Page 49 of The Alpha's Second Chance Mate

“You got it,” Al said, and went into the kitchen.

Even though the last few minutes had been strange and surreal, it warmed my heart that Cole had remembered our son was starving and ensured he would get the burger he so desperately wanted.

Outside in the fresh air, though, my mind instantly returned to what had just happened in the restaurant.

“Are you going to tell me what’s happening?” I asked.

“In the car,” he said. “I promise.”

Once he helped me into the truck, he got into the driver’s seat and pulled away. For a few seconds, he was silent, almost brooding. Not wanting to push, I sat with my hands folded in my lap, trying not to fidget. I wanted answers, but I knew Cole well enough to know that he was working out what he wanted to say before he opened his mouth. It was one of the things that made him who he was. He never spoke without having his thoughts in order. Not when it was something important. Still, it was maddening to sit there in silence while I waited.

Finally, he spoke.

“I need to tell you something. Something I should have told you fifteen years ago, but I was too childish back then.”

A tremor ran through me, so strong that I almost shivered from it. Answers. Was that what I was about to receive? A reason for why he’d left me in the dark and alone?

“I’m all ears,” I said, and though I was eager to hear, I still caught the bitterness in my voice. There was nothing I could do about that.

“You remember what it was like those last couple years with my father?” he asked.

I huffed a laugh. “You and he were at each other’s throats.”

“Yeah. He kept badgering me about taking over the pack,” Cole said, his eyes pinned on the road as if trying to peer back in time rather than at the yellow lines and pavement. “I was still mourning my mother, even though it had been years since she died, and I was still angry about what he’d done. In my mind, it was his affair that killed her. Dead of a broken heart, you know.”

“I do,” I murmured.

After all I’d gone through after Cole left me, I’d become intensely aware of how fragile a heart was. It was easy to see how a betrayal like that could kill some. I’d felt like dying myself in the months after Cole vanished.

“We fought like cats and dogs. I kept pushing back, telling him I didn’t want to take over for a few years. Told him, uh…” He gave me a sidelong glance. “I told him I wanted to live life with you for a bit before settling down to take over the pack. He didn’t like that. He kept telling me it was my duty to the pack. You know I never wanted to lead. Don’t you, Avery? Do you remember what we talked about?”

I did. Cole had confided in me that he wanted to renounce his claim to the Harbor Mills pack. He’d thought of it as a tainted position due to his father’s infidelity. The way Lance had dishonored the position had made Cole sour on the prospect of taking over. He also didn’t want to be in charge of a whole town full of people. He’d agonized over it.

I thought back on the photos I’d found the other night. The way Cole’s face had slowly lost its shining smile, the haunted look that had slowly crept into his eyes with each subsequent photo. It had weighed on him heavily.

“I remember,” I said.

Cole nodded. When he glanced at me, there was pain in his eyes. Pain unlike anything I’d ever seen there before.

“I finally told my father the truth. That I never wanted to be the alpha, that I had no desire to set down roots here and take over what he’d built. Things got pretty tense between us after that. It got worse when I brought up the idea that he go ahead and acknowledge Dallas, make him an official member of the Garrett family. My hope was that maybe Dad could mentor him, and he could be the new alpha when Dad retired.”

I frowned, confused again. “But I thought Dallas was born a beta. He’s not an alpha by blood. How could he be the alpha of a whole pack?”

Cole shrugged. “I know. I figured he could be an interim alpha. Maintain order and structure until a new alpha from a different family could be chosen. Then, Dallas could be the right hand of that new regime, if you will. The Garrett family would still hold some power and prestige, but we could slowly begin to fade into the background. In my mind, my father had soiled our name with what he’d done, and it made sense to give up control.

“Dad outright rejected the idea. Avery, it was the first time in my life I thought he might physically attack me. He cursed me and threw shit. Farrah was the only one who managed to calm us both down before we went to blows. After that night, Dad started drinking more. Heavily. The hardest shit he could find, so it could actually make him drunk. It takes a lot to get a shifter hammered, but he did his best. Mostly vodka with a super-high alcohol content. Fuck, I think he was probably drinking a couple bottles a day. Drowning his sorrows, I guess.”

“You told me all this, Cole,” I said. “None of this is news to me. We talked about this back then. You were afraid you’d end up attacking him.”

“Yeah. He got verbally abusive. Calling me every name under the sun. Farrah, too, since she was taking my side on most of it. It was bad. It was worse than I even told you,” Cole said, his voice growing thin with emotion. “I didn’t want you worrying about it, so I kept a lot of it to myself.”

On impulse, I reached out, taking his free hand in mine and lacing my fingers through it. For a moment, neither of us spoke. It was the most intimacy either of us had had with one another in fifteen years, and the simple feel of his skin on mine sent me tumbling through time. In an instant, we were eighteen again, driving to a movie, holding hands, thinking we’d be together forever. As much hurt as I’d gone through, I was starting to forgive. As crazy as that would have sounded a month ago, I truly was. And I didn’t really know what to do with that feeling.

Cole cleared his throat, and I saw the strain in his eyes. The pain in his face was almost indescribable. I wanted to speak, to say something comforting, but I stayed quiet.

“One afternoon, he called me to come to the house. He was drunk again. You were at college, and I’d spent the day doing God knows what. He was in his office, and his pistol was on his desk.”

My hand squeezed his in shock. A gun?

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