Chapter 29
CLIO
“Do not climb that stack of tires,” I warned JT. He was running off his after school energy by zooming around the garage.
“I won’t get on the rafters,” JT conceded.
“You’d better not.”
Because Sam isn’t around to get you down when you get yourself stuck.
It had been four days since we broke up, and I was barely keeping my shit together. But being a mom, I didn’t get to self-indulge in pity parties.
That was what I’d told myself all week. I pushed through, even though I could barely function. Even though everything felt empty and lonely without Sam.
The guy had barely been in my life for more than a week, but he’d changed everything.
He’d turned me inside out. Made me come alive again. Got me to open my heart.
Then broke it.
This time felt so much worse than with Ted. Ted’s breakup had hurt my pride. The idea I wasn’t worthy had deeply offended me. The fact that I was pregnant and suddenly single had been traumatic for me on top of it.
But I realized now I hadn’t actually been in love with Ted. He’d been exciting and sexy. Also, arrogant and self-centered.
Except he hadn’t been mine.
Not the way Sam had been. Ted never showed up for me the way Sam had. Ted never made me the focus of his world.
I finished checking my work on a rebuild of a Mustang GT and dropped the hood, then pulled off my latex gloves and threw them away.
“Look at me, Mommy!” JT was standing atop the tire pile, arms thrown in a victory “V”, hips waggling.
Gah.
This child would never stop scaring the crap out of me.
“How are you going to get down?” I forced patience into my voice.
“Like this!” He took a soaring leap to plant one foot on the hood of the Mustang, then pushed off it, to land with the other foot on the ground.
It was truly breathtaking and so, so dangerous. I was going to be gray by the time he went to middle school.
“No jumping on client’s cars.” I made a new rule.
He didn’t look all that contrite. “Okay. What’s for dinner? Can we get those green sandwiches, like Sam brought over?”
A tight band cinched around my chest, constricting my breath, squeezing my heart.
Had that only been a week ago that Sam had shown up with sandwiches to take us to see the foal?
Sam…
A wall of grief nearly bowled me over at the memory, and I set my hand on the workbench to brace myself.
Should I reach out?
As my shock over everything that happened at the picnic wore off, I started to wonder if I’d overreacted. Yes, the pack alpha had asked about JT, but maybe I should’ve at least talked things through with Sam before throwing it all away.
But he hadn’t called me either. That proved that he hadn’t been serious about being my mate, right? That he hadn’t shared things intentionally? That I wasn’t really going to be part of the pack?
Ugh. I had no idea. My thoughts were too tangled. Feelings too conflicted.
“Mommy?”
“Oh, the, um, pesto turkey sandwiches?” I thought quickly about my plans for dinner. “Sure, we could go pick those up.” Where had Sam said he got them? On Main?
Grief washed over me again.
Think, Clio. Apple-something deli.
Just then, right before closing, two cars pulled in–a minivan and an SUV.
Shit. I hadn’t put up the closed sign yet. Now I had to deal with customers before dinner.
I sighed and headed out to the front lot only to see Remy and Joy climb out of the passenger side of the minivan, along with Becky, a woman I’d met at the pack barbecue, who was unbuckling a two-year-old from a car seat.
Another woman I recognized from the barbecue got out of the SUV and unbuckled a preschooler from the back seat.
“Remy!” JT shouted gleefully, dashing out to her at top speed. I had to put my hand on the wall to keep from being bowled over.
“Slow–oh. Nevermind,” I said, still not used to JT having friends he didn’t have to hide his true nature from.
“It’s not an ambush,” Joy called out with a smile on her face. She held up a bottle of red wine. “We brought wine!”
“And charcuterie!” said the bespectacled blonde with the preschooler who wiggled out of the car as she grabbed a grocery bag from the floor of the minivan. Audrey, if I remembered correctly. She was the wife of one of the Wolf brothers. The one who was also a rodeo star.
Joy walked over, cautiously sizing me up for my reaction.
I threw my arms around her.
“Oh, honey. I’m so sorry.” Joy squeezed me back.
God, I’d needed a friend–even if these particular friends were related to the pack that I wanted no part of.
But I wasn’t even sure if that was true anymore.
All I knew was that I was hurting and didn’t know how to stop the bleeding. Friends of any kind who I could at least talk to about the situation were welcome. At least I could speak openly with them and not eat every other word, so I didn’t mention wolf shifters.
“Come in. Come on up. I was just closing up shop.” I jogged into the office to turn around the closed sign and lock the door. “JT, bud, why don’t you take Remy and the other kids upstairs?”
“Want to see my room?” JT asked.
“Yeah!”
He and Remy took off racing, leaving the women and little ones in the dust.
“Sorry,” I said when I emerged from the office. “We haven’t honed his hosting skills yet.”
The women laughed. “We don’t need to be hosted. We brought the party to you. I’m Becky, and this little one is Lily,” she said as she set the toddler down.
“I’m Audrey, and the one who’s leading Lily is Lizzie.” She set her hand on her chest and smiled. “Please don’t stress about anything, especially since we’re barging in.”
“Barging in with wine is allowed,” I said and smiled.
I was first up the steps then directed them to the kitchen. I pulled out a wine key and glasses from the kitchen as they unpacked the grocery bag full of cheeses and crackers, grapes, raspberries, olives, pickled artichokes, and cured meats.
“If you don’t mind, I’ll just grab a couple of plates to arrange this?” Joy asked, already opening my kitchen cabinet doors, searching for what she needed.
“Make yourself at home.” It wasn’t green sandwiches, but it looked good. And there was wine.
The relief at having another adult around to make decisions and take charge of things after I’d barely been functioning nearly made me cry.
This was that sweet small town life. My business was everyone’s business, which meant I wasn’t alone.
These women were here to support me. They wouldn’t have shown up with kids and food and wine if they were going to run me out of town.
Maybe they’d been sent to plead Sam’s or their pack’s case. Maybe both.
I didn’t care. I didn’t realize until now just how desperate and lonely I’d felt since I’d left Sam in that field.
Within five minutes, they’d created a gourmet-level spread in the center of the table that the two kindergarteners took full advantage of with frequent drive-by snack grabs. The little girls followed Remy and JT around with that older child hero-worship in their eyes.
I hadn’t been able to eat much since Sam and I broke up, but I was tempted to nibble, too. I poured the wine into four glasses, and we sat down together. The apartment was small even for this small crowd, but everyone was content to squeeze close on the couch and loveseat.
I tried to remember what Sam had told me about the other two mothers–Becky and Audrey.
“Are you all…human?”
Becky grinned. “Yep. The theme here with this gathering is human moms with shifter kids. We thought you could use the moral support–if not about you and Sam then with raising a half shifter. We’re here for you no matter what happens between you and Sam.”
My throat grew tight. “Thank you.”
Harper from the fall festival was really nice, and I could’ve drowned my sorrows in a bottle of wine with her, except I couldn’t explain to her anything about why we broke up. Or what JT was. Or anything. The only answers she’d have for me were other restaurant recommendations.
I eyed the three women, who were kind enough to organize this ambush.
So much for me not wanting any part of their pack. I was so desperate for mom friends who understood, my misgivings started to leak away.
“How are you holding up?” Joy asked, sympathy in her gaze. She sat across from me on the loveseat beside Audrey. Her long blonde hair was piled on top of her head in a messy bun, like usual. “Falling for a wolf is some crazy shitake, right?”
I laughed at her modification of the word shit for the little ears present. “Yeah. Falling for one wolf six years ago was crazy.” I took a deep swig of the red wine. “Two wolves have pushed me over the edge.”
“Yeah, Wes said Sam’s pretty much going out of his mind, too.”
I went still, my heart stuttering.
I was right. Sam was hurt. This thing between us really was real.
“I couldn’t help but overhear what Sam’s bonehead brother-in-law said. About Sam being on seduction duty?” Joy added. “I just want to say that he’s an idiot for saying it that way. You’re Sam’s fated mate. No one had to tell him to seduce you. It’s guaranteed by nature.”
“Yeah, it’s really his only option for survival,” Becky said, nodding.
Audrey shot her a look, and Becky quickly said, “I mean–”
I held up my hand.
“What do you mean, survival?” I cut in. I wasn’t going to be an outsider with these women, too. They were human like me, and they had shifter mates. They needed to let me in on what they knew.
No one spoke for a moment.
Audrey sighed. “Sometimes with wolves with enough alpha in them, never meeting their fated mate or meeting her but not claiming her can essentially turn them feral,” she explained in a doctor-patient voice.
I remembered that she was an OB/GYN. “They call it moon madness although it actually has nothing to do with the moon, other than that the symptoms are exacerbated by the full moon.”
“What is claiming her?” I demanded, setting my empty glass on the side table and giving her my full attention.
The women glanced at each other again, like they weren’t certain they should tell me.
Becky chose to answer, tugging at the hem of her cute top. “When a shifter male meets his fated mate, he’s overcome with the urge to mark her. Essentially, he bites her and permanently leaves his scent in her skin, so other wolves can tell she’s been claimed.”
My eyes widened. I remembered someone saying that Sam hadn’t marked me. Bitten? Sam had to bite me to mark me as his? The one who’d done the biting had been me. I felt my cheeks heat remembering. “Have you all been bitten? Or claimed? Marked?”
Each of them nodded.
“If you were a wolf, he probably would’ve marked you the first time you had s-e-x.
” Audrey spelled that out and continued.
“You’d both be on board and understand it.
But with you, Sam was holding himself in check until you consented.
” She smiled. “We humans expect a normal courtship, not just to be carried off and bitten.”
For some reason, the idea of being carried off and bitten by Sam sent a thrill of excitement through me. It was the same as when I had that déjà vu meeting his wolf. Like some part of me knew being marked by Sam was right.
“Was that why his eyes changed when we were having… you know?” I glanced toward JT’s bedroom. The kids were all in there, but with them all being half-shifters, I had to assume they could hear anything we said.
I picked up a piece of cheese and set it on a cracker and took a bite.
Joy nodded and stood to pour me some more wine. “Yes. Well, they will always do that, but it’s a sign his wolf came out,” she explained.
The food tasted good. I made myself another cracker. “So, you’re telling me that Sam could go mad if he doesn’t bite me?”
“Yes. Let’s not focus on that, though. We didn’t come here to pressure you into letting Sam bite you. We came to support you,” Aubrey said.
“Right. It sounds like you’ve been through the wringer with wolves,” Joy said, popping an olive in her mouth. “Do you want to talk about it?”
I downed my glass of wine. Yeah, I did.
I told them the story of what happened with Ted. How his alpha had made him break up with me to find his fated mate. How I hadn’t told him I was pregnant with JT because their pack already wanted my memories wiped, and I was supposed to be out of his life.
“Wow. So when you heard Rob was asking about JT, it triggered you,” Becky said, shaking her head.
Sometimes having someone narrate your feelings out loud was all you needed to find your center. “Yeah. I guess it did.”
“I don’t know if this helps, but here’s my opinion about packs and alphas,” Audrey said. “Because shifters are superhuman, they can’t really be controlled by human laws or law enforcement. That makes pack alphas important for keeping their kind in line–they have to play the role of big boss.”
“That makes sense,” Joy murmured.
“I think you’ll find Rob is not at all a tyrant, but I also understand if you want to keep your distance for a while until you’re sure. We’re here for you, regardless, and I know Sam will be, too.”
“Thank you,” I said.
“You don’t really believe that Sam was put on seduction duty, though, right? You know that was Chuck being an as—jerk?” Joy prompted.
I sucked in a breath to really consider my answer, then I nodded. “No. I mean, I was upset in the moment and wasn’t sure what to think. But now with a little perspective? I guess I believe Sam really cares about me.”
“I know Sam would do anything for you,” Becky offered. “Not just because it’s guaranteed by his biology but also because he’s a great guy. He takes good care of the people he loves–his mom and sisters and nieces and nephews.”
Joy reached over and covered my hand. “I guess the real question is, do you care about Sam? I mean, were you falling for him?”
Tears blurred my eyes. I thought about his pirate grin.
His perpetually shirtless state. How sweet he was with JT, Remy, and his niece.
The way he stepped in to serve pizza all night at the school for me.
The way he paid attention to me and had my back.
The way he made me scream from so much pleasure.
Giving up Sam was a non-option.
I must’ve been out of my mind.
“Yeah. Yeah, I was. I mean, I have.”
Joy smiled at me. “Good. Then everything will work itself out.”