Chapter 40

Chapter Forty

H arper

Inevitably, we end up back in bed together, me on my hands and knees, Wyatt’s cock in my mouth and Daxton’s in my pussy.

Afterwards, I’d like to take the box of cakes and a pot of coffee out into the pack’s secluded garden and sit with them in the afternoon sun.

But I have to go home. We’ve decided to keep this budding relationship to ourselves for now, and although I’m regretting it as I drag myself from their house and back into my mom’s car, staying any longer might rouse suspicions. And besides, I promised to be back to have dinner with my mom and my step dad tonight.

I cringe at the thought. It’s going to be another few hours where my acting abilities and straight face are tested to the limit. I straighten my spine and lift my chin.

You can do it, Harper. You only have to lie for a little bit. Only keep the pretense going for a few weeks.

Then, in just a little while, we can come clean, and then there’ll be no need to sneak around or lie anymore. I’ll be able to spend every hour of my day at the pack house if I want to. Maybe I’ll even move in.

I have another one of those massive grins on my face as I drive back home, the sun dipping behind the buildings and the sky streaked with red light.

The smile is still stretched over my face as I step through the door to be greeted to the sound of crashing cutlery and clanging pans.

I freeze, my smile falls from my face.

I know that sound. It’s very familiar. It was the sound that emitted from our apartment’s kitchen every time my mom had a bad or difficult shift at the hospital. Or she received an unexpected bill. Or the washing machine broke down again. It always signaled to me that she was in a bad mood.

I walk that way quickly, wondering what on earth could have upset her. She’s a much happier person since she met Ethan: gave up nursing and got married.

“Hey, Mom,” I call out as she crashes a pan down on the counter with a look of thunder on her face. “Everything okay?”

“Absolutely fine.” She reaches into the cupboard, yanks out a packet of pasta and slams it on the counter. “How were those boys?”

“Much better. In fact, they demolished the cakes.”

She reaches into a drawer and plucks out a sharp-looking knife, brandishing it in her hand like a murder weapon. “Well, that is a relief.”

She slices through the neck of the pasta packet with one vicious swipe.

“Were you just worried about Daxton? Or is anything else bothering you, Mom?” I say, eyeing up the knife with caution.

“What makes you say that? I’m fine, perfectly fine.” She stabs the tip of the knife into the chopping board and dumps the whole packet of pasta into the pan. “Absolutely fine, if you discount the nasty women in this town, spreading horrible – revolting – rumors about my family.”

My mom violently flicks on the gas stove, a flame roaring up into the air, so high it nearly singes off her eyebrows.

The blood plunges from my head and down into my toes. I sway, grabbing hold of the nearest stool.

She knows.

My mom knows.

“What gossip?” I say, my voice trembling.

“Oh, Harper, I don’t want to talk about it. I shouldn’t have said anything. These gossips are just pathetic shriveled up shrews with nothing better to do!”

“This gossip … is it something about … me?”

My mom purses her lips together.

“I’m a big girl now, Mom. I can take it. Please tell me.”

“Harper. I’m not going to dignify–”

“Mom,” I say, my voice coming from far far away. “What are they saying?”

She flicks off the gas and walks around the counter, coming closer to me and lowering her voice, even though there’s no one around to overhear our conversation. She takes my hands in hers.

“They like to make up the silliest stuff. You know last year they started a rumor about Heidi Lowinski. Soon the entire city seemed to believe the poor girl gave every single player on the Rockview’s Ice Hockey team a blow job when they won against the St Lyon’s.”

I shake my head, feeling even more light-headed. I know for a fact that that little rumor happens to be true.

“And they’re making up even more disgusting garbage about you.” She pauses, an apology hovering in her eyes. “And Daxton. And Daxton’s pack.”

My ears ring with noise and my vision swims. Somehow, though, I manage to remain on my feet.

“Me and Daxton?” I murmur, clutching the counter.

“They say you’re sleeping together. That it was Daxton’s pack that saw you through your heat.” Anger crashes over her face again. “Can you believe it?! Brother and sister?! Every time I think they’ve finally gone too far, the gossips of this town outdo themselves. I mean it’s ridiculous.” She lets out a manic laugh.

And I gape at her, caught in indecision, not sure what I should say, what I should tell her.

“I mean, if they really thought you were all delinquent enough to do …” She trails off with disgust curling her lips. “Do they seriously think that Daxton and his pack would lie to the hospital? Would risk losing their jobs? Their careers? Careers they’ve spent one and a half decades training, studying, working for.”

I stare at her, watching as horror races across her face.

“Oh gosh,” she gasps. “I just had a terrible thought. What if the hospital catches wind of these awful rumors?”

I stand there stunned.

“I’m sure the hospital wouldn’t care who Daxton and his pack are sleeping with,” I mumble.

“Their sister?”

“Step-sister.”

“They certainly would,” my mom continues. “And if they thought they’d been faking a serious illness like Harold Virus, they’d be fired on the spot! Honestly, the entire thing is preposterous. People will believe anything! Will make up anything!”

Faked?

Lied?

Fired?

Fuck, I hadn’t considered that. I hadn’t considered it at all.

Nausea swims through my belly. I think I might actually be sick.

Fired?

Daxton said he wouldn’t care what he was doing as long as he was with me. But I never, for one moment, considered he was serious. That he could actually lose his job. That it would come down to that.

Sure, I was prepared for gossip, snide remarks and sly comments, for my mom and Ethan to take a bit of time to adjust. But ending the pack’s careers?

I think of what they’d told me, of how much they love working as doctors, of how much it means to all three of them.

I think of what Wyatt told me about his dad all those years ago. Of wanting to become a doctor so that other families wouldn’t have to lose loved ones like his had.

I think of our little game in the kitchen. Even pretending, messing around, they’d been such good doctors. And that day at the lake!

I tune back into my mom’s rambling.

“Do they seriously think you’d lie to your families? And then there’s you.” Tears fill my mom’s eyes as the anger dissipates. “How could they ruin my daughter’s reputation like that? Although, that’s probably why they’re doing it. To scare off all the packs! Sure up the chances of their own daughters.”

“What’s going on?” a voice says from behind us.

I spin around and find my step-dad standing in the kitchen doorway. He spots the tears racing down my mom’s cheeks and opens his arms.

My mom rushes into his embrace, sobbing into his chest.

“Oh, Ethan,” she begins, and I slip out into the hallway, leaning against the wall and attempting to catch my breath.

I knew there would be consequences. Serious consequences.

I was prepared to face them all to be with the pack.

But I had no idea they would be this bad.

Those men were born to be doctors. I can’t take that away from them. I can’t ask them to do that for me.

My eyes fill with water.

I can’t ruin their lives like that. I can’t take away the thing they love most.

A tear rolls down my cheeks. First one, then another and another and another.

I can’t ruin their lives.

I can’t ruin their lives like I ruined Laurent’s.

He’d stood over me as I packed my bags, screaming at me that he’d given up everything for me, all his dreams, all his opportunities, all for nothing.

And he wasn’t the only one.

I ruined my mom’s life too.

She gave up everything to have me, to keep me. And it cost her dearly – scraping to survive, hungry, miserable, desperate.

There were so many times I lay in my bed and I could hear her sobbing through the thin walls of our apartment.

I can’t do it to the pack. Not if I love them. Not if I love them as much as I do. As I always have. All these years. All these long years, I never stopped loving them.

But, if I love them, I can’t do this to them.

I can’t destroy their lives.

My heart aches so much I can’t breathe.

I screw shut my eyes, sink my nails into my palms.

I was stupid to ever consider this.

Stupid, stupid girl.

I’ve been a fool. A giddy, silly little fool – my senses swamped by mouth-watering scents, jaw-dropping bodies, earth-shattering sex and some sweet talking.

I haven’t been thinking straight. I haven’t grasped the enormity of what this all means.

My heart shatters into a million pieces inside my chest. The pain is so vast I don’t know how I keep breathing.

It doesn’t matter.

It’s time I saw sense.