Page 21 of Unforgivable

I swallow. Damn, this is awkward. "I came to collect some of her things... clothes and personal items," I say stiffly. Why did I volunteer for this? Oh, right, because I'm less intimidating than the other two. I still should've sent one of them.

"I want to see her," Tabitha suddenly declares, lifting her tear-soaked face to look at Ted determinedly. "Please, I need to see her. She's my baby."

"We can't, Tabby. She's in exile," Ted whispers brokenly.

A surge of guilt punches me in the gut like a fist. I have a shitty feeling that this is a discussion that these two wolves have had many times.

When Alpha Jax announced Lyri as a nulla venia, it meant that anyone offering her assistance was banned from getting any pack funds or assistance. Ted would lose his warrior's pension. I know that Lyri has a younger sister and brother. The pups wouldn't be able to go to school. The Lyri entire family would have been cast out.

What a fucking horrible decision these two had to make. If they help their daughter, they threaten the futures of the other two pups. If they leave the pack, Ted loses his income, so how would they live outside the pack?

"She's doing really well," I blurt out inanely. "Ah, I can bring a letter to her, or something. "

A miniature version of Tabitha slouches into the room a moment later. I wince at the hateful glare the female tosses to her parents.

"Who's this?" she snaps. Pouty, she's a pre-shifted, pissed-off, hormonal teenager. Awesome.

"I'm Ezra," I introduce myself to all of them, realizing that Lyri's parents may not know who I am, either. "I'm here to collect Lyri's things."

The female huffs in annoyance and stomps from the room. "It's always about Lyri, right?" she calls out over her shoulder.

I can't stop the growl that slips. The family freezes. Ted's response is immediate, posturing, shoulders up in a tense readiness as he steps toward me to protect his family if necessary.

I open my mouth to apologize when Tabitha speaks up to diffuse the situation.

"Do you care about my Lyri? Do you love her?"

"Tabitha!" Ted hisses. "He's known her for a month!"

"I am falling in love with her," I tell them the truth. How can you not love that female? I don't care if she slept around before that night. I don't give a fuck that Alpha Jax's panties were in a twist because his perfect golden-boy alphason got caught with his dick hanging out. He should have kept it in his pants, and it's bullshit that Lyri paid the price for what was a consensual act.

"I'll take you to her room," Tabitha volunteers. "Then, if you can wait, I would like to send her a letter."

I nod, following the female upstairs with Ted breathing down my neck. Tabitha hurries to a door, ignoring the snick of another door where I assume Lyri's sister was spying on us from.

"Penny has been having trouble at school," Tabitha confesses to me in a voice soft enough to not carry.

I nod, looking around the room that smells a lot like Lyri, if not exactly what I'm used to. "She can talk to Inuit if she needs to, my younger brother," I explain, "they're about the same age."

Tabitha's eyebrow quirks up, a faint smile on her face, "everyone at school is afraid of that male."

I let the grin take over my face. Good kid, my brother.

Lyri's room is simple, furnished in light purple and white. She doesn't have posters on her walls, but there's a photograph of a cow grazing in a pasture with a glittery crown on its head. I break out into a chuckle when I see it.

Tabitha's eyes follow mine. "Oh, she says it's soothing."

"It is," I agree. I walk to the closet doors and pull them open. Ted comes into the room with a couple of cardboard boxes.

"We were thinking of leaving the pack," he mutters to me. "If anything got worse, we would. I looked for work, but the pay is so low, and we couldn't..." he paused, holding back tears, "we couldn't find Lyri. It was a couple of days after... her punishment... before we heard you all had her up at Genom."

"I'm sorry. We should have sent word."

Ted shakes his head. "Hold her tight up there. Don't let her come back. I never thought that this could happen here. They stole my child. We were told nothing, except what the pack was told. Our daughter was a nulla venia for seducing the alphason and committing treason against the pack. She was gone," he stares into my eyes. I fight the urge to squirm at the intensity of his gaze.

"They guarded our house. I couldn't help my daughter. I couldn't leave this damn house. It felt like a fucking tomb. Then, dawn came, and we ran out of here as fast as we could."

He falls silent. "When we came to that meadow in the woods, they were already burning brush on the ground. There was no trail, no sign of Lyri. No one would answer our questions. This has been hell, but if you really are taking care of her, then thank you. Thank you for doing what I couldn't."

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