Page 44 of Pack Kasen: Part 2

Kat must have told her dad about me nearly killing her.

Patric takes a step toward me, fists flexing.

A growl rumbles from my throat as I meet his gaze. “One hit. That’s all you get. I amstillthe Wolf King.”

His eyes flash with rage. “You don’t deserve her. Not for one day do you deserve my Kata after what you did to her.”

13

KAT

Yesterday, 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—myrealdad—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.

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