Pack Ruin (The Splintered Bond #3)

9. Middle Names

9

Middle Names

FLOR

M y hand shook slightly as I scratched my name on the slightly yellowed page. It felt like I was desecrating the ancient book that Verona had been so proud to show me. Every Alpha since the Mountain pack had been established, dozens of them, had their names there, as well as their mates and children. The line for Brand’s mate was on the right side of the page, and I almost laughed out loud, thinking about how it would look to scribble in the other Alpha Heirs’ names around his. Would I line them up underneath his? Put them in parentheses?

I was long past denying that there was some weird shit going on with my mate bonds. And something even more weird with my wolf. I still hadn’t been able to shift, not that I would ask that of my wolf. She felt off, somehow. Like she was lying still, panting heavily, recovering.

But she was alive, and so were all my… well, all the guys.

I felt three sets of eyes on me as I finished my name and wrote in my mother’s—Lily Rain Wills—but then got stuck. “Samuel,” I said quietly. “Do you happen to know Alpha Callaway’s middle name?”

He went silent, then cursed under his breath. Verona, who had been standing beside her chair, sat with an audible thump.

Brand was the one who answered. “Lee. Alpha Calvin Lee Callaway.”

“Thanks.” I met his bright gaze, the light in his eyes as beautiful and odd as it had been since I’d woken up. I glanced at the window. It was late evening now, and the moon was shining through a gap in the curtains.

“You know what this means, Brand,” Samuel whispered. “She can’t be here. She’s an Alpha’s child .”

“She’s my mate,” Brand replied without blinking. “And no one will take her from me.”

“I’m sworn to do so,” Samuel growled. He was grabbing the armrests of his chair, the wood creaking in his tight grip. “Who else knows this?”

I shrugged. “Callaway.” That was the only person still alive who knew.

“Luke,” Brand said softly.

I shuffled my feet. “I think Margarette suspects, but she didn’t press the issue.”

“Finnick?” Samuel’s voice was tight, but Brand shook his head.Samuel didn’t seem comforted. “If anyone discovers this, if Aidan finds out… At the very least, I’ll have to throw her into the cell with Glen. The Council must be notified?—”

Brand began to growl, a low, threatening rumble.

“Mate bonds, mate bond preeminence,” Verona began muttering and stood, rushing to a shelf. “We have almost everything ever recorded about pack law, the ancient laws, in this room. True mate bonds should always trump any other law. We just need to find the right way to frame it… There must be a way. There’s always a way.” She dropped another stack of books on the table. “You boys, read for a way out. Flor? Pass that over.”

She held a hand out imperiously, and I closed the dusty book where I’d signed my name. I’d hoped she wouldn’t look, but I saw her face change as she opened it back up and read it. She staggered for a moment before regaining her balance. Then, carefully, she placed the book back on the stand, and closed the glass doors around it as if she was trying to put a pin back in a grenade. She didn’t say a word about what I’d written, and neither of the men asked, though I was almost certain Brand knew.

Brand knew everything, just like he knew when I’d had enough.“We need to sleep,” he announced and held out a hand, nodding to his relatives, who were both reading furiously. Desperately. “Join me, little flower?”He led me to a side door, not toward the bedrooms.

“Where are we going?”

His smile was as bright as his gaze. “It’s time for me to show you my lake.”

“Is it everything you hoped?” Brand asked the next morning as we sat side by side, staring out at the calm water.

“It’s exactly as you described it,” I whispered. “The most beautiful place I’ve ever been.”

Brand had run beside me for three miles or so the night before, from the Alpha’s Den to a cabin hidden in a grove of aspen trees. He’d insisted on carrying me over the threshold, muttering something about old ways.

Someone had obviously freshened up the small one-room bungalow, and left a picnic basket filled with food for breakfast. We’d slept, woken up and made slow, sweet love to each other, Brand’s eyes gleaming like twin moons in the darkness. Then we’d gotten dressed in sets of generic forest-green sweats that had been stored in a cedar chest, and he’d led me to the water.

At first, the lake had been dark, reflecting stars. But as the sun rose, it had turned a lighter blue and gold, then pink, orange, and bright turquoise. Mountains on the far side of the valley reflected in the water, until it was a perfect mirror of the opposite shore and sky.

It truly was the most peaceful, gorgeous place I’d ever seen. Ducks called across the water, swallows dipped to drink as a soft breeze blew, and for the first time in my life, I felt utterly safe. And completely incomplete.

I tried not to show Brand what I was feeling, but he lifted me onto his lap, feeding me purple grapes and squares of cheese, and didn’t mention the tears on my cheeks. “We’ll all live together,” he said at last. “Here, or somewhere like this. We’ll build a home, with enough rooms for as many mates as you call to your side, my queen.”

I pressed a kiss to his lips, his beard tickling my face, and sighed. “What did I do to deserve you, Brand Becker?”

He shrugged. “Must have been something pretty amazing. If I say so myself, I’m a catch.” At the same moment he said that, a giant trout leaped out of the water. I snorted at Brand’s teasing, then laughed at his pinkened cheeks.

“He’s almost as much of a catch as me,” a voice chimed in from the trees behind us.

“Glen?” I gasped and jumped up. “Did you escape?”

Blue eyes sparkled like the water, and white teeth flashed as he stepped out from under the trees, wearing dark gray sweatpants and a red flannel shirt.

“There’s no cage that could keep me away from you, Flor.” Glen struck a pose like a bodybuilder as I ran to him, except one of his hands was filled with flowers. “ Oof! Woman, has Grandma Ida been feeding you?” he teased, pretending to stagger under my weight as I hugged him.

“How did you get out?” I ignored his teasing and pushed back to stare at his face. He seemed fine. Uninjured, but a little tired. There was a tension in his eyes, though. Fear.

Of course there was. He had an order of execution from the Council hanging over his head.

Before he could answer, Brand joined us. “Has Grandma Ida been feeding you , is the question? Say, baking you cakes with files in them?”

“Not a file.” Glen grinned and pushed his curls away from his forehead, looking like a toothpaste commercial I’d seen once. “She slipped a key right underneath a tray of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies, though.” He held the slightly bedraggled bouquet of wildflowers out to me. “I brought you a courting gift.”

“A what now?” I sputtered.

“Damnit,” Brand muttered for some reason.

Glen winked at him. “Better catch up, Bearman.”

I smacked Glen’s arm. “A courting gift? What are you thinking? You’re a wanted criminal! You stupid ass, what in the hell are you doing out here in the open?” I grabbed the flowers in one hand and his forearm in the other, dragging him toward the cabin. Brand jogged ahead of us. “If anyone sees you?—”

Brand snorted, holding the door for me to enter. “No one will. This lake is off limits.”

“Whatever,” I scoffed. “Packs are nosy. They don’t stay out of somewhere just because you say so.”

“They do if you beat the living shit out of any pack member who comes within a quarter mile of a place,” Glen chipped in.

“No one should approach. Lock the door anyway, Glenda,” Brand said calmly, then took the flowers and arranged them in a glass Mason jar, adding water and placing them on the small table.

After Glen shut and locked the door with a broad wooden bar, he looked around. “Reminds me of another lake cabin. I wonder if the bed is as comfy.” He opened his arms and fell back onto it like a starfish.

I gawked. “How can you be so relaxed? Brand’s dad is under some ultra-powerful Council command to do what they tell him and execu—” My voice cracked on the word, and Glen hopped back up, folding his arms around me.

“Shush now, princess. You know that won’t happen. We’re working on a plan.”

I let myself go boneless in his arms as he lifted me up to hold me tighter, for a moment pretending that the world worked that way. That a strong, handsome man could just waltz in, declare that everything would be fine, rub his erection on your leg, and… rub it again, a little harder. I groaned in exasperation. “Glen, are you humping my leg?”

He gave a soft, “Woof.”

Brand snorted softly. “I’m going to find a good branch.” I had no idea what he meant by that, but Glen murmured a thank you, and the door closed behind my mate.

“Now that our chaperone is gone…” Glen yanked off his shirt, throwing it on the floor. Then he used his strong arms to maneuver me up and down so his erection was grinding into my thigh, and made what I thought might be his attempt at an O face.

“You’re ridiculous,” I muttered, allowing myself to appreciate the feeling of his warm skin under my hands as he nuzzled my neck. Glen had just enough chest hair to give my fingers something to tug on. I was doing just that when his mouth came close to Finnick’s bite, and I shuddered at the tiny burst of cold pleasure that blossomed there. Could Finnick feel that?

It felt odd, having a mate so far away. Painful, and a tiny inner voice whispered that Finnick could have done what Glen did. He could have left his entire family and pack for me.

What a selfish thought. When had I turned into such a greedy bitch? It wasn’t like I could fuck more than one at a ti… Huh. That might be possible.

My inner wolf roused at that thought, sending a few images.

“Ridiculous,” I said again, but this time to myself.

Glen chuckled. “I don’t know. This could be my last time to commit frottage on your person, sweet wolf.” I didn’t ask him what frottage meant; I could kind of put it together from context, and Glen’s hands were doing something else now.

“What are you doing?” I moaned as he held me closer, using one hand to work the muscles of my neck.

“Shhh. Relax.” He tugged at my sweatshirt, and I let him slip it off, over my head. Then, he pressed me down on the bed, rolled me over onto my stomach, and began to rub rhythmically, working from my neck down to my shoulders, then to my lower back, pressing deep into the tense muscles. “Have you ever had a massage?”

“No. I used to give Del massages, though,” I said quietly, my heart aching as it always did when I thought of him. “His stump would hurt, especially at the end of a long day, or when it rained. I got pretty good at it.”

“I’m so glad he had you.”

“He was my… everything. My father figure.”

“But not your father.”

“No.” I took a deep breath. Glen deserved to know that he wasn’t the only one here against pack law. And I trusted him to keep my secret. I let that thought float through my head.

He was kind, funny, thoughtful and romantic. He’d raced to save me, and followed me without question. Once he’d realized how he’d been blinded to the injustices at Northern, and learned his own parents’ place in it, he’d taken a stand.

He’d fought for me. If the Council got their way, he’d die for me, too. He deserved my trust.

“My biological father is Calvin Callaway.” Glen hummed slightly, but didn’t react. “You already knew?”

“I’d put a few things together. You know that the kind of power you have, so much that you could meet almost any other shifter’s eyes and hold their gaze, is beyond rare? It only exists in the ruling Alpha families, pretty much. I knew whoever your dad was, he had to be someone powerful. And powerfully stupid, not to take care of you.”

I almost laughed. Callaway was that. “Del was the best father I could have ever had. My real father in every way but one.” Of course, that had to be the one way the Council cared about.

“I’m sorry you lost him. I’m sorry you had to live for so long in a pack run by your own father, who should have loved you…” He cursed, then let out a long breath, focusing on the massage again. “I wish I’d been there to take care of you. But I can do it now.”

“You don’t need to—ooh, that’s the spot. Harder, right there .” How was he finding every little knot of tension without me saying a word?

Glen’s incredible at this , I thought, as my brain started to fizz. Wherever his bare hands met my skin, the whirlpool feeling I’d always gotten from him started up in my center, but somehow calmer this time.

His murmur felt like velvet on my skin as he leaned over me, slowly working the muscles down my spine in small, rolling movements. “If you accept me, princess, I’ll do this every day. Any time you feel stress, any time you’re sore, I’ll rub you until you feel nothing but pleasure. Let you set the pace, spend every bit of my energy taking care of you. You deserve this. You deserve love.”

My heart raced a little as I thought about all the times Glen had blurted out that he loved me. Had he meant that?

There was no other explanation. He’d left his pack, his family, his home, to follow me. When I thought about it, I wasn’t certain I could say I loved him. But I could someday. I might already, a little.

I rolled until I was facing him. His blue eyes were wide, the pupils enormous as he took in my naked breasts. “Flor?”

My mouth had gone dry. There was no way I could ask for what I wanted, so I decided to let my body do the talking. With my hands on his wrists as he hovered over me, I arched my back up slightly, tilted my head so the unmarked side of my neck was exposed to him, and waited.