ignoring me.
The longer I stay because it feels right to be near her, the more irritated she becomes. I’m a looming presence intruding on her space. She growls at me when I’m blocking her path. There aren’t many places to move in the tiny cabin.
After she’s tucked her youngest sister into bed, she grabs my wrist and drags me outside. A creaking noise distracts me. I stop to inspect the door.
“Do you want me to send the healer to check on Lena?”
“Don’t bother. I’ve got it covered.”
“Are you sure? If I send him, he might be able to help.”
“He’s a hack.”
My frown deepens. The hinges are probably shot and the door’s not worth salvaging. I’ll need to replace it all to resolve the noise.
“Damn it, would you stop that?” she snaps.
She attempts to push me away from fussing with the door. Even with her improved strength now that she has a wolf, she’s barely able to make me budge when I don’t want to. She releases a terse sigh when I kneel to examine the ancient, rusted hinges closer.
“It’s just—like that, okay? I’ve tried to fix it,” she grits out. “There’s nothing to be done.”
“You’ ve tried to fix this? On your own?” The question comes out through my teeth and she takes it the wrong way.
“Yes, Caden. When something breaks around here, who are we going to call? The maintenance crew?” She tosses her head with a scoff that rubs my fur the wrong way. “The only one I can rely on for help is myself.”
She shakes her head at my sharp look and storms off the porch.
My jaw works and I stretch my head side to side to ease the tension stiffening every muscle in my body. There’s no threat to fight. Not a physical one. The growl working its way up my throat is an overreaction caused by this damn bond for leaving my fated mate to fend for herself in such an extreme way.
I was an idiot to think she wouldn’t be a worthy Alpha female. A worthy mate. I’m the unworthy one, not her.
My chest constricts with dread. I rejected her. Fuck, is it too late to undo my mistakes? Would she want me if I accept the bond?
I push to my feet with another rumble and make it to her with long strides by the time she reaches the woods. She stumbles and I automatically catch her elbow to keep her steady.
“I’m fine.” She yanks free and rubs at her chest.
I feel the urge to do the same because the mad pulsing insisting I drag her body against mine and claim her mouth is driving me to the brink of madness.
“If you came to petition for help, it would be my duty as Alpha to hear you out,” I argue, unable to control my volume. “You’re still part of this pack.”
She halts, shoulders heaving with heavy breaths. Then she turns and meets my eye. The death glare she serves me would be viewed as a direct challenge by anyone, yet my heartbeat races for an entirely different reason.
Avery Morgan is beautiful and entirely too tempting when she’s furious.