And all he could think about was how much he didn’t want to be there.
Not to mention how much he didn’t want to go through with his arranged marriage.
He checked his watch, seeing it was a little after eight. The camp was beginning to come alive, a few of the other members of the pack leaving their cabins and taking in the fresh morning air. Some of them greeted Jason as he passed, Jason giving back slight waves as he made his way to his family cabin. He had his own place but stopping home to see the family, to let them know he was back in town, seemed like the right thing to do.
When he reached the front door, he paused, not wanting to go inside, not wanting to see his family. To Jason, the pack, the family, and everything else meant nothing more to him than responsibility. And the last thing he wanted was to be tied down.
No sense in putting it off, he thought.
But before he opened the door, he glanced off in the direction he’d come.
I could just go back to the station, take the bus right back to Seattle. Sure, I’d be walking out on my marriage, but they’d probably get over it. Right?
He smiled at the thought. Seattle had everything he could possibly want—parties, girls, fun. And “fun” to Jason mostly meant girls. He loved how easily he swept up human women, how they all seemed to be irresistibly drawn to his animal magnetism as if they could all sense how dangerous he was without him even needing to shift.
With another sigh, he put all of that out of his head. He knocked on the door, letting everyone inside know he was there, then he stepped in.
“I’m ho-ome!” he said as if he were on some fifties sitcom.
But no one was there. He stood in the entrance to his family home, letting his suitcase drop out of his hand and onto the floor.
“Hello? Long-lost favorite son here,” he said. “Back from the big city with all sorts of stories of action, excitement, and adventure.”
He knew he was only talking shit—his time in the city had been to work, to be a part of one of the pack businesses that some of the other members of the Thundertooth bears had established to bring money into the tribe. It’d been mostly business, but he’d made more than a little bit of time for fun.
And more importantly, it’d given him a taste for the world outside of the pack grounds.
All he wanted was to see more.
“In here!” His dad’s familiar bellow came from the other room.
“Uh, wasn’t exactly expecting a welcome home party, but...”
He stepped through the familiar living room, decorated in non-descript furniture and tacky wall art. It was drab and simple, reminding him of the life he wanted to leave behind.
Sure enough, his family was in the kitchen. It was his father Jared, his mother Amy, and his older brother, Eric. They were all eating breakfast—steak and eggs—his father reading the paper, his mother playing on her phone, and his brother flipping through his iPad. Not one of them looked up at him as he entered.
“Uh, hey family!” he said, adding some forced enthusiasm to his voice. “Great to see you all, too!”
“Sit down,” his father said, folding the paper in half and setting it down on the table.
“Aw, come on, Pops—not even a hug?”
Jared was tall and built like a refrigerator, with small dark eyes and a shaved head. He wore his usual flannel shirt and baggy jeans. Amy was petite and slender and pretty, a former omega who’d been paired with Jared back when they were both barely into adulthood—far younger than Jason’s twenty-four. And Eric was dressed in gym shorts and an oversized shirt, his bulging muscles sleeveless.
“Welcome back,” said Jared, as if getting it out of the way. “Now, sit down.”
Jason dropped into the open chair, Eric giving him a shit-eating grin.
“What’s so funny?” asked Jason.
“Your face,” said Eric.
“Wow, good one,” said Jason. “You know, just because you’re eighteen doesn’t mean you have to act like a total teenage shithead cliché.”
“Whatever,” said Eric, letting out a snort as he spoke.
Eric could drive Jason crazy, but he’d always loved his little brother and looked out for him whenever he could. With his mother more concerned about their social standing than raising the family, and his father never seeming interested in parenthood, it often came down to Jason