Brothersong (Green Creek #4) - T.J. Klune Page 0,94
she said. “And you’re unsure. It’s blue. But I see the green in you. You know us. You know this place, don’t you.” It wasn’t a question.
He took a step toward her.
She said, “Can I tell you a secret?”
He cocked his head.
She said, “I knew your mother, brief though the moment was. I have this… gift. Ever since I could remember. It doesn’t always work, but when it does, I know what I’m witnessing. Certain people shine. Brightly, as if their innate goodness was a palpable thing. Her name was Wendy. Wendy Walsh. And she shone. It was happenstance, this meeting, the passing of ships in the night. She didn’t know who I was, but I knew her. She was lovely. An innocent in all of this. She didn’t know what we did. She didn’t know what your father truly was. She only saw what he allowed her to see, as was his way.”
Gavin growled.
Mom nodded. “She was his tether. Was it fair of him to put that burden upon her? It would be hypocritical of me to say one way or another.”
Joe leaned his head against Ox’s shoulder.
“But I know this,” Mom continued. “She shone brightly. And I wondered then, as I do now, what things would have been like if only we’d done right by her. If Abel Bennett had brought her into the fold instead of sending her away. We are wolves, yes. We can do many things that others cannot. But we can still make mistakes. Awful, terrible mistakes. We should have seen what was coming. We should have known how deep the darkness ran within our own pack. We didn’t, and she suffered because of it. Her hand was forced in a way it never should have been. And you… you were never given a chance to know you had a family. A brother.”
Gordo looked away, Mark whispering in his ear.
“I’ll ask for your forgiveness,” my mother said. “But I won’t demand it. It’s not conditional of you being here. You’ll always have a choice of whom to trust. But if you allow it, I would like to earn it. I know it’ll take time, and time may be something we don’t have. But you are not a thing to be discarded. You are flesh and blood. You are important. And not just because of my son or my witch. You are important to me, to this pack, because you have proven yourself beyond measure. We have lost much. We have suffered.” Her voice cracked, but she pushed on. “But we stand tall, because we are the Bennett pack.”
Gavin bowed his head.
She reached out slowly. He didn’t pull away as she pressed her hand on the underside of his jaw, lifting his head. She looked so small compared to him, but she was unafraid. “Regardless of what relationships you forge with the pack, what decisions you make about the future you see for yourself, you will always have a place here. I have missed you. I know the wolf before me, and if you’ll let me, I’d like to know the man.”
He stepped away from her. He looked above her at the rest of us. No one spoke.
He looked to me.
I nodded.
He walked back behind the truck. The hair along his back began to recede as muscle and bone shifted. He gasped quietly. Gordo stepped forward. He went around to the passenger side of the truck and gathered up the clothes Gavin had discarded. He walked to the back, muttering to his brother that it was too cold to be naked. Gavin grunted, and Gordo sighed.
When Gavin reappeared, he was wearing jeans and a coat, though he’d forgone the shirt and shoes. He looked skittish as he stepped out from behind the truck, hands clenched in fists at his sides.
“He’s like a hotter version of Gordo,” Bambi muttered.
Jessie snorted into her hand as Rico glared at the both of them.
But Gavin only had eyes for my mother.
She stood slowly. “Gavin,” she said.
He nodded, head jerking up and down, eyes darting side to side. I wanted to go to him, to tell him it would be all right, but I was rooted in place.
“I like your face,” Mom told him. “It’s a good face.”
He grimaced, hair hanging down. He reached up and brushed it back. And then he said, “Music.”
“Music?”
He nodded again. “You. In the kitchen. Or… painting. You play music. You sing.”