Chapter Fifteen
Shane hadn’t meant it. He didn’t even know where the words came from.
What he said about Kimberly wasn’t true, but he spoke them with such conviction as if he believed them, which he didn’t.
Not really. Kimberly was just going through a rough time.
Her inability to shift and her dominance wasn’t a reflection of her validity as a shifter.
He knew that as sure as he knew the color of his own hair, so why did he say the one thing he knew would hurt her like that?
The last thing he ever wanted to do was hurt her.
He promised he wouldn’t. Another promise broken.
After she left his apartment, Shane heard one last message from his dead father.
If that snowflake won’t own up to her own flaws, she’s not worth your time.
Shane had bellowed and trashed what little he had in his apartment, heedless of the consequences. When his rage was spent, Shane fell to his knees.
He wanted to pound his fists into the tile. Shifter rage wanted to take hold and tear the whole building apart, and he could almost feel the wolf boil under his skin, demanding release. His words had been cruel, and he might have lost Kimberly forever.
The night was spent in utter agony as he paced, tossed and turned on his shitty mattress, and adamantly fought against the last vestiges of his father in his head.
Work the next day left him sluggish and unproductive, unable to think about anything else except how he had fucked up on everything that mattered. His pack and Kimberly.
When he got the call in the middle of his workday, Shane’s heart jolted, hopeful that it was Kimberly. Instead, it was Paul, his prospective beta, asking to meet him that evening at Jade Lake for a talk. He could tell by the flat tone and short sentences that it wouldn’t be a good talk.
Shane dreaded what it could be, but nothing could match the torment he and his wolf shared since the night before when Kimberly walked out of his apartment. And he feared she might have walked out of his life permanently this time.
When calls and texts didn’t work, he tried to catch her at the flower shop after his shift.
Her coworker said she called in for a mental health day with no promise to be back the following day.
He tried her apartment before heading to the lake, but she wasn’t home, and her scent was old, like she hadn’t been there for hours.
Another try on the phone told him that she had figured out how to block his number because it didn’t even ring, and his texts bounced back.
He royally fucked up, and she wasn’t ready to let him make things right. He couldn’t blame her. The only thing left to do was to meet with Paul, see what he wanted, and then take things one day at a time until Kimberly came back to him … if she came back.
If only he could find out if she was safe, and where the hell she was, just to know, not to hunt her down. If he could have some reassurance that she was fine, then maybe his aching heart would be given a tiny break.
Shane pulled up alongside Paul’s pickup, an even more beat-up clunker than his own. The old shifter waited, leaning against his tailgate with folded arms and a deep frown.
He angled out of the truck and breathed in the crisp, late-evening air, the scent of fresh water from the lake, freshly mowed grass, and fuel exhaust from Paul’s rusty heap.
The faded traces of families and visitors to the lake from earlier that afternoon were too indistinct to matter and blended together on a seamless mass of humanity.
Paul greeted him with a nod and adjusted his posture a little but remained against the truck. He stayed casual and easy in front of his visibly cranky alpha.
“What did you need to talk to me about in person that couldn’t have been a call or email?”
Paul narrowed his eyes and jumped straight to the point. “Cody and Thea are gone.”
Shane stared, unblinking. “Gone … As in, missing? On a trip? What?”
“They’re gone, Shane. It took Cody all of twelve hours to make him realize he didn’t want his family in your pack anymore. They packed up and left.”
He closed his eyes, battling the impulse to throw his fist into the side of one of their trucks. “And you know this, because…”
“He talked to me. After you sent Andy running, he began to wonder what you’d do if he slipped up again.
You know he’s made mistakes. Drank too much.
Started fights here and there. He didn’t want to break one of your rules and leave behind a widow and an orphan.
So, he told me that he left and made me promise to give them a head start in case you wanted to follow. ”
His chest tightened with so many tangled emotions he couldn’t name or keep straight.
A quick check into the pack bonds told him enough.
He had completely missed the massive distance that stretched between himself and Cody’s family.
In the midst of everything that happened, it totally passed under his radar.
If he had been more aware, more in touch with the pack, he would have had a heads-up sooner.
Once more, he failed, and his visceral reaction was not one of meek acceptance or humility.
“Why did you keep that promise against me?” Shane didn’t care that the question came out biting.
“Because he had a right to leave.” Paul shrugged, as if this were nothing.
“I don’t know what’s gotten into you, kid, but I don’t like it.
None of us do. We followed you and not Kevin for a reason.
What did you think that was about? It wasn’t because of your father, that’s for damn sure.
Your father could be a real hard ass, even at the best of times.
He didn’t take care of his pack at all, and I’m surprised more shifters didn’t challenge him, or just walk out the way Cody did.
” Paul jabbed a finger at Shane’s chest. “You were different. You were not your father. That’s why we followed you and not Kevin. Don’t you get that?”
“I was soft,” Shane countered, repeating the words that condemned him. “I let my pack walk all over me, keep secrets from me. I practically stood aside and let the power-hungry bastard force his way into my place.”
“Yeah, you did let your father take your place.”
Shane’s brain stalled out like a tractor with a failing engine. He had been talking about Kevin, not his father. But the longer he paused with that thought, he realized Paul was right.
Paul straightened, pushing off the truck.
“You, on the other hand, took care of your people. When Kevin was out scheming and spreading rumors, you were attending Little League matches when parents couldn’t show up.
You were helping out during harvest and calving season when people were short on working hands.
You stood in the kitchen with the ladies and helped bake for a god damn fundraiser for the middle school.
You helped the pack in every way you knew how.
You were an alpha, Shane … but now?” Paul looked him up and down.
“I barely know what you are now. You have the dominance for an alpha, and you inherited that title, but you aren’t the alpha who brought us here.
You took the initiative and brought us to a safe place. ”
“I took you from your home.” Shane hated the way his voice cracked under the burden he had carried for months. “Because I couldn’t protect any of you.”
Paul gave him a tiny, sympathetic smile.
“Home is where the pack is. Or didn’t you know that?
” By the vacancy in Shane’s face, Paul must have assumed he didn’t.
“I’ll let you think on that. I just wanted to tell you about Cody and Thea.
” Paul moved around the back corner of his truck toward the driver’s side. “Get some sleep. You look like shit.”
Shane shuffled back to give Paul room to drive away, all the things he said buzzing through his mind like an angry hornet’s nest. He remembered all those instances he mentioned.
The ball games, the bake sale, hell, he even went wedding dress shopping with his friend’s fiancé when her mom couldn’t be there for her.
For so long, he had been there for his pack.
He supported them and tried his best to be the kind of support he would have wanted or expected from his father.
Where did he forget that along the way? When did he lose sight of that?
Was it a gradual loss or did it all fall out when he got that call about Andy?
Nothing Paul said was wrong, or even new.
The night before, Kimberly essentially said the same things.
She reminded him of what an alpha was, but he didn’t want to listen.
Even now, he felt the tug-of-war in his head and heart.
It felt less of a choice between compassion or cruelty than one of security and fear.
If he softened, if he let his pack get away with these offenses, how quickly would he lose control?
Then again, if he beat them into the ground with dominance and death threats, he would lose them faster.
Just in twenty-four hours he lost Andy, Cody, and Thea …
And if he let himself think of it, he lost Kimberly too.
Shane dragged himself back to his truck, and behind the wheel, he severed two more pack connections.
The pain of their losses was little more than twinges on his battered spirit that had been through too much in too short a time.
Regardless of what Cody or Paul thought, he wouldn’t try to run after them.
He’d let them go, let them choose the life they wanted.
He owed them that much after the hell he put them through.
*