Waindale
thirty-one. when i wake alone

Adam carries my bag inside and up the stairs. I follow as we pass many doors which I know lead to bedrooms, but unlike last time, one door is open that has always been closed. Unaware, I glance inside as we pass, but the contents of the room bring me to a stop. Adam soon realizes that I’m not with him, and he turns.

My hand pushes the door further open. It’s a boy’s room—that’s clear. Not a little boy, but what I would assume to be a teenage boy’s room. “What is this?” I ask Adam.

“That was my brother’s room,” he says.

My hand springs from the door as if it has suddenly become searing hot. “Oh, sorry,” I mutter and quickly bring the door to its previous position.

We enter the master bedroom and he places my bag down for me to unload. “My parents kept his room,” Adam says. “I couldn’t take it down either.”

“Of course,” I say.

“I never told you what happened to him. How he died.”

“Adam, you don’t have to,” I assure him.

He worries me when he says, “I think you deserve to know. Now that you’re living here part of the time; now that things between us have settled.”

I come over to him and place my hand on his arm. “What do you mean?”

“In an Alpha’s family, if there are two sons, the eldest son takes the position of Alpha after the father. It isn’t common nowadays, but the younger could challenge the older for the title to prove to be the better choice. My brother did this.”

“He challenged you? What did you have to do?” I ask.

“You fight in shifted form. It isn’t supposed to be messy. It’s a clean fight, and usually the weaker gives up before it goes too far. I shouldn’t have agreed to do it—he was different that day. I would have never agreed to it if I knew how he would be.”

I swallow.

“He was unstable, dangerous, messy—I tried to end it many times but he wasn’t giving in. He died because I killed him,” Adam says, his eyes aimed directly into my own.

My hand falls from his arm. “Adam I—”

“I would have never done it if I knew he was going to die. But toward the end, I knew that he wasn’t going to stop until one of us did.”

My stomach is uneasy. The thought of Adam killing his own brother clouds my head. I don’t know what to think, but I sit down on the edge of the bed just in case I start to stumble.

Adam comes down to my level. “I don’t want you to fear me, Wrenley, but I feel like I have been keeping this from you. It isn’t possible for me to rectify or forgive what I did—I regret it every day of my life—but it is a part of me that I have been avoiding since I met you. I don’t want to feel as if I am hiding things from you, not anymore.”

“It wasn’t an accident?” I mumble.

Adam lets out a heavy breath. “I don’t think it was. Not at the time.” He takes my hand in between his own. “Wrenley, I would never do anything to hurt you—shifted or as man. You know that, don’t you?”

I abruptly stand up. “You had to tell me this? Why?”

My hand leaves his grasp. What would my family think? I convinced them that staying with Adam is a good idea, but they don’t know what he’s done. My mother would have never given me her blessing if this came up. There’s more to them than I thought; there are dark practices and deadly matches. How could Adam fight his own brother and end up taking his life? What does it take to kill one’s own brother?

“I told you; I don’t want any secrets between us. I want you to know who I am—the good and bad,” he says.

“Is that who you are, Adam?”

His gaze falls to the floor. “I did it, didn’t I? It’s not something I can forget—not something I can make excuses for.”

I cross my arms and notice my drifting steps. Adam doesn’t reach out to me; he lets me wander and take my time.

“It wasn’t like him to challenge me. He had no interest in being Alpha before, but I assume he was keeping it from all of us. My family doesn’t talk about it. We haven’t said his name in two years, but his room sits there like some sort of shrine. I tried to put it all away earlier, but I couldn’t. If I did, it would be like I’ve moved on and forgiven myself.”

His eyes are no longer on me. He stares at the wall but I know his mind is elsewhere, imagining sad things that shouldn’t be wished upon anybody. It frightens me knowing that Adam did such a thing. Yet, I don’t feel like there is enough room for me to judge him for what he did—he’s taken up all the space himself. Maybe I’m moving on easily because I never knew his brother, because I didn’t lose a son or sibling or friend. Maybe it’s because our bond brings me to quick resolutions. Whatever it is, it draws me closer to him. Adam stands and finally looks to me again.

“I want to know you,” I say softly. “The good and the bad.”

Ben stops by with Alpha business. I leave them alone in the office while I finish putting away my things; Adam cleared space for me, which warms my heart. The break gives me time to think without his presence influencing me, but I fail to come to any new conclusions. I don’t see him until dinner is ready—thankfully Yuke had been busy cooking so we didn’t have to worry about it ourselves—and I ask Ben to join us. He agrees after I ask two more times. There is so much food that we could no doubt feed three more people on top of us, but the two impress me when they manage to finish the feast off on their own. I wonder where all the food goes.

Ben answers with, “What can I say? We’re animals,” when I ask them how they did it.

As I ate, I thought about mom and grandma and how they must be eating dinner right about now. I wonder what they talk about when I’m not there. I wonder if they’re discussing my situation with Adam—whether or not they’ve both grasped the concept of the supernatural and how it’s swallowed me whole. What happened to the Wrenley that stayed in on Friday nights watching bad TV on the couch with a pint of ice cream? The Wrenley that spent lunches in the library or under a tree with a good book?

Ben leaves and the rest of the night is promised to me. Adam takes a quick shower so I put on my pajamas and wander downstairs for a glass of water. The house is big and empty and quiet. The sounds of my footsteps are loud against the wood floors as I trace my previous steps to the kitchen. It’s like being in a haunted mansion except the ghosts are replaced with werewolves. My eyes shift from the dark hallways to the black windows in anticipation. At any moment a rogue or evil mother-in-law will jump out and send me running for the bedroom like a child for their mother. I don’t like being down here alone at night. Because of last time’s events, I can’t help but suspect danger around every corner.

Hopefully over time I’ll grow more and more comfortable. The rogue must have stayed far away as there’s been no trouble since then—at least that I know of. Adam makes me feel safe. I know he’ll protect me, but there are so many things out of his control. It’s hard to imagine being in this house without him.

I fill a glass with water and it immediately turns ice cold against my fingers. Footsteps descend the stairs and near me as I drink. I place the glass down on the counter and turn to the kitchen entrance just as Adam appears.

“I came down for water,” I say, feeling as if I need an explanation for my being anywhere in this house.

Adam nods and comes over. “You aren’t cold?”

I peer down at my camisole and sleeping shorts, both seeming unusual for December. “Oh, you’re always so warm. I don’t really need to layer up when we sleep next to each other.”

“Right,” he says.

“Is something wrong?”

“Wrenley, what I told you earlier—I can’t help but worry that your opinion of me has changed. With the truth comes consequences, and I’m willing to face them, but—”

My lips part and without thinking I say, “Don’t worry. It was a little unexpected, sure, but I don’t really know what to think about all of it. I’m still here, though, right? I didn’t grab my bag and run for the hills.”

Adam sighs. He leans against the counter, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Come on, let’s go upstairs and not think about any of that.”

My hands gently run along his crossed arms, unfolding them all to guide him out of the kitchen. I lead the way up the steps this time. If I don’t show Adam that I’m unbothered, then I’m afraid he’ll never stop wondering whether I fear him or not. I don’t think Adam should worry about such things. I think I should be the one worrying; why has this sudden information not changed my view of him, not even a smidge? Do I blame it on our bond and move on? Surely I shouldn’t try and force myself to change my opinion to something closer to that of a normal human response. What about this situation is human? Considering his confession from a shifters point of view may serve me best. Although, I’d have to ask if death is common to them. I hope it isn’t.

In the bedroom, I climb onto the bed and lay on top of the comforter. My eyes follow Adam as he turns off the bathroom light and then the main light above me. We’re left in the dim warmth of the matching, elegant lamps sat on either side of the bed. I secure a pillow against my torso and hold it there tightly.

“I’ve never seen so much of you,” Adam says casually as he settles down.

“So much of me?”

He glances over. “So much skin.”

My arms grasping the pillow restrict further like a snake suffocating its prey. “I can put on a sweatshirt if I’m making you uncomfortable,” I say sarcastically.

As expected, he ignores me.

“I also have pants.”

Adam brings his arms up and rests his head in the palms of his hands. “Why cover up? If I remember correctly, you like to see me struggle.”

My face immediately flushes. I push off the bed and sit myself up. “I knew I should have never told you anything.”

Instead of speaking, Adam’s face lights up as if he forgot something. He then takes off his shirt and tosses it to the ground before returning to his lounged position.

“Give it a rest,” I groan and throw my pillow down at his bareness. Facing the other way, I get under the blankets and scoot over until I’m nearly falling off the edge of the bed. My body curls up as if I’m activating a defense mode against my own over-sharing.

He pats my arm and I ball up more.

When his hand works it’s way past my armor and turns me back to face him, I say, “I knew you would use it against me.”

“I know, I know, forgive me.”

The lightness in his tone makes me roll my eyes. I know that on the surface, this is all fun and games, but there is a genuine truth to my words. There’s a fear tucked deep inside of me—a fear of intimacy, of exposure. I put on a camisole and shorts because it gets too hot in long pajamas with him, yes, but I’m also dipping a toe in the water.

I reach over and turn off the lamp on my side of the bed. He’s watching me, and when I look back at him, our eyes meet. I raise my brows. “Well? You know how I like it.”

Adam smiles to himself, lays his head on his pillow, and outstretches his arm for me. I lay against him and nestle my head on his chest and in the crook of his arm. My knee rests on top of his leg and my arm drapes over him. While anchored down by my body, he stretches out to the lamp and turns it off, drenching the room in darkness.

My chronic worries come true when I wake after a few hours of sleep. I mindlessly yank at the blanket to warm up due to the chill that’s overcome me. My mind turns on then and I lift up only to replace Adam’s place empty. The bathroom is dark but there’s a light on somewhere in the house that just kisses the open doorway to the bedroom. Despite this, there’s an absence in my gut—the feeling I get when Adam isn’t with me. Quickly, I slide off the bed and wrap myself in a throw blanket. I wander into the hall, searching for the light like a moth even though, deep down, I know he isn’t here.

The light is coming from the foyer, concluding my fear that Adam has gone into the night as he did before. A sudden pang jolts me as if someone had jabbed me with a taser. My hand grips my side. I lift up my shirt yet replace no mark. The unease and discomfort linger, and I know that something bad has happened.