Page 107 of Moonlit Nights & Northern Lights
“Desperate is a strong word,” she replied, leaning back in her chair. “But you and Kit are still my sons, and I’d like a distant, cordial relationship with you both. Other packs have been asking about you.”
I scoffed. “Of course. It’s all about appearances.”
“Not just that. And I’ve wanted to reach out for a while,” she continued. “When Callum suggested—though slightly last minute, I confess—that the Spring Equinox Gathering could be a suitable time to reconnect, I agreed.”
“Callum?” I couldn’t believe my ears. “Did you know he attacked me last night?”
“He told me everything, aye. Including who made the first strike.”
“Rory came back bleeding,” Maxwell interjected, scowling so deeply his glasses slid down his nose.
“I trust Callum’s assessment of the situation.” She waved a dismissive hand. “Those two have always had their issues.”
Maxwell leaned forward, his voice dangerously calm. “So you’re not going to discipline Callum for almost killing your son?”
Edina’s gaze slid from Maxwell to me, her eyes cold. “Let’s stay on topic, shall we? Rory, I’m glad you decided to come up early, because I would like to move forward.”
“Well, I’m not interested in any sort of relationship, especially one just for appearances. You’ve got Callum now anyway, your perfect little lapdog. I only came up this week to see Uncle Alex and Isla, and to get closure.”
Edina frowned. “Closure?”
I laughed, the sound hollow. “You really have no idea, do you? What you put me through when I lived here?”
Her face froze. It took a while for her to say, “Your father was… harsh, that is true. But he was just trying to teach you discipline. You needed structure. Your mind was always… everywhere. Your… condition… made you unpredictable. Dangerous, even. The pack couldnae afford that kind of liability. How else could you learn? And he was harder on you because he saw potential. Don’t you see that was a compliment? That’s how we learn—through challenge and hardship.”
Beside me, I felt Maxwell shift in his seat. I looked over to find his face thunderous. I reached across to grab his knee.
Yet my own vision blurred with rage. I wanted to scream at her, throw the objects on her desk at her, to shout that all I ever wanted as a child was a mother who loved me, a father who didn’t beat me with a belt and lock me in the basement.
But I took a deep breath and said, “Well, I hope you’re happy with the result of your methods. Because neither Kit nor I became your perfect successor. We’d both rather have died. We moved countries to get away from you.”
My mother visibly recoiled, and I rejoiced in my small victory. “How is… Kit?” she asked, tensing—clearly desperate for information about her favourite son after all these years.
Icouldhave told her how equally traumatised Kit was, how my parents’ behaviour pushed him to join the military unit that further fucked him up in ways that I didn’t even understand yet, on top of everything he experienced here. That he couldn’t even bear to talk about our childhood.
Instead I said, “He’s doing great. Brilliant, in fact. He laughed at Alex’s email. The idea of bothering to come up here to see you was hilarious to him.”
Edina’s fingers drummed against the polished oak of her desk. “Is there any way Kit would consider coming up?” A flicker of something—vulnerability, maybe—passed across her face.
I paused, genuinely surprised by the question. Was there a slight maternal instinct beneath Edina’s many icy layers—a mother aching for her firstborn? For a brief, unsettling moment, I felt a twinge of sympathy for her.
Then I remembered Kit’s face whenever our childhood was mentioned. The nightmares he still had. The way he’d lock himself in his room on the anniversary of the day he left.
“Nope. No way,” I said flatly. “You’re never going to see him again.”
The softness in her eyes hardened instantly. Her lips pressed into a thin line, jaw tightening as she rose from her seat with deliberate slowness.
“You may leave now,” she seethed, her voice a controlled blade. “I shall see you at the gathering on Friday.”
I stood, teetering on the balls of my feet. A part of me was unsure if I should ask her about Dev—maybe I secretly wanted to see a look of genuine confusion across her face. Because although Dev was convinced my family was involved with his investigation, I didn’t want to believe it, despite hating them.
The question hung in my throat, but I swallowed it down. Not yet. Not until I knew more.
“Goodbye,” I said, marching to the door without looking back.
When we were outside the manor, at the bottom of the steps, Maxwell stopped me with a gentle hand on my arm.
“You did a great job just then,” he said, his voice uncharacteristically soft. “You were right. You didn’t actually need me there at all.”
