Chapter One #3
“My dad was monitoring all my phone activity, even after he gave me back my phone. Every text, every call. He had some sort of history tracker on my computer to see if I’d even try to make a social media account to find you.
If there was any evidence that I had tried to reach out to you, we would have all been in a shitload of trouble.
If you think he was strict before you left, our house was like a prison after you were gone. ”
Kimberly shook her head. “Nope. I had thought of that possibility. You had plenty of friends. You could have used one of their phones. Your dad couldn’t keep tabs on you at school.”
Undeterred, Shane answered, “You know all of my friends were in the pack. Dad didn’t like me making friends with humans.
And all of their parents sided with my dad.
No one was sympathetic to your dad or your family.
If I used Jake’s phone or Bobby’s, their parents would have ratted me out to my dad. ”
That took some of the starch out of Kimberly’s defense. “No one … No one thought my dad could have won the challenge?”
Shane slowly shook his head. “No one. Your dad was crazy to try and take over the pack. He couldn’t even match my dad’s beta’s dominance or strength. What was he thinking?”
Kimberly went stiff again. “He wasn’t crazy. He was just … ambitious.”
“There’s a fine line between ambitious and insane.”
Right about now, any shifter’s eyes might have flashed gold with indignation. Kimberly’s eyes did not, but he could feel the waves of rage pouring off of her.
“My dad is not insane!”
“No, you’re right. He’s just a narcissistic, power-hungry asshole who abused his family, wrecked their lives, and made his daughter feel like she wasn’t as amazing and perfect as she really was … is.”
Shane didn’t know whether to feel proud or ashamed of the curveball he just launched at Kimberly.
Her mouth had opened as if she were going to make a comeback, but nothing came out.
He could see the war in her as her eyes jumped from him to the ground, to the forest around them, as if searching for a way out of this conversation.
Pride must have kept her rooted, but fear and uncertainty made her want to bolt.
But unlike in their old lives, Shane wasn’t going to make it easy on her. They were grown now. No more running.
“Say what you’re thinking,” Shane demanded.
Kimberly’s throat worked through the words, then she said softly, “I can’t deal with this right now. This is too much. You, our past, our families, the … I just don’t want to deal with it right now.”
Shane’s eyes narrowed. There was something she wasn’t saying, but he was far from the position to ask her. She owed him nothing. Not after the way he hurt her. Maybe he had been too quick to believe a miracle had walked into his life.
For months, his father’s voice echoed in his mind, reminding him of how he had failed his pack, how not following his tried-and-true method of how to be an alpha had put them all in a mess.
They were in Tolstone for a reason, and that reason likely had his father rolling in his grave.
So, his father’s ghost came to haunt him, pushing him to make decisions that weren’t his own.
Shane might have let his father rule his life while he was living, but not while he was dead.
Still, the countless lessons he had to endure in his younger years had lingered in the back of his mind, resurfacing with the shame of his mistakes.
His own willpower and determination to treat his pack with respect and consideration had held off his father’s nagging lectures, but Shane needed something else.
Another way. Another voice shouting down his father’s.
At first, he believed he could have learned from Dominic Beaumont, the Prime Alpha of Tolstone.
Obviously, Dominic was doing something right, or his family line would have lost its position decades ago.
But the moment he saw Kimberly, he had another idea.
When they were younger, and then as teenagers, Kimberly ran to Shane’s embrace when her father was too critical and broke her spirit.
And Kimberly’s company was what Shane relied on to keep his father’s toxicity from poisoning his own principles on what it meant to be an alpha.
He had thought that maybe, just maybe, they could have been that safe haven for one another again.
But it was clear now, in the way Kimberly struggled to keep stable in this moment, that Shane was wrong. She wasn’t ready for him to be back in her life in the way that he was ready for her.
Shane sighed. “Fine. Then I’ll go this way and you go that way, and I’ll make sure not to bother again.”
He turned to leave, but thought he saw her take a step forward, so he paused and waited.
Nothing. She didn’t move again, didn’t say a word.
Didn’t try to stop him. How ironic. Kimberly didn’t stop him from running off, just as he didn’t go after her ten years ago.
Leaving Warrington and his father’s pack had once been their ultimate plan.
Run away and start their own pack somewhere their fathers couldn’t track them down.
Looking back now, he knew that was a fantasy. After everything that happened, Shane didn’t have the kind of bravery at eighteen that he needed to take that leap of faith and leave Warrington. Kimberly took that courage with her when she and her family left.
Shane took off into the woods and called upon his wolf for the shift.
He still had a park to scout for his pack.
Hanging out with Kimberly would have been a pleasant change to his plans, but at the heart of it, Shane had his obligations to wolves who still needed him.
And Kimberly didn’t need him. Not anymore.
*
All the way home, Kimberly replayed every second of her encounter with Shane.
Everything from his excuse for why he ghosted her, how he talked about her father, and the indirect, golden compliment that made her want to rush him, regardless of the fact that he was naked behind that bush.
If emotional whiplash were a thing, she had it bad.
One moment, she wanted nothing more than the ability to extend her wolfish claws and slash at his stupid, beautiful face, and the next she wanted to be reminded of just how wonderful his kisses could be.
She hadn’t lied. She did not want to deal with Shane coming back into her life.
Her inability to shift, the reminder of how she lost Shane and her childhood home, how absolutely hot he was now, and his obvious willingness to put the past aside to reconnect with her now, all of it made her lose focus.
Lose direction. One fucking problem at a time, Universe!
Kimberly couldn’t get distracted by Shane and the presence of his dad’s pack in Tolstone.
And she knew for a fact that if Shane was in Tolstone, so was his dad.
She couldn’t think about it, or she might never shift into a wolf again.
Her nerves were too frazzled, too raw to contemplate what it would be like for her if she and Shane’s father ever met face to face again.
After all the bad blood between that alpha and her own father, animosity was a guarantee.
Would he attack her? Try to convince Dominic to kick her out of Tolstone?
She might have been overthinking it, but with Shane’s father, she couldn’t afford not to overthink it.
Like with her own father, she had to be so careful about what she said and what she did around Shane’s house.
Even a passive joke could stir his dad up into a paranoid frenzy about some plot or intention to undermine his authority.
If what Shane said was true and his father only got more tyrannical after winning the challenge against her dad, there was no way she could risk running into him at the supermarket or Lunar Lantern, everyone’s favorite restaurant in Tolstone.
And if Isaac Synder’s pack was in Tolstone, his ego was likely a little bruised by some incident, making him even more volatile.
A perfect storm of alpha arrogance. Not what she needed right now.
And she certainly didn’t need Shane to complicate things.
If Isaac still held a grudge against Kimberly and her family, he wouldn’t want his son hanging around her either.
They might have been adults now, but Isaac was, undoubtedly, still Isaac.
It wouldn’t matter if Shane wanted to spend time with Kimberly; for both of their sakes, it was safer to stay apart.
She’d push him away as long as she could, even if it killed her not to be tucked up into his embrace like she used to when she needed it most.
Kimberly pulled up in front of Oak Haven Apartments at almost the exact time one of her neighbors slid out of their car. The woman’s silhouette against the streetlights tipped off Kimberly first. Her little beat-up silver sedan confirmed who it was, and she let out an audible groan of annoyance.
Kaelyn, holding a takeout box, stepped onto the sidewalk and made her way toward the open stairwell that divided the apartment building.
Kimberly’s car slowed to a crawl as dread settled in her gut.
As her second-floor neighbor neared the well-lit stairwell, she turned just in time to see Kimberly.
They locked eyes, and Kaelyn’s face broke out in a big smile.