“I’m twenty-one, you idiot. I’m not thinking about anything beyond my finals and getting this whole Church of Madmen situation sorted out. Marriage isn’t part of my five-year plan at the moment.”
Ben’s relief was nakedly obvious. Did he think I had run off to Tulane to hunt down a husband? That was beyond insulting. This wasn’t 1952.
“Good.”
“But if I did marry Cash, I’d expect you to come to my wedding, shake his hand and be nice to his entire family. Understood?”
He nodded vaguely, because now that he knew it wasn’t in the cards, he didn’t have to keep any of his promises for the time being. And honestly it was becoming less and less likely Cash and I would make it to a wedding if we couldn’t even get past a full year without our problems coming between us.
“About Wilder, though…” he started again.
Damn, just when I thought I’d escaped this extra-humiliating topic where my brother reminded me he could smell my attraction. Gross.
I sighed. “I’m going to yell again. Do you want me to yell again?”
He put a hand on my shoulder, and I didn’t pull away. Skin to skin, I felt our connection like a physical tether. Touch was soothing between werewolves, especially those of the same pack. For Ben and me it was extra effective because we’d been soothing each other by touch since before we were born.
I softened, willing myself to listen. After all, he might have a good reason to not like the younger Shaw brother, and I should hear him out if he thought it was important. I might not agree with whatever he was about to say, but I owed it to Ben to listen.
“I get the feeling you guys aren’t on the friendliest of terms,” I said, hoping it would get him to the point faster.
“You missed a lot while you were in the swamp.” From the firm set of his jaw I could tell he was gritting his teeth.
“What’s the deal with him anyway? He can’t have been with the pack long if he came and went while I was away.” It must have been during the four years I was gone, but that was a short period of time for a wolf to stay with the pack. All the other wolves near our age had grown up with us, and I would have remembered Wilder. Hank had been with the pack even when I was a child, but not Wilder.
Seeming to understand why I was doubtful, Ben said, “Their family split them up when they were younger. Hank was the problem. I guess they figured being close to the king might straighten him out, which is why Hank was here when we were kids. It turned out Wilder had alpha traits, so he went to live in Shreveport with extended family. But about a year after you left, he came b
ack. I don’t know all the details. I think Callum was hoping Hank would feel less ostracized with family around, or maybe Wilder was being groomed to take over the Atlanta pack. I’ve never asked.”
“And?” Was this all because another Alpha was around? That seemed petty even for Ben. Something else had to have gone down for Ben to dislike Wilder so much. Part of me suspected this must have something to do with a girl, but the only eligible female their age was Magnolia. And she couldn’t keep a secret to save her life. If there’d been a man in her life at one point who wasn’t Ben, she would have told me.
“There was a girl.”
Ding ding ding ding ding. “Somehow I knew this would all boil down to jealousy.”
Ben narrowed his eyes, clearly annoyed with me for interrupting him. In spite of us spending so many years apart, I’d learned how to push his buttons like an expert since I’d returned. Both intentionally to annoy him, and often without meaning to.
“Would you please listen to me for a minute?”
“Fine.”
“There was a girl he and I went to school with. Her name was Holly.”
Was. The burden of the past tense made my heart clench, and I swallowed hard, already not liking the trajectory of this story. Ben looked sad all of a sudden, which wasn’t typical of him. He liked to keep his emotions checked at all times, but memories of this girl were causing him to slip. It made me nervous enough to not want to hear the rest.
But I had to.
“What happened?”
“She went missing. They found her a few days after the full moon, dead. Her stepfather was arrested and convicted, but…”
I knew the rest of his sentence, even though he drifted off quietly. The kill hadn’t been right, not quite human. And a dead girl in the woods after a full moon? We were all lucky no one knew about werewolves then, because all fingers would have pointed at Callum and the pack faster than someone could say howl.
A cold sensation crept up my spine. “Does she still have people here, Ben? Now that we’re out, are they going to start thinking the cops made a mistake?”
He shook his head. “Her mom moved away years ago. Last I heard she died. The stepdad was killed in prison. No one likes a guy who kills kids, right?”
I wanted his words to make me feel better, but instead I felt bad for the girl. No matter who or what had killed her, she’d never gotten her chance to grow up and get the hell out of this town.