"Yeah, I guess. Does that run in your family?"
"Our family...." Lex said, his brown eyes warming.
"Our family." Emma murmered with a suprised smile, warmth flooding her at the
words that she had never said before.
Seeming happy that she understood Lex said, "not that I know of. Do you have
stronger senses like we do? Can you heal well?
"Yeah, I heal just like the rest of you do. I have good senses, better than humans,
but I'm not sure if its as good as yours."
"Mine is better as a wolf, but still really good as a man." He replied.
Looking around the house, "when did they leave? It was pretty rude of me to
leave everyone down here like that."
"Nah, no worries. They left right after the shower turned on." He hesitated."I can hear the half truth there. I got that handy ability too Lex."
"Of course you did. They, ah, shit Emma, we heard you break up there. It was
rough hearing that knowing there wasn't anything to do to fix it for you. Kayla
started to go up to you, and Kole had to stop her. He said you needed to get it all
out before you could deal with it. She was crying, so I told them I would stay until
Deck gets home. Since this is all on me."
"Oh." If it was one of them up there bawling like that she would have had a hard
time listening too. "Wasn't thinking about shifter hearing."
They sat there in silence for awhile. Too much had happened, there was
too much to say, but words didn't seem to be enough. The only sound the wind
moving through trees. Leafless branches creaking. Thinking her stuff looked
good scattered around Kian's house Emma wondered if he would still want her
as a mate. Lex was no doubt hoping he hadn't lost his best friend. And Kian, her
love was running through the night trying to burn the hurt out of himself. She
could feel him pushing himself, trying to find relief. It occured to her that if she
was still feeling him then he had felt all her tears in the shower. It would have
been nice to spare him that. Wishing she could take Russell Decker down herself
right now for making Kian feel her pain she asked Lex, "do you think I could be
turned? Like with a bite? Would that give me a wolf?"
Hell, I don't know, it could kill you Emma. Even if it didn't, it might not give you a
wolf. You were born to shifters, maybe that would cancel it out or something."
Lex looked really worried."Don't worry I'm not asking you to do it. I was just wondering, is all."
"If Deck wasn't already pissed off at me, that would definitely do it. Changing
someone else's mate is on hell of a big no-no." Lex said visibly relieved that she
didn't want him to try and turn her.
Emma figured they could both use a distraction. She asked Lex to tell her
about his childhood. What it had been like for him growing up. He thought about
it for a moment, like he wasn't quite sure where would be a good place to start.
He told her how humid the summers in Michigan got, that the air was so thick
with moisture it could almost choke you sometimes. So his family and Kian's
brought all the kids to Lake Michigan to cool off every chance they got. That
people called it the 'big lake' around here since you were never more than 6
miles from a lake. They would trek across what felt like miles of scorchingly hot
sand to pick the perfect spot to set up their blanket. Everyone would be loaded
down with coolers full of sandwiches and cans of 'red pop'. Or beach bags filled
with toys, towels, a few bottles of sunscreen, and a half dozen bags of chips.
When they were really little they would build giant sandcastles with moats dug
deep and filled with buckets of water. Once they had buried Kian's Dad and
made him look like a mermaid.
Then when they were teenagers and could drive themselves they would
go in search of girls. Couple of scrawny 16 year olds, tall but not quite filled out
yet. Kole sometimes convincing them he should tag along even though he was
two years younger. One time they walked down the pier and jumped off the end,even though you really weren't supposed to. They figured since they were
badass shifters and all it was no big deal. That rip current was pretty intense
though, and it was harder than they thought to swim into shore.
Emma could see the three of them swimming for all they had. Taking more
than they planned, battling the churning waters. Apparently youth held bad
decisions and teenage stupidity for shifters too. Laughing hard at how they had
probably looked like half drown cats when they reached the shore. Emma told
Lex she would have liked to see that. Shaking his head he said it hadn't
impressed any of the girls, and they all drove home feeling sore and throughly
water logged. When the laughter died down they looked at each other smiling.
Chapter 14
It had been one of hell of a night. Kian was still fighting the rage and pain
swirling inside of him. But he was finally able to gain enough control to shift back.
His wolf needed to run the hurt out since he couldn't rip into his uncle yet. He was
more determined to put and end to all of this with each beat of his paws on the
ground. How would he ever be able to erase all the damage his uncle had
caused?
Kian checked on his siblings before heading home. Kayla was in bed,
tossing and turning, probably feeling completely helpless to fix everything. Kole
was down in the living room feet up on the glossy red coffee table bottle of
whiskey half gone, it wasn't easy for their kind to get drunk. With their
metabolisms they processed the alcohol too quickly, so they had to drink a whole
lot rather quickly to get sloshed like humans. But Kole was just trying to take the
edge off. Numb the pain a little. Knowing Kian's wolf was outside checking
