Page 27 of Sinful Shifters

"It would be, but we need to find a place for you to stay. Come on—I want to talk to the others about this."

He's gone into full protection mode, I can tell. Thale brings me to the guys and announces that they have to find somewhere safe for me to stay. The mansion is half-destroyed, mom's house is still flooded, and my apartment is tiny, so that leaves few places.

I have an idea, though it churns my stomach. "What about the First Mate's house? It's where I was supposed to live anyway. The former First Mate already moved into the retirement village, so it's empty."

Though I cross my finger for an objection, they all agree that it's the best, safest place to go. It makes me feel queasy, staying in a house that was meant for another fate, another life. But maybe I'll be able to make it my own, especially with my four guys at my side.

Besides, it's safe. A place to rest our heads. To mate, and be together.

First, though, we have to lay our dead to rest. Adar and Lucian make the fires burn strong, and a few pack members say something about Morgan. Laila surprises me with a touching speech, even though he wasn't her fated mate in the end. I find myself watching her with her new mate, a woman with short hair, and appreciating that much more the fact that I found who I'm meant to be with the first time around.

As the ashes swirl around us, the witches gather them into urns and we head to the Elder Tombs together.

"What about the key?" I ask.

Rhea shrugs. "It just turned up mysteriously. Maybe we misplaced it... though I swear Morgan always had it on him."

As we walk towards the tombs together, carrying the urns full of ashes, I match my strides to Adar's. He doesn't look at me as I glance sidelong at him, listening to the coven gossip about the key going missing.

"What did you do with it?" I ask him in a low voice.

"I took back something that was mine before I became the Keeper of the Flames in the first place."

Pulling a small locket out of his shirt, he claims, "It belonged to someone I once cared about who isn't with me any more."

I try, but fail, to tamp down on my jealousy. I know it isn't fair of me to be so upset that the guys had lives centuries before I was even born, but that doesn't change how I feel.

If the woman in question was beautiful, I'll kill her all over again.

"Who was it?" I ask, unable to keep the question at bay.

He smirks. "My mother, if you must know. Why? Is something wrong?"

I punch him lightly in the shoulder, rolling my eyes at his smugness as well as my jealousy. "You know what's wrong. Don't do that to me again."

"But you're so cute when you're unreasonably green," he quips, laughing at my frown. "I won't do it again... unless I get the opportunity, and then I will."

He's hopeless. Yet I'm charmed by him anyway, despite, or because of, his nature.

In the tomb, we put Morgan's ashes near a marble pillar. It's blank, surrounded by carvings of other alphas. Raising their arms, the witches call on a spell that carves into the pillar and leaves behind a likeness of him.

It has his kind eyes. The eyes that looked up at me just before he died. I feel a pang of grief despite myself, and promise him silently that we'll care for his pack and protect his people.

The warriors' ashes are entombed in honored crypts, their fangs arranged on top of the ashes left behind.

A hollowness fills my chest at the sight of all our dead. All of this, everything Teller, Klaus, and Eli have done, is because of me.

All to claim my heat.

Which is coming, I can tell, very, very soon.

Chapter22

Everett

The house meant for the First Mate is larger than I expected, and was recently occupied. When I ask about the woman who lived here, I'm reassured to discover that she's since moved into the retirement village with her fated mate. Apparently, life in the new pack has been good to her already.

As we walk down the hallway, Adar helpfully points out, "There are three bedrooms. We'll have to share."

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