Chapter Twenty-Four

Terrick

“So is that house your house now?” Salta asked, sipping on her blood boba tea.

“It is,” I nodded. “We talked to Liam and Bobby a few days ago. We’re going to stay here and figure it all out.”

“Figure what out?” Salta asked, barely taking her lips off the straw to speak.

“Life,” I laughed. “You’ll understand when you’re older.”

“Mom’s been saying that a lot recently,” she sighed, letting go of the straw.

“About what?” I asked.

“You and your new boyfriend,” she rolled her eyes.

“Hey! First, he’s not my boyfriend, kiddo. He’s my mate. There’s a big difference there and I thought you liked him.”

“I do, but why here? Why can’t you guys come live with us?” She sighed.

I took a long breath and tried to figure out how to explain everything to an eleven-year-old.

“Because Scott needs more sunshine than we get at the coven. If he slept all day and only went out at night, he’d get sick,” I finally settled on.

“He could sleep at night,” she grinned as if she solved all the world’s problems. “If you can sleep at night here instead of the day, he can do it back home too.”

“That might not work,” I said. “It would be loud and noisy while he tried to sleep.”

“Do I need to get Mom’s sword again? I’ll make everyone be quiet!”

“It’s not that easy, Salta. People deserve to live their lives. Can you imagine telling the baby to be quiet?” I said, barely managing to keep the sigh out of my voice.

How did you tell a kid that you’re haunted back home? That everything reminds you of a man she never knew and doesn’t know to miss? How was I supposed to tell her that I needed a place where things were more relaxed?

“Well, no, but we can buy earplugs!” she grinned.

In other groups, people grew up and moved away from home. That really didn’t happen in the Lost Fang Coven. We were close knit and occasionally took in outside vampires or elves, if our mother approved of them or they true-mate responded to one of ours. Hell, we even took in a few humans and non-shifters over the years that last way.

“Can I tell you a secret?” I asked.

“Yes!” She cheered and I shushed her.

“It’s a secret. We have to be quiet about it and you have to keep it to yourself!” I whisper-shouted.

“She’s not going to keep any secret,” the hound sounded off in my thoughts.

I was pretty damn sure he was right, but as long as she kept her mouth shut until she was home, it would all work out.

“Who can’t I tell?” Salta whispered back to me, tucking a long strand of hair behind her tiny, pointed ear.

“Anyone,” I whispered.

“Why?”

“Because it’s a secret,” I laughed.

“What’s it about?” she asked, her expression turning way too serious for any little girl to wear.

“Why we can’t move.”

“Is it the bad guys? The one who made you crash the car? I miss that car,” she pouted.

“There weren’t any bad guys that made me crash. It was just an accident. I miss the car too,” I said, feeling my heart sink into my stomach.

I really missed the car. Not that it was practical with a newborn baby on the way, but me and that car had some really good times.

“Then why can’t you live with us still?” she asked, her bottom lip trembling.

“Scott and I are going to have a baby,” I whispered.

Her eyes went huge.

“Then you have to come home! You have to come where it’s safe!” She said a bit louder than I liked.

“Shhh! It’s a secret for now, remember?”

“You have to come home to where we have guards!” she said, looking more like our mother with each word that tumbled out of her mouth.

“We’re safe here, kiddo. They have patrols too,” I said, reaching over to ruffle her hair.

She dodged my move and smoothed her hair out in case I messed any of it up.

“But---” she searched for words.

“But what, Salta? The baby needs to be somewhere that they can play in the grass and the sunlight. The baby will probably be a wolf shifter like Scott. Wolves need sunlight to be healthy and happy.”

“What about me?” she finally asked the question that was on her mind.

I wanted to tell her not to worry about anything. That I’d fix her up one of the bedrooms and that our mother would just have to deal with it. Only I couldn’t make that call. I tried to imagine our unborn child at her age and someone trying to take them away from me. I’d rip them asunder.

“I love you, kiddo. You are one of my favorite people in the whole universe and when you grow up you can come and stay with us full time if you want. That’s a promise you can sink your fangs into.”

“But what about now? It’ll be forever before I grow up,” she frowned and stared down at her half-drunk blood boba.

“You’ll visit just like this weekend. Maybe longer for the holidays, if it’s okay with mom.”

“It’s not fair,” she shook her head. “You’re my brother.”

“And you’re about to be an aunt.”

“I’m already an aunt. The old people have kids.”

“Yes, but this is my baby.”

“I’m your baby,” she said, and the words cut through my heart.

I fought off the urge to rub the bridge of my nose. She was right. In some ways, I quit being a kid the day she was born.

“You are my baby sister,” I finally settled on staying.

“Mom’s mean.”

“Mom loves you.”

“If she loved me, she’d just let me live with you. She’s always so busy with work and the little kids,” she said, her bottom lip trembling again.

“Have you told her that?” I asked.

“That she’s busy? She knows she’s busy! She’s always saying it.”

The kid was breaking my heart because I knew everything she said was true. What could I do, though?

“You’re really not coming back?” she asked, pushing away from the table.

“It’s not like that, Salta. Please sit back down.”

“EVERYONE MY brOTHER IS PREGNANT!” She shouted.

It was backwards, but also it was the whole truth at the same time.

She dashed from the bakery, and I swore under my breath as everyone turned to look at me. I didn’t have time to excuse her bad manners or explain what she meant. I swore again. Scott was gonna bust my balls for not keeping my mouth shut.

I pushed the door open just in time to see the hem of Salta’s sundress disappear around the corner. Shit! She didn’t know a damn thing about Heartville and even less about the woods which she was headed towards. I sprinted ahead trying to catch up with her before she disappeared. She was just as elven as I was and her small size allowed her to squeeze and weave through the people walking around the village.

A sob tore from her throat and echoed around as her feet thumped onto the path that headed into the woods. She was breaking my damn heart.

“Salta!” I called for her, but she didn’t even look back.

I sped up. My heart pounding in my ears as my mind raced through all the things that might happen to a little girl lost in the woods. Sure, these woods were safer than average, because the pack considered them part of the village. Salta was eleven and had only been away from home once before. This time she didn’t even have a destination in mind.

“Salta!” I tried over our family link instead. “Sweetheart, please! Stop running! I don’t want you to get lost in the woods!”

She didn’t answer me then either.

“Let me!” my hound howled into my thoughts, and I skidded to a stop at the edge of the woods.

This time he came out fast and fiercely with his nose to the ground. Salta’s scent path wasn’t crimson like Scott’s was. Hers was pink and yellow, like a field full of spring wildflowers. Salta raced faster. Her breathing played in my ears, but she couldn’t out run the hound. She shrieked as he closed in on her and grabbed her up by the back of her dress.

“Help! Help! Terrick!” she shrieked.

“This is me,” I said over our family link as the hound turned, still carrying her in his mouth as we headed back to the village.

“Then put me down!” she shrieked.

“No! We’re going back to the house to talk about this! You can’t go running off in the woods by yourself. You’re eleven!”

“I’m almost twelve!” she said, switching to protesting on the family link.

“Stop! You’re drawing attention to us!”

We were already back in the village proper and the hound didn’t care about all the onlookers. He was hauling a naughty pup back to the house. A few of them chuckled. Fortunately for me, most of the shifters were wolves or married to them. They knew how canines reacted to things.

“Terrick?!” Scott’s voice broke through my thoughts about a block away from the house. “What happened?! We heard her shrieking all the way at the house.”

Blithe was with him, looking exhausted but ready for a fight.

“She ran away because she figured out I wasn’t moving back to the coven,” I sighed. “Right into the woods and I wasn’t having it. She’s not getting herself killed. That’s a death I won’t survive, Scott. That’s when I’ll just pretend I’m in a bad vampire novel and crawl into a coffin.”

“Don’t talk like that!” Scott scolded me over our mating link.

“Salta!” he scolded, putting on a tone of voice I never heard from him before.

“What?” she cried.

“Stop wiggling around. You’re going to show off your underwear.”

Salta froze and looked at Scott for what to do next.

“Are you going to be a big girl and walk back to the house or does Terrick have to carry you all the way there?” he asked.

“I can walk.”

“Will you?” Scott asked. “Will you hold my hand and walk back like the brave young lady with the sword I first met?”

She nodded and the hound sat her down in front of Scott. He took her hand and then the hound relented and allowed me to return to my human form. Scott was right. That got easier every time. Maybe being a canine shifter wouldn’t be so bad after all.

None of us said anything as we walked back to the house.

“Take it easy,” Blithe said, giving his brother a one-armed hug when we arrived home. “And thanks for telling me all that. It’s given me a lot to think on and when it’s a better time for us both, I’d like to talk about it some more.”

“I’d love that,” Scott hugged him.