Page 13

13

KAT

Y esterday, I woke up as a wolf, curled up on a hard wooden floor, but sure of my place in the world. Of who I am and where I’m from.

But I was wrong.

About all of it.

I met my dad—my real dad—and seeing him unlocked a part of my brain that I hadn’t realized existed.

I don’t have all my memories back, but I have some.

Now, I know where I came from. Not all of it. But more than I have ever known before.

It’s still early, and so quiet. The birds must still be sleeping as I walk out of the bunkhouse, where I slept in a room next to my dad’s, and down to the creek.

“How did you sleep?” he asks.

I can’t stop looking at him. I feel like if I don’t do it at least every minute, he’ll fade away, and none of this will be real. It’ll just be something I dreamed up.

We have the same nose, short with a curved tip. And our eyes are blue but his are a slightly darker shade. Our resemblance ends there. The early morning sunlight highlights the red in his auburn hair and the light freckles over his face.

“Okay,” I lie.

I’d be surprised if I got an hour of sleep.

“You?”

His eyes are red, probably a result of getting as little sleep as I did. “Best night’s sleep ever.”

We smile at each other.

“I didn’t sleep at all,” I quietly admit.

“Neither did I.” His smile is rueful. “I thought I’d wake up, and you’d be dead and gone again.”

The back of my eyelids prickle and I look away because I never cry. And I’m afraid if I start, I won’t be able to stop.

“The bunkhouse was a lot fancier than I was expecting,” I say as we stop beside the creek.

After Patric— dad —had given me the brief rundown of how he had lost me, I was so overwhelmed that he said we should speak again later, when everything wasn’t so raw.

He asked me about how I wound up in Montana, hundreds of miles from our home in Nebraska.

I’d told him what little I knew, which wasn’t very much, and I hoped he wouldn’t ask me about everything that had happened to me. He looked so happy to find me again that if I’d told him about all the bad things that had happened to me in foster care, it would break his heart.

When I told him that Aren had accused me of being a feral and locked me in his cage, it never crossed my mind that he would kiss me on my forehead, tell me he would be back in a moment, then walk downstairs and punch Aren in the face.

I’d followed him, of course, and my jaw had been hanging open as wide as everyone's.

When it looked like he was getting ready to punch Aren again, even after Aren warned him that he only got one hit, I’d made my presence known.

It’s a weird thing to have people fight for you when, for years, you’ve had to fight for yourself.

It had felt good.

Strange, but good.

“Ours isn’t so fancy,” he says, looking at the bunkhouse that resembles a horse stable on the outside, but inside is like a farmhouse with bedrooms, a couple of communal kitchens, living rooms, and bathrooms. “I don’t think Aren was happy about you staying in the bunkhouse.”

He wasn’t, but I’d needed to be close to my dad. We slept in adjoining rooms, but just knowing my dad was in the room next to mine with a single wall separating us was unreal.

“He has a lot of wrongs to right.” I look at my dad. “And I refuse to make it easy for him.”

He grins at me. “Ah, there it is.”

I scrunch my nose. “There is what?”

“The Prairie stubbornness.”

“The what?”

“Your great-great-grandmother was the first who showed signs of it. Nothing can ever defeat the Prairie stubbornness.”

I smile. “It sounds like I have a lot to learn.”

His smile fades. “Will you tell me what happened?”

I shrug, feigning casualness. “There isn’t much to say.”

“We’re also very good at hiding when we’re in pain,” he says, watching me closely. “Something tells me you’ve been doing a lot of hurting.”

I chew the inside of my cheek as I debate how much to tell him. “There’s a lot that happened. Some I don’t remember.” Like how I wound up in the basement. Mom was sick. I remember that, but I don’t know why her being sick and then dying led to me living in the basement.

But it was my fault.

Whatever happened to her was my fault.

“There was another man,” I explain, carefully choosing my words as uncertainty lingers. “I thought he was my dad."

He slowly nods. “Did he take you from us?”

I reach into my memories, search for the answer, and… “I don’t know.”

He draws me against his chest, and I breathe in the scent of his skin. Raw leather and sweet licorice, and the very faint smell of sunflowers that make my eyes prickle with tears. “It’s okay, Kata. We have each other again. That’s all that matters for now.”

The man who kept me in the basement wasn’t my dad. I think I knew it at the time, but didn’t want to believe it. Even if I did something wrong, I didn’t deserve to live in the basement. I was just a child.

I clear my throat. “It wasn’t Kat before. I chose it. Kat Meadow. I went to the county court and said I wanted a new name and filled in so many forms, and that name felt like me. I didn’t understand until now.”

The resemblance between the name I picked for myself and Kataleya Prairie is too close not to notice.

He cradles the back of my head, smiling. “Our Kataleya Prairie became Kat Meadow. You might have memory gaps, but I think a part of you remembered who you once were.”

“So what happens now?”

“Now, we go home. Your mom would want to see you. And your little sister.”

My heart twists. “Mom and a sister?”

He nods. “I wanted to tell you more yesterday, but…”

“I was two seconds away from a panic attack.” I was more overwhelmed than I’ve ever been in my entire life.

“They would like to talk to you.”

I thought I did a good job of hiding my overwhelm, but from his smile, clearly not. “Still too soon?”

I nod.

“Leonore—your mom—is holding down the fort.”

“She’s Luna?”

Those pup lessons are already paying off. If my dad is the Alpha of Pack Lake Prairie, my mom must be its Luna, the female head.

He nods. “I couldn’t do it without her.” His gaze sharpens. “If you want to leave, you don’t have to stay here.”

I think I know where he’s going with this. “Aren isn’t keeping me here. No need to break me out of here… dad.” Still feels strange to say it. Not bad. Just… new.

The flash of delight in his eyes reveals just how much it means to him.

When his cell phone vibrates, he pulls it from his pocket, glancing down at the screen. His smile is apologetic. “Leonore. Are you sure you don’t want to speak to her?”

I take a step back. “Not yet. Maybe later.”

When I’ve had time to process the fact that I have a mom, a sister, and a whole pack in Nebraska.

A family.

I have a family and my wolf is yipping with excitement, desperate to meet them, and to no longer be alone.

He presses a kiss on my forehead. “Then I’ll see you later. Leonore doesn’t know the meaning of a short conversation.”

Smiling, I watch him walk away, answering the call with, “My love.”

He wanders toward the bunkhouse to continue his phone call.

I’m in no hurry to go inside when my cell phone vibrates.

I grabbed my cell phone and a change of clothes from Aren’s room to stay in the bunkhouse. We even ate together in his room, so I have no idea what Aren thought when neither of us turned up to eat dinner last night.

It’s Rachel.

Instinctively, I brace myself. The last time she called, Cris had gone missing.

There’s no one else in my life left for the Gregson Killer to kill, other than Aren, that is.

So, what is it?

Did they burn down my apartment?

“Hi, Rachel,” I greet her, wary. “What’s up?”

“Are you sitting down?”

My stomach tenses as my hand tightens around my phone. “No. Why?”

“The cops don’t think it’s a wild animal now. They wanted to know if you were okay.”

“Why would they want to know that?” I whisper, dread heavy in my belly.

“Something—or someone—tore apart Cris’s apartment. There was blood everywhere. That’s why the cops think it’s like a serial killer or a stalker or something. Where are you?”

I struggle to formulate a response. “Blood? How much blood?”

“Not sure. Someone said…” Her voice trails off.

“Someone said what?”

When she speaks, her voice is so hesitant that it’s clear she didn’t want to tell me this at all. “That the killer could have tortured Cris.”

I struggle to breathe. “ Torture ? Why would…”

And the answer hits me.

The killer doesn’t know where I am.

Aren swooped into town, and I left soon after.

Yet again, I didn’t tell anyone where I was going. Maybe the killer kept Cris alive, and they were torturing the answer out of him. An answer he doesn’t have.

I sway.

Someone plucks the phone from my nerveless fingers, and a firm grip steadies me before I can faint for the second time in twenty-four hours.

No. Not someone. Aren .

“Who are you and why are you upsetting my mate?” Aren demands, glowering into the distance.

“What are you—” I try to grab the phone from him, but he turns away, and because he’s taller, I can’t snatch it back.

“Uh… Kat’s old roommate. Who are you ?” Rachel demands, her voice rising, threaded with suspicion.

“Her mate.”

I try to grab the phone off him again. Normal people don’t have mates. She’s going to think I’ve been snatched up by a serial killer or a caveman. “Aren, give me that phone!” I hiss.

He grips my arm and keeps me at a distance.

I’m debating kneeing him in the balls when he says. “I want to know what you said to upset Kat so I can kill it.”

What ?

Rachel is silent as she processes this declaration.

“Someone killed Cristofer,” I say before Rachel can ask Aren any embarrassing questions and vice versa.

Aren stares at me blankly. “Cristofer?”

“He worked in the library,” I explain. “He was a friend.”

His eyes narrow. “ Just a friend?”

I glare at him. “Are you being jealous ? Seriously? After someone killed him?”

“Why would someone kill him?” Aren asks, looking away.

“Kat was talking with him at Doug’s wake, and he walked her to her car after. The killer is probably an obsessed stalker who doesn’t want Kat to speak to anyone. That’s what everyone thinks. The cop, too, when he stopped by to ask me if I’d seen any guy hanging around or watching you,” Rachel says.

Aren hangs up without so much as a goodbye. He tucks the cell phone into my pocket and hauls me into his arms.

I grunt as I thump against rock-hard abs, and he wraps his arms tight around me.

“What are you doing?” I ask, my voice muffled by his T-shirt.

“Comforting my mate.”

I ask myself why I’m not shoving myself out of his grip even as I continue to stand within it. It might have something to do with how good it feels to be in it. “I don’t need comforting.”

His mouth brushes the top of my head. “I know. Just humor me, will you?”

I tilt my head up to look at him. “Is that a joke?”

He squeezes me. “Maybe. If I were to kiss you?” His eyes dip to my mouth.

My belly tightens in response to his heated gaze, but I maintain a blank expression. “Would result in my knee in a sensitive place or my claws in your belly. Haven’t worked out which yet. I might surprise you.”

His eyes crinkle with a smile. “I thought as much. Hence the hug.” He sweeps his gaze over my face, and I realize then that his shock hug and threat to kiss me chased away the shock of Rachel’s news.

I can think straight now.

Aren must realize I’m okay for him to ask, “You ready to go hunting, Kitty cat?”

Those words have my wolf sitting up. “Hunting what?”

“Come on.” He threads his fingers with mine and leads the way to the house. “It’s time to do something I should have done before now.”

I flinch when Aren throws his head back and howls.

I’m even more alarmed when five men and one woman come running from all directions.

“Boss?”

“Alpha?”

“Where’s the fire?”

“What’s going on?”

He resumes leading me into the house. “Meeting. We have a problem that needs solving, and I need all your brightest ideas.”