He’s nothing like my own father. He may come across as harsh and even rude at times, but he seems to really love his family. I’m pretty sure my dad doesn’t even know what love is.
For as long as I can remember, he only knew hate and cruelty.
Marlowe brings my refilled wine glass back, one hand slipping to rest between my shoulder blades. Looking up at him, I’m finally able to push the bad memories behind enough to attempt a weak smile.
The scene around me is surreal.
Here I am, cozied up by the fire with all three boys surrounding me when just a few days ago, maybe closer to a week now, I thought. Somehow, our floor cushions all managed to creep closer together until they’re all basically at the point of making one big cushion we’re all sitting around on; very closely sitting on.
Kaleb and Marlowe are right on either side of me, with Rory sitting slightly in front of us. His body is turned diagonally toward me, one knee pressed up against mine. I’m keenly aware of how each one of their bodies is physically touching a part of me in some way or another.
At first glance, it would look so comfortable, romantic even, with the amber light of the fire highlighting everyone’s faces as it casts a dull glow throughout the room.
But then Romulus starts explaining how he was planning on killing me a couple days ago, and the mood quickly changes.
“Wait, what?”
Romulus pauses, mouth agape, and looks over at me annoyed for interrupting him. But how was I supposed not to?
I blame my newfound confidence on the two glasses of wine I’ve already finished.
I sit forward suddenly, shaking my head to clear it a bit. Surely I didn’t hear what I think I just did.
“You were going to kill me? That night you came by after the river … that weird thing you said to my mom …”
I trail off, shaking my head again.
Sometimes recovery is the more dangerous of the two options.
No amount of head shaking is going to make the realization any less daunting. Maybe, though, if I keep shaking it I’ll get enough brain damage to forget what I just heard.
“You have to understand me, Sabrina. It wasn’t personal. This sort of secret,” he motions around the room, towards the moon and wolf artefacts scattered around the corners, “keeping it comes with consequences.”
“Uh huh,” I say, slowly sitting back but keeping my eye on him. “Consequences. Killing me. Got it.”
I don’t mean to be petulant, or maybe I do, but I somehow manage to reign in my sudden temper enough to let Romulus continue.
And only with the reassuring, if a little embarrassed, looks from Rory and Marlowe. Kaleb just seems happy I haven’t pulled my hand away from his.
I wish I was imagining it, but I think Romulus has actually started to enjoy himself now. Halfway through Romulus’ thoroughly detailed description of how he was planning to sneak back up to the cabin in the middle of the night, Lydia must catch sight of the stricken look on my face and tries to temper her husband’s blunt reasoning.
“It really wasn’t anything against you in particular,” she says, hastily. She’s stopped smiling now, but she still speaks as pleasantly as she can. “He just had this outdated and stubborn idea that he had to kill you since you’d seen the shift.”
She’s talking about that wolf-girl in the woods.
“He was only trying to protect his family, and at that point, he didn’t know about the boys,” she says.
“What about the boys?”
Lydia exchanges glances with all four men in the room before she continues talking. “If the boys hadn’t intervened, Romulus likely would have gone through with killing you. Just for safety’s sake.”
A chill goes up my spine and I visibly shudder, even against the warmth of the fireplace.
“What do you mean intervene?” I ask quietly, feeling small in this large room surrounded by wolf-shifters. They could tear me to shreds in an instant if they wanted to. I look ahead of me at Rory. “What did you guys do that changed your father’s mind about killing me?”
Surely, finding out his sons had a crush on a human wouldn’t be enough to make him change his mind about murder. I hate to think he’s able to make decisions like that so flippantly.
Rory looks as though he doesn’t want to answer, or maybe he can’t. I can’t tell which. Kaleb and Marlowe aren’t forthcoming with an answer either. So again, it falls on Lydia to speak for everyone.