Chapter 25 Marrow Secrets #2
I hated how that stung. Not because he’d said it to hurt me, he hadn’t, but because it reminded me of everything I didn’t have.
Aiden could casually mention a grandma who still answered his calls, best friends who texted, even if they ran with wolves.
For years, I had worn a mask of indifference, convincing myself that the absence of support didn’t hurt.
Back in my hometown, Emily was my lifeline, but she remained tethered to a past I’d left behind when I fled.
Ava had been my anchor, but her light extinguished far too soon, leaving me adrift.
Mrs. White offered what she could, a flicker of guidance, yet I hesitated to burden her with my fears, knowing her kindness had limits.
I envied the way Aiden carried the weight of exile but still had roots. I had none, just ash, burnt bridges, and a kid who needed more than one exhausted mother could give.
And yet, here he was, telling me all of this. Maybe it was the exhaustion in his voice, or maybe he was just as desperate for an ally as I was.
The realization stung.
For a second, I wanted to reach out, touch his hand, his shoulder, but I held back, afraid it would cost him more than it comforted.
“So this Council,” I said, pivoting before the vulnerability could catch fire, “do they know about Mateo? Or are we pretending he’s normal until someone comes knocking?”
Aiden’s whole body went still. “Not yet. And we need to keep it that way. The fewer people who know, the better. Especially anyone with a direct line to the Elders.” He pronounced the last word as if it belonged in capital letters, a proper noun with a body count.
I bristled, a sour taste flooding my mouth, as if the thought alone could curdle coffee straight from my stomach.
The world had felt so small, so safe, for a few precious years, just me and Mateo, the universe shrunk to whatever we could fit in the space between paycheck and bedtime.
The idea that my son was now a blip on the radar of a secret wolf Illuminati made my skin crawl with dread.
“Great,” I said, and the sarcasm came out too sharp. “So there’s a group of powerful wolves who might care about my eleven-year-old.”
That wasn’t funny.
My hands shook, so I clenched them in my shirt to hide it.
Aiden hesitated. “Josie, I need to ask,” he began. “Who’s his father?” There was no accusation in his tone, but the question itself hit like a slap, sudden and humiliating.
Rage flashed in my chest because that was what mattered: not who Mateo was as a person, but whose genetics had gotten tangled up with mine. I wanted to tell him to mind his own lineage, but I saw the way he was bracing himself.
The truth was, I’d spent eleven years constructing lies out of necessity, not malice. Mateo’s father existed only as a shadow. I told him the story I’d invented for myself, for the teachers at PTA, for anyone who asked. I made his father a ghost, a deadbeat, a myth spun out of American cliché.
But the real story was darker, more complicated.
I held his gaze. “He’s not in the picture,” I said flatly. “Never has been. Mateo is mine and mine alone.”
Aiden didn’t break eye contact, but I saw the flicker of disappointment, or maybe relief, or maybe just acceptance.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and for once, it sounded like he meant it.
The room was silent, heavy with the aftershock. I wanted to fill it with noise, to move, to punch a pillow or throw something just to prove I was still in control of my own story.
Instead, I stared at Aiden with a fierceness that felt primal. “They won’t come near him. I won’t let them.”
Aiden’s eyes softened, but only for a heartbeat. “You think I’m not terrified? The second someone sniffs out what he is, it’s over. But I swear, Josie, as long as I’m breathing, they don’t get to touch him.”
“Funny,” I shot back, “for a guy who walked out on the wolf mafia, you still talk like you’ve got a pack at your back.”
He just smiled, slow and predatory. “I might not be the Alpha of my pack. But I still have teeth.”
The words hung between us. The pause felt loaded with everything we weren’t saying: fear, hope, old wounds that refused to scab over.
I was the first to break. I dragged my fingers through my hair and sighed. “So now the Source is back online, and everyone with a drop of supernatural blood gets an upgrade?” I tried on a smirk. “Is that what happened to Mateo?”
Aiden hesitated before looking me dead in the eyes. “Maybe. Or maybe Mateo’s just connected to the Source somehow.”
I felt the weight of those words crash into me. Mateo, my Mateo, who still needed reminders to brush his teeth, was now, apparently, in the crosshairs of something so vast and ancient that even the name of it made grown werewolves flinch.
The absurdity of the situation almost made me laugh.
For the past ten years, reality had been manageable: wake up, prepare breakfast, school drop-off, work, repeat.
The monsters I faced were bills and deadlines, and the dreaded parent-teacher conferences.
The only magic in my life was Mateo’s uncanny ability to find the last peanut butter cup in a supposedly empty bag.
But now, an unexpected revelation had thrust me into a game with unfamiliar rules and personal stakes.
My head spun with jagged, urgent questions. Was there some internal alarm bell inside him that neither of us could hear? Were his strange dreams warning signs? Had I missed something, a flicker of wolf in his eyes or a snarl in his innocent laughter, that should have told me of his transformation?
In that moment, it was easier to imagine this as an elaborate prank.
That Aiden was messing with me, spinning a wild tale for his amusement.
But his face held no humor, only the weary patience of someone who had long since run out of lies.
He looked at me with an understanding that spoke volumes; he knew what it meant to want normalcy for your child and to realize it was already out of reach.
I wanted to yell, demand answers, call bullshit on the entire universe for handing Mateo such a fate.
Instead, I sat there, hands trembling so violently I had to press them under my thighs to steady myself.
For a few seconds, all I could do was stare at the worn-out rug and count the coffee stains while trying to breathe around the panic clawing at my chest.
I hated the helplessness more than anything else. I was supposed to be the adult here, the fixer of things, the soother of nightmares, the repairer of broken appliances. I could handle monsters if they played by human rules.
But this?
This was alien territory, and all I could do was hope that love and stubbornness would be enough to keep Mateo safe.
The urge to flee, to grab him, our belongings, and get on a train until the city lights disappeared, was almost irresistible. But deep down, I knew there was no escaping this. Not when it was written into his bones. Not when family history ran thicker than blood and was just as hard to wash off.
Instead, I did what I always did when things got too overwhelming: I found a new problem to focus on.
A human-sized problem.
Something tangible, even if it left splinters.
I sank into the armrest of the couch, arms crossed tightly over my chest as if they were armor. “And Ava?” I asked. “What did she get herself into?”
That made him pause.
A storm passed through his eyes. “Ulysses knew her better than I did. But she was poking around things she shouldn’t have. She believed the Source could be… unlocked. That kind of talk gets you marked.”
“So you’re saying she was killed for what she knew?
” My voice came out flat and hard, unrecognizable to me.
It reminded me of my grandmother at her worst, cold as glass, ready to shatter at the slightest touch.
Maybe that was my way of retaliating: with words that left splinters in those who cared enough to listen.
Aiden didn’t answer, but the silence between us spoke volumes.
He met my gaze head-on, and for the first time, I saw fear in his eyes, perhaps fear of revealing too much or fear of how I’d react to the truth once it was revealed.
The thought made me feel both powerful and powerless at the same time, and it nearly made me laugh.
Instead, I clenched my jaw so tight I thought my teeth might crack.
“I knew it,” I whispered, not sure if I was addressing Aiden or Ava’s ghost that seemed to linger in the corners of my apartment.
“I knew it. Ulysses keeps showing up like a bad penny, always pretending to be helpful, always knowing just a bit too much. He talks about Ava like she was stupid, like she didn’t know what she was doing.
As if she deserved it.” My hands curled into fists, nails digging into my palms.
Aiden’s voice was rough. “Josie, no one’s blaming…”
“Don’t.” I snapped, cutting him off mid-sentence. “You don’t get to tell me it’s not my fault. The last time I saw her, she looked me in the eye and told me to ‘stay weird.’ I thought it was a joke. I thought…” My chest ached with the memory, hollow and sour.
He started to say something else, but a sound cut through the tension: a sharp, scraping cough tore down the hallway, too deep, too adult for his still-changing voice.
It echoed down the hallway, sharp as glass splintering on tile.
It was a sound familiar to any mother who’s already buried too many what-ifs and is terrified of losing one more.
“Mateo?” My body reacted before my mind did, an instinct older than fear itself. I sprinted towards the hallway, the world narrowing down to peeling paint and the metallic taste of terror on my tongue.
I barged into his bedroom so fast that the door bounced off the stopper. For a split second, everything was clear: his long limbs tangled in the sheets, one foot sticking out from the blanket; his cheeks flushed with fever; his lips moving, whispering something unintelligible.