Page 31 of The Alpha's Rejected Mate

In a moment, Gretel had insisted that I sit down and rest on the wicker sofa. She brought me and the others herbal teas, andI relished being able to breathe easy. Gretel pulled on a woolen jumper and took a seat in another chair.

“Tsk,” she said, her brown eyes sweeping my bare arms, then threw a tartan blanket around my shoulders like a shawl. Aislin appeared and settled down next to me. Muriel took the wicker chair to my other side, and contentment stole through me.

Gretel had lit the lanterns around the balcony. The rest of the pack hadn’t assembled here or by the bonfire, and I suspected they were all giving me space and time to process what had happened tonight. Sitting and breathing in the calming scent of the hot peppermint tea, the thoughtfulness of the whole pack moved me.

It was Aislin who first broached the events of earlier. “I want to murder that traitorous Catrina.”

Gretel tsked. “You don’t fight fire with fire, Aislin. That girl’s got darkness in her, and you’d do well not to invite it in,” she advised her daughter seriously.

Muriel nodded, her silvery eyes and hair catching the soft light and making her look ethereal, even in her human form. I noticed that she had a flowing sage green dress on that complimented her coloring.

With Gretel’s sage advice and Muriel’s kind-hearted eyes, I remembered that therewasa Hexen I was grateful for. “When I was locked up by David and kept prisoner by Catrina, I would never have gotten out if it hadn’t been for Colt. He got me the key and occupied the pack so that I could get away,” I shared.

But Aislin shook her head. “He just stood there in the clearing tonight. He didn’t speak out against Catrina or defend you.”

Hollowness moved through me as she pointed that out. I wanted to explain about how he couldn’t go against his father and Alpha and that it was understandable that his loyalties were torn between me as his adoptive sister and his blood relations.

But before I could voice my thoughts, Muriel clasped my knee and gave it a squeeze. “If you believe in him, Billie, maybe he does have a chance to rid himself of his father and sister’s influence.”

Aislin snorted into her tea. “Well, I think we’re best rid of all Dalesbloomers.”

I realized that the glimpse of softness that I’d caught in Aislin’s eye and expression earlier was a very rare thing.

Knowing that there were more answers I needed to find tonight, and feeling the heaviness of everything that had happened threatening to catch up with me, I said to everyone, “I need to go speak to Gavin.”

“Of course, dear,” Muriel said.

Gretel took my mug and insisted I keep the tartan blanket wrapped around me as I went over to Gavin’s. Before I left, she said, “We’ve got a guest bedroom, love. So come over when you’re done, and you can sleep in there.”

“Thanks,” I said as my heart squeezed at her thoughtfulness.

For a moment, I lingered on the doorstep but then, with a steadying breath, knocked on the door. I chided my quickening pulse. After all that had happened tonight, could I seriously be nervous about seeing Gavin?

Only a few seconds later, he opened the door. And as the tall, muscular Alpha, this time clothed thankfully, stood framed in the doorway, I admitted that, yes, I very much could still be nervous about seeing this ridiculously gorgeous man.

The waves of his dark brown hair were slightly damp, and from the scent of soap, I knew he’d recently showered. Again, this was another imagining that I didn’t need right now but that my wayward imagination was running with as it hadplentyof material to work with from the woods earlier.

Thankfully, the reminder of the woods had me voicing why I’d actually come to talk. “Can we talk about my parents?”

His deep hazel eyes softened, and I felt my legs actually go weak. It was everything that had happened tonight, I told myself. “Of course we can,” he said. “Come in. Please, have a seat,” he told me, closing the door to the cabin.

I ventured over to the couch, enjoying the softness of the worn leather and breathing in the mellow aroma from the wood fire burning in the hearth.

Gavin asked, “Can I get you anything? Tea, coffee?”

I shook my head. “Gretel just made me tea.”

He nodded and took a seat in the armchair by the fire.

As he sat across from me, my eyes locked onto his. In his stare rested a mixture of compassion and determination. Incredulity whipped through me that this man held the answers to the questions that had haunted me for as long as I could remember.

With a shaky breath, I started, “You said Shannon and Tobi Rathbone are my parents.”

He nodded.

“What happened to them?” My pulse quickened.

“They disappeared,” he explained, his brow furrowing. “I was only six years old when it happened, but I remember both my parents being shaken up about not knowing where Shannon and Tobi … and you were,” he added, looking at me. “Their three-year-old daughter, Elizabeth, had disappeared, too.

---