Page 23 of Star-crossed Betas

“He ran into my knife, ten times,” I add on with an equally terrible impression. “You should really spend less time watching Chicago; it always leaves you a bit too stabby for my liking.” We’re both laughing, and I forgot how much I missed this. It occurs to me that if my relationship with Fee is going to continue—and I really hope it does—I have to find a way to stop the secrecy from driving a wedge between me and my family.

Standing in front ofBedroom in Arlesat the Van Gogh exhibit, Will comes over and rests his head against my shoulder. I wrap my arm around him instinctively, but I feel a pang of guilt in my gut. Wolf shifters are tactile in nature, and Will is especially. I’ve never really thought twice about it, but now I wonder if I’d be doing this if Fee was here? Not that he can be here, but still.

How would I feel if he had his arm wrapped around someone else?

Pretty feral if I’m being completely honest with myself.

Dropping my arm from his shoulder, I step away and search for Niamh, who went looking for a bathroom around ten minutes ago. My attempt at putting some physical distance between us clearly goes unnoticed by him since he catches up to me in a second and puts his hand in mine.

“Thanks for inviting me today,” he says, squeezing my hand. The statement reminds me of how little time I’ve been spending with him and Niamh recently. The three of us have been inseparable for most of our lives, but I’ve been pulling away from both of them.

“You don’t need to thank me. I’m glad you could come,” I reply, returning the squeeze of his fingers before untangling them and letting go. He smiles brightly at that, his soft rosy lips stretched wide around straight white teeth.

Will is objectively beautiful; he has curly blonde hair that always seems to fall just right and big blue eyes with full lips. Plenty of people dismiss him as nothing more than a pretty face, but he’s also super intelligent and fiercely loyal. Sometimes I wonder, if it weren’t for Fee, would I have fallen for Will eventually? He wouldn’t be hard to love that way.

I don’t, though; it scares me sometimes how much I love Fee. In many respects, my life would be simpler if we’d never met, but the thought of never knowing him makes a cold sweat trickle down my back. When I look at Will, all I see is one of my oldest and closest friends, who I will probably hurt when I find a way out of this arrangement. But my heart belongs to a big, brawny, soft-hearted boy in the Lake District, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

Nine

March 2022 - Present Day

Phoenix Campbell

My stomach drops as we step into the drawing room of my parents’ house. Jade’s sister, Iris, sips red wine as my dad talks her ear off by the fireplace. I have no idea why my mother invited Iris to this, of all dinners.

For the past couple of days, there’s been a tentative peace between the two of us. We’ve only got this one dinner to get through with my family before we head to the Peak District tomorrow.

Cee manages not to flinch as I gently press my hand to his lower back, nudging him out of the doorway. Jasper wanders over to us with a sleepy-looking Henry resting on his hip.

“Look who it is, Hen. You want a cuddle from Uncle Nix?” Jasper says to his son in a sing-song voice. Henry seems to debate it for a moment before reaching out his chubby littlehands to me. He rests his heavy head on my shoulder and settles back down again. I might be biased, but I have the cutest nephewever. His skin is quite fair, similar to Jasper’s, but he has tight black ringlet hair just like his mum’s, and his dark lashes frame big brown eyes that always look remarkably thoughtful for a toddler.

Before I get a chance to ask Jasper what Iris is doing here, my mum appears behind me. She runs a hand affectionately over Henry’s head before asking us all to make our way into the dining room for dinner.

Starters have just been served when Jade joins us at the table, having put Henry down to sleep. My mum, as Alpha, sits at the head of the table. My dad, Cee, and I are on one side, and Alfie, Jasper, Jade, and Iris sit opposite us.

A painfully uncomfortable knot forms in my stomach. Other than the highly unlikely scenario that Iris happened to be visiting Jade and Jas when this dinner was organised, I can’t think of a singlegoodreason why my mother would have invited her tonight.

We make it through the first course relatively unscathed, with nothing more than inane small talk. Things start to take a turn as we wait for Claire, their housekeeper, to serve the main course.

“I hear Alice Graham is thinking of leaving us,” my mum says.

“What? Where did you hear that?” I ask. Alice is my best friend, and while I know she’s not particularly happy in this pack after everything that went down last year, she’s never mentioned leaving.

“She’s been spending significant time with the Eastwood pack, isn’t that right, Iris?”

“I wouldn’t say so. She visits her cousin, Oliver, fairly frequently, but since the rest of his family are human, they haven’t spent much time around anyone in the pack, except formaybe Calvin,” Iris replies. I’m grateful she’s not throwing Alice under the bus.

“Calvin, as in the future Alpha of your pack?” My mum’s tone is baiting as if she’s trying to catch Iris in a lie.

“Calvin, as in mine and Jade’s older brother, and Oliver’s best friend.” Iris’ firm response brokers no room to continue the conversation—she’s braver than I am when it comes to my mother. I suppose she benefits from my mum not being her Alpha.

The awkward silence that follows is brief because Claire appears with large plates of food. Mum has clearly gone into fullshow-offmode with sirloin steaks and lobster tails. Cee's eyes go wide when the dish is placed before him. A wave of embarrassment washes over me because while it may appear my mum has pulled out all the stops for a special guest, this is just another way for her to flaunt our pack’s wealth.

I’m chewing on a mouthful of steak when my mother decides to start the one conversation I was dreading.

“It’s such a pleasure to have you with us this evening, Iris. It feels as though we’ve hardly seen you since you and Nix broke up.” Iris’ face goes scarlet red, and I pinch the bridge of my nose, wincing. Cee is white-knuckling the cutlery in his hands and glaring a hole into his dinner plate. While I don’t want to give my mum the satisfaction of knowing she’s caused a rift, I also really don’t want him to think I have a secret ex-girlfriend.

“Mum, Connor is right there; what a weird thing to bring up,” Jasper says. He thinks he’s helping, but he’s kind of not.

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