The Shadows in the Hills: Triple Threat

Chapter Seventeen

I slept in longer than usual the next morning. After months of sleeping in the undergrowth, a bed was a welcome relief. It had been a late night. It was the early hours of the morning before we got to the hotel. We had to travel even further because of the time, needing to find one that was open all night. The second I woke up, the need to check in on her arose, but I resisted it. I knew she needed space, and I was intent on giving it to her, even if it hurt.

Having a hotel made life easier in so many ways. I got straight to work. I had barely done more than make decisions in months. Gerald was taking care of pretty much everything, but it was about time for me to check in on the pack's investments. I was grateful to my father. Despite his failures, his decision to invest in the human world was a sound one. There might have been a time when the pack could survive without funds, but those days were over. It didn't take much to run the pack, and we had accumulated quite the excess.

I could see from the bank account that Tyler had already used the card I gave him, but it was much less than I had expected. I couldn't understand how he could have possibly gotten everything they needed for only a few hundred pounds. Marcus was milling around, but stayed out of my way. There was only one room left when we arrived at the hotel, so we had been forced to share one. Despite myself, I was starting to actually like the prick.

As soon as I had finished organising business, I closed the laptop and just sat there. Staring at the clock as time clicked on. I felt like some sort of teenage girl waiting for the boy of the moment to get in touch. It was torture. It was also ridiculous because I could have been waiting for days. She could never have gotten in touch. Although, I doubted that. I knew Esme. Even if she never wanted to see me again, she would at least tell me that much. She didn't have to tell me she was pregnant, but she did. It was just who she was.

"Are you going to sit there all day pining for her?"

"Maybe."

"Come on, don't be stupid."

"There aren't many people who would speak to me like that." The truth was, I could only think of one other person who would be quite so unvarnished in their approach, Esme. Maybe there was more the pair had in common than I had considered. I wanted to tell him he was wrong, but he wasn't. Sitting around waiting wasn't doing me any good at all. "Fine. What do you suggest we do?"

"I have no idea, but anything is better than being forced to watch this pitiful display."

"Fine, let's talk. There's some stuff we need to put to bed. Why did you kill my dad?" He took a step back. It wasn't a conversation either of us wanted to have, but we did need to. I had avoided even thinking about it because I needed him, but that was over. He was lucky to have lived as long as he had after what he did.

"That's not what you really want to ask. I'm not sure you even care about the answer. So ask me what you really want to know."

"My mother, why?" It was as much as I could put into words. Even that felt impossible to say. The words just refused to come out of my mouth. He wasn't wrong. My dad I understood. He gave him the chance to surrender and my dad chose not to. Killing him wasn't the same as killing a defenseless woman.

"I didn't do it. I took your father's life, but I never even met your mother. There were more important details to deal with at the time. Sorry, I didn't mean it like that. I followed my brother when he fled with Esme. He went into the woods and came out without her, so I left a couple of my men lurking around for when he came back. The plan was to get back to Mary and finish her off, but he got there first. When he and Mary went into the woods again, I lost track of them. I headed back home to gather reinforcements. I was living in Poland at the time and it wasn't the sort of place that I could just pop back from."

He looked genuinely remorseful while having to go over it. "When I sensed Esme, I sent my men to investigate. They were on strict instructions not to harm my family. It never occurred to me that she would be with anyone else. When I found out what had happened, I dealt with the vamp involved, but the damage was done. I don't make a habit of killing people for the sake of killing people. Jones said that he had no choice. He tried to get Esme away from your mother, but she wouldn't stop fighting. According to him, she attacked him and she died in the process of him defending himself. I have my own doubts about what happened, but I do believe that your mother refused to back down."

"She cared for Esme a great deal. My dad always said she believed that the Goddess had given her Esme to protect. That there was something important that she was destined for. Something more important than her own life. I still can't forgive you for your role in that."

"I don't expect you to. We aren't actually too different from one another. My brother ran off with the love of my life, too. You find it hard enough knowing that Jackson is there with her, but my brother wasn't just there. When I found out that he had inserted himself inside of her via Esme, I wanted to rip her apart and wipe out that link between them. I've spent my whole life trying to wipe out that link between them, but I was wrong."

"About which bit?"

"It's unimportant. The only thing that matters is that I realise how wrong I was and I wish I could go back. I would change so much. I've never been the sort of person to kill people for the sake of it. I never had a cause. That was all my i***t brother. I just used it as a reason to extract my revenge and break the link." He was obviously keeping something back, and I had no idea what it was. Only time would tell.