Page 32 of Legacy Wolf: Semester One (Legacy Wolf #1)

RAWLING

“What is with you today?” I sat down on the bench outside the coffee house, my hot cocoa in hand.

Jack had none. She was a grumpy butt all day and so far had barely stepped inside the stores with me.

I didn’t get it. We’d planned this all week, and it was as if I was torturing her, and I was good and done with that.

We came out here to have fun and grab snacks for board game night, not to be miserable.

“Nothing. I’m just tired.” And maybe she was, but that was no excuse to be like this. Unless maybe she was coming down with something, and in that case, I was the one being the complete asshat.

“Why don’t we go home.” I stood up and stretched my neck to the side. Archery practice had been rough yesterday and somehow that manifested itself in a stiff neck. “I thought this would be a fun day out, but if you need a nap, you need a nap.”

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to… Let’s just enjoy our day. I can rally.” She patted the seat on the bench beside herself. “Sit and enjoy your cocoa. I’ll go get something.”

I agreed, and she disappeared inside, coming out with a cup of water.

It wasn’t even hot water. Just plain old water.

Crap, she was getting sick, or maybe… maybe she and Atticus weren’t being as careful in their alone time as they should’ve been.

Not that I was going to bring it up again.

Last time it made things between Jack and me weird for a bit, and I hated it.

I took a long sip of my cocoa. It was every bit as delicious as I thought it would be. They used shredded chocolate and steamed milk to make it, unlike the dining hall that used powder and hot water. The two creations didn’t belong in the same category.

“What did you want to do next?” I asked.

The plan was to hang out around town and then hit up the convenience store on our way home, filling our bags with snacks. The in-between was still wide open.

“We could window shop?” she offered.

“Yeah. That sounds good.” If she wasn’t wanting to shop, that was fine, and maybe looking at the window displays would pull her out of her funk.

We finished our drinks and tossed the cups before heading down the block. There wasn’t a ton to look at, but there was enough to keep us entertained.

“I wish they made those in my size.” I pointed to the footed pajamas in the window we were standing in front of.

“Imagine getting up on a chilly morning and not having your feet get cold?” I hated cold feet, and our bathroom floor was sooooo cold some mornings.

It was as if they stuck the tiles in the freezer overnight or something.

“Then your feet would just get wet. I think the guys next door have an aversion to bath mats.” It was true. They sucked at common courtesy over bathroom cleanliness. Jack and I cleaned it more often than not, just so we didn’t have to deal with their grossness.

She pointed to the other side of the display. “That’s what I want. A hooded towel. I hate having to use two towels because my hair gets the first one soaking wet. A hooded towel is like a twofer—one for my head and one for my body.”

It was nice seeing her snap out of her funk.

The next store was a book-and-gift shop.

Their selection of books wasn’t huge, but they did a nice job deciding what to have in-house.

Their front display was all banned books, and I could only guess how many people would buy them just because someone somewhere said that no one should. Super clever.

“I want to see if they have the next book in my portal series,” I said as we walked past the window and closer to the door. “Wanna come in with me?”

She looked back to the window and then up at me. “Yeah. Okay.”

I went straight to the fantasy section to see if it was in yet, and Jack hung around the front display. Book in hand, I went back up front to see her looking at a novel about a mouse, apparently a dangerous one, given it was in the banned display.

“Victory.” I held up my book.

“Great.” She placed hers down.

“Is that one any good?” I asked. She seemed so into it and now it was just discarded.

“It’s fine. I just… don’t tell anyone, but my dad lost his job, and he was helping me cover expenses so I could focus on school. Books aren’t in my budget. Shit, the new shoes Coach says I need for soccer aren’t either, but I have to figure it out.” That explained her grumpiness.

I knew she talked to her parents last night.

I came inside, heard her say “Dad,” and slipped into the bathroom for a shower to give her privacy.

When I came back out, she was gone. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but now it made sense.

Jack needed time to process the information.

At least I would have, if I had a family to get news from.

“Is the book one I would like?”

I wasn’t going to straight-out offer to buy it for her, not here in public.

And possibly not at all. She was stubborn, and if I was going to get her anything, it was her shoes.

If her coach was like mine, not following through would mean consequences, and in her case, possibly less time on the field.

And it wasn’t as if giving her the money would hurt me financially.

I had far more money than I could ever spend.

“I see you, Rawling. Don’t. Just don’t.” She pointed to the register. “Go pay for your portal book and meet me outside. I need to grab some air.”

I paid and let the topic drop. When I went back out, the two of us both pretended it had never happened.

She acted as if she still had cash flow, and I acted as if I hadn’t thought twice about her finances, and it worked.

We enjoyed the rest of the afternoon together, Jack conceding to me buying the snacks since it technically was for the house and not her.

Our plan to ignore all things came to a swift end when we arrived home to a note on the door, a note from her coach.

“Did you miss a practice?” I asked as Jack crumpled up the letter and tossed it in the trash bin.

“No, it’s a warning that I can’t compete until I get new cleats.” She flopped back on her bed. “I can’t ask my parents. Maybe Bardoul has an in to get me a job.”

“Or you can let me buy them.” I was going to leave it, just drop it for the sake of roommate peace, but there was no reason for her to suffer if I could help.

“I don’t need you suffering over my issues.”

“That’s the thing. I wouldn’t be. I kind of just found out I’m rich.”

That had her sitting up quickly. “What? Rich? No way. I’ve seen you put things in your online cart and take them out again countless times. Rich people don’t do that.”

I wasn’t sure if that was true or not, but I very much did that with the board games. It took me three days to finalize the order. It hadn’t been about money, though, just my indecisiveness over what would be best for the group.

“Okay, I’m going to tell you some things, but it is between us. Not even Channon and Bardoul and especially not Atticus.” I said, not because I didn’t trust her. I did. But if she didn’t know it was a secret, how did I expect her to keep it one?

“I won’t say a word.”

I spent the next hour telling her about my godfather’s book, the stories it contained, and finally about the bank account.

Jack was intrigued by it all, and we looked through the book together, pointing out pages that fascinated us and conjecturing about the information on random pages.

If anyone came in and overheard us, they would assume we were full-on conspiracy theorists.

“I’m glad I have someone to talk to about this with,” I admitted when we decided to put the book away and grab some dinner. “It was hard having everything be such a secret.”

“I’m glad you told me.” She rubbed the back of her neck. “And maybe… if you really don’t mine, I will accept the cleats. I have a game this week, and I really want to participate.”

“Absolutely.”

“But I will pay you back. I saw those digits. I know you won’t feel it, but I will know I owe it.”

“You can if you want.” I wasn’t ever going to hold her to it. She was right. I wouldn’t feel it. “Now let’s go get some dinner.”

Jack

After dinner, Rawling had an archery practice to get ready for some big tournament, and that left me all alone, which was probably a good thing because my head was spinning from all that I’d learned.

I was itching to grab the book and dive back in. His godfather had some things in there that I knew about from growing up in a shifter community, but there was also a lot I didn’t know. The curiosity was getting to me. But also—I cared about Rawling and breaking his trust like that was bullshit.

So instead, I sat on my bed with my math text book with the intention of getting work done.

Zero work got done. Instead, I thought about not only the book, but the ring on Rawling’s finger.

He said his godfather told him not to take it off, but also that his godfather didn’t even know he was going to come here.

Was his godfather hiding Rawling’s heritage from his shifter friends apart from Professor Shaw?

If so, that was some grade-A bullshit. Him scenting as latent would also explain why Phelan hid him away like a dirty little secret.

But that theory didn’t make sense. If Rawling was someone his godfather was embarrassed by, why would he leave him all that money? It wasn’t pocket change, not even for the wealthy elite. By all metrics, it was a boat-ton of cash. You didn’t give that away willy-nilly.

Rawling better not tell anyone else about the money.

I might have agreed to letting him buy me cleats, but I felt guilty about it.

And I would pay him back. It wasn’t like my dad was going to be out of work forever, and even if he was, I had all summer to make money between semesters.

I would just pick up a second job, potentially one with tips.

He was so lucky to have been paired with me of all people.

I wasn’t the bee’s knees or anything like that, but I was loyal, and he needed that.

There were too many people here looking at Sombertooth as the launching pad to their future, many of them legacy students.

Not everyone would protect him the way I would.

That ring coming off in front of the wrong person that day could have resulted in terrible consequences.

There were days I wondered how we got paired together. We were the only co-ed roommates in the house. I could explain that away with my name. But co-ed roommates who both appeared to be latents? That seemed a bit too coincidental to me. Could his godfather have had a hand in this?

“No, Jack. It was the goddess.” I just knew it. We were here together for a reason. We just had to figure out what that reason was.