Page 66 of Fire Bound

“Read down farther.” Scanning the page, I find the obituaries. “Gen’s mom was named Claire,” he tells me before I have to ask.

At the very bottom of the obituary section is a small little blurb.

“For Claire Axton. It wasn’t supposed to end like this. -John”

“What happened to her?”

“I don’t know.” Whisper rubs his face in frustration. “This newspaper article and this”—he flips the newspaper clipping up to show what’s underneath—“this family picture from when Gen and William were younger was all I could find. Someone went through a great deal to wipe everything there is about them out. I’m lucky I found the few pieces they missed.”

The picture looks like it was taken at one of those mall photography places. Where everyone wears matching white shirts and blue denim jeans. Except for the happy, smiling photo you’d expect of a family, the parents look stiff and their expressions are bland. Unemotional. The two children that stand in front of them have tight, almost pained smiles on their faces.

This wasn’t a happy family.

“Genevieve looks just like Pru when she was a kid,” I observe. Gen’s hair is just a couple shades darker than Pru’s white, blonde locks. Everyone in the picture is blonde, although John’s hair looks a little sparse. It seems William has lucked out with being able to keep his hair. Sighing, I take the picture from the folder. “It’s not much, but at least Pru will know what her grandparents looked like.”

Whisper nods solemnly. “I’ll keep looking, but something is really weird about this family.”

“I bet when William got involved with Nicolai, he had his family’s history wiped so they couldn’t be tracked if things went south.” I grasp at straws for an explanation.

“Yeah, maybe.”

I leave Whisper to wallow in his mess.

I’m on my hands and knees rummaging around through boxes of various décor and knickknacks in Winslow’s storage closet when someone abruptly clears their throat behind me, making me jump and hit my head on the shelf.

“Fuck!” I moan as the back of my skull throbs. Carefully backing up so I don’t accidentally do it again, I turn around to glare up at Isabeau. She leans against the wall, an impassive look on her face as she watches me. “You were a really good assassin, weren’t you?” I ask dumbly while rubbing my head. As a wolf shifter, my senses are heightened, but I still wasn’t able to hear or sense Beau approaching.

The vampire lifts a shoulder in a noncommittal shrug before pushing off the wall and stepping closer to me. “What are you doing?”

“I need a frame to put a picture in for Pru,” I explain while climbing back to my feet. It’s not the kind of picture I’d typically want to frame for someone, but I still want it to look somewhat presentable when I give it to Pru later today when I go train with the rest of the pack. “I kinda screwed up and forgot to get her a gift for her baby shower, so I had Whisper try and track down some information about Genevieve’s side of the family.”

“That was thoughtful of you. I just bought the first thing I saw on the registry. What is aBaby Bjorn?”

Isabeau can tell you a million facts about guns and knives and tell you the easiest and cleanest way to kill someone, but she is still learning about real world things. Ransom has her in what he calls‘pop culture’bootcamp because before meeting him, she’d never watched TV or seen a movie. He got tired of none of his movie references working on her, so he now forces her to watch Netflix and whatnot with him.

“It’s something you strap to your chest and pop your baby into so you can use both your hands,” I explain to her while looking through the upper shelves of the closet.

“So, it’s a baby...carrier?”

“Pretty much,” I answer over my shoulder. Standing on my tippy-toes, I try to see what Winnie has stashed on the very top shelf, but it looks to be just leftover gallons of wall paint and painting supplies. “Hey! You wouldn’t happen to have an extra picture frame, would you?”

She quirks a dark brow at me. “Do I look like someone that would have an extra picture frame? I have one framed picture in my house and it’s from when I married Ransom in Vegas and it was included in the package for the ceremony.” While shifters don’t typically get married, Ransom decided to elope with Beau in Vegas. It’s a really classy affair when an Elvis impersonator marries you.

“You know what? That’s on me. I forgot that your idea of decorating is mounting weapons on walls.”

She scoffs. “Ransom only let me do that inoneroom.”

“Whatever, it still looks like a serial killer dungeon.” I roll my eyes. “Want to go with me to town to pick a frame up before we head back to your house?” I snag the picture off the side table I’d left it on. “I really want to give this to Pruitt today,” I explain while handing the photograph to Beau.

She takes it from me with little to no interest in her eyes, almost as if she’s looking at it just to humor me. Her arctic eyes scan the picture really quick like she’s going through the motions before starting to hand it back to me. I reach out to take it from her, but just as I’m about to touch it, her eyes narrow and she snaps it back to her.

Thinking she’s seeing the same thing I see, I cross my arms and frown. “I know, not exactly the happiest of pictures.”

Beau ignores my statement before asking harshly. “You said this is Pru’s mom?”

“And her parents and brother,” I confirm, standing up a little straighter because of her change in tone.

“Whisper found this for you? Did he find any more pictures or just this one?”

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