Page 38 of The Awakened Wolf

“So…” Father’s brow folded. “Damian is your father?”

“My sire,” Sebastian insisted. “Not my father. Never my father. But yes, I am his biological son. My mother confirmed what he told me himself right before I fled the battle.” He looked down. “I am sorry, Phelan. When you left your daughter with me, I promised to always take care of her, but in the battle, she had Kiana and Evan and, most importantly, herself. My mother had no one but me. I had to leave.”

“No one but you?” Father coughed into his fist, and I didn’t miss the flecks of blood he left there. “I do not fault you for whisking your mother to safety, but to leave the country without a word to anyone, not even your mother’s mate of nearly three decades? I’ve never known such a devoted pair without a fate bond.”

“My parents came to love each other deeply, it’s true, but in the beginning, they were full of resentment. My mother wanted to be in Puerto Rico with her family, not starting a new one here when she was barely more than a pup. And so, even after I was born and they grew close, my father feared she would not return if she ever went home.” Sebastian’s eyes sought out mine again. “I only meant to take her back to the Plaza that day, but as I was tucking her into bed, I saw this photo of her sisters she kept on her bedside table, and suddenly I knew exactly what she needed to be whole.”

A current of awkward energy passed between Kiana and I, forcing us each to step ever so slightly away from each other. Evan released my hand and wrapped his arm around my shoulders. Sebastian’s defeated gaze dropped to his black-and-white sneakers, and for once, I couldn’t blame him for assuming the absurd about my best friend and me. We were dressed in mating clothes.

Father cleared his throat, wet with blood and mucus rather than emotion. “I would not dream of questioning Yara’s integrity, but since you are alluding to her… mental difficulties yourself, then I will be so bold as to ask how you can be sure Max is not your father, even if Damian did—” Father’s face twisted with disgust. “As you’ve said.”

“Mother is certain,” Sebastian said firmly, and then in a murmur only those closest could hear added, “And equally certain my father never did the math. He believed I was his rightful Alpha Heir, but I am not. I belong here, as a Beta and as your daughter’s fated mate, though I have done nothing to deserve her.”

My wolf shoved me from the inside out, and I took a halting step toward him, desperate to hold his face and tell him he was wrong, but Kiana’s arm shot in front of me like a mother protecting her pup from the slamming brakes of a cab.

“I am still the Alpha here, and I still have final say on all the pairings in my pack,” Kiana said. “And if you know that you’ve done nothing to deserve her, then why would you disrupt her mating ceremony with someone who does?”

Evan swore under his breath as his arm fell off my shoulders and slapped against his side. “Alpha Kiana—”

“Quiet.” Kiana held up a hand and then tilted it into a single pointing finger at Evan’s exhausted face. “This male has only been one of our kind for a few weeks, but he saved my sister’s life in the battle you missed, and while she returned to the home you were supposed to share, he returned to the Bronx with me to take care of the new shifters your father rejected. And when your father rejected Elyse, as well, because of the change you made to her scent, this male agreed to take your place and spare her the fate of a fallen female, even if that meant being father to your pup.”

Sebastian’s eyes bulged so big it seemed his irises were smashed right up against his glasses. He crossed the distance between us in two strides before Kiana’s elbow to his sternum brought him short. But still he reached for me, and the warmth of my embarrassment collided with the warmth of my wolf’s delight, creating an explosion of heat in the general vicinity of where Sebastian’s child would be if it weren’t a figment of sister’s imagination.

“Sebastian, no,” I started. “I’m not—”

“Not going to let you barge in here and undermine her Alpha’s mating decisions,” Kiana finished for me, even though her words were nothing close to what I was going to say. “We all understand your desire to protect your mother, under the circumstances, but there is no excuse for leaving my sister in this condition.”

Sebastian’s gaze dropped to my stomach, and I slapped a hand to my burning red forehead. “Kiana, I’m not—”

“Mating with that sorry excuse for a male.” Kiana stepped in front of me and placed her hand on Evan’s shoulder. “Evan has made his vows to you. And now you will finish yours to him. I don’t want my nieces and nephews sired with Damian’s blood or raised with Max’s beliefs.”

“Kiana, no!” I tried to push her arm down, but it was like trying to move a subway style without a Metrocard. “Sebastian, I—”

“She’s right, Elyse.” Sebastian’s hands settled over my own. “You will always be my fated, but I failed you, unforgivably.” He smiled sadly. “If this were a movie, I would root for him too.”

“Oh, for the love of your Gods and my mother’s!” Evan cried, throwing both arms into the air and dramatically stomping one foot. “I’m gay, Sebastian! Kiana! Everyone! I’m gay! I smell mated because I… make lots of terrible decisions about men, but at the end of the day, I can’t quit them! And I know some of you thought werewolf conversion camp was going to fix me, but guess what? I think I actually got gayer.” He waved one arm at Atlas, who had been standing quietly by this entire time, and the other arm presumably at all the males behind us. “Everywhere I look there’s a beautiful bad decision waiting to happen, and I want to make them…” His eyes darted back to Atlas and quickly away as he finished with a mutter, “Some of them.”

In the silence that followed, Atlas’ face flamed as red as his hair. Our shared puppy years rewound behind my eyes. Oh. Ohhhh. I stifled my first genuinely happy laugh in days, not at my old friend’s expense, but at Sebastian’s clueless confidence for the past month. It wasn’t just a human thing, after all. Or maybe I should say it was a very human thing because that’s exactly what we all were. Humans who could turn into wolves, sure, but I’d never seen a nature documentary about wolves yearning to be seen for who they really were.

I looked at my sister, whose skin was as white as her wolf’s fur. Evan grasped the wrist of her hand that clutched his shoulder.

“I am honored that you’ve formed such a high opinion of me, but if you really think I’m such a worthy male, then please just let me be who I really am—your sister’s best friend, nothing else. And… maybe your friend too?” He offered a small smile and raised one eyebrow.

Kiana looked up at the ceiling, almost as if in prayer. Then she squeezed Evan’s shoulder and took a step back. Evan’s whole body sagged with exaggerated relief and he swipe a hand across his forehead before grabbing Sebastian’s jacket lapels and yanking him into my personal space.

“If you don’t do the most romantic thing I’ve ever seen in my life right now, I will end you,” Evan said through smiling teeth. “I will rip off your actual—”

“Okay, okay!” Sebastian held up his hands. “I’ve got this. And… I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, well.” Evan shrugged and turned up his nose. “I’m still waiting on that gold-plated phone you promised, so…”

“Me too, actually.” I shoved Evan ever-so-lovingly out of our space and perhaps a little toward Atlas on purpose. “But…”

“You abandoned us.”

I startled as my wolf spoke directly to Sebastian’s. His human face flinched, curling falling over his glasses as he ducked his chin. “I know,” his wolf answered.

“I don’t think I’m with pup.” I bowed my own head as she continued, “But I could have been, and you knew that—”

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