Page 333 of Warlords, Witches & Wolves

Ivy slid off the stool. “I’m sorry, Noah.”

Liam gathered Ivy’s coat and helped her into it. The tension in the bar increased with each second. I jumped when Ivy touched my arm, her face etched with sadness. Without saying another word, she left with Liam.

I waited for the door to close before turning to Noah. “You want to tell me what’s going on?”

He rounded the bar to sit on the stool beside me, spinning me and positioning my legs between his. “It doesn’t matter. You’re nothing like your ancestors.”

A weight sank low in my belly. “You know my family?”

Of course, he did. Noah said shifters were near immortal, the Coles had probably lived in Woodland Falls for decades, if not longer. Had my family lived here that long too? My mother grew up here, though from what I knew, she left as a teen after a falling out with Joan.

“Your family knew about us, about the shifter world.”

“What?” I whispered the words so softly I hardly heard them. “If that’s true, wouldn’t I have known?”

Would I? Growing up, I didn’t exactly have a great relationship with my mother. She never spoke to me about anything important. She hardly spoke to me at all, too busy organizing where to ditch me before her next work trip. And I’d only spent one summer with Joan.

“Noah.” An uneasy feeling prickled along my nape. “What aren’t you telling me?”

He met my gaze and in that split second, I wished I hadn’t asked. I didn’t want to know the answer.

An awful feeling sank low and heavy in my belly.

“The Whitcomes are the original…hunters.”

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