Moon Child (The Year of the Wolf #2) - Serena Akeroyd Page 0,38
about not being tied to us was enough to aggravate even the lowest rank of wolves. Eli was top dog. Literally and figuratively.
She heaved a sigh, then traipsed over to him, not stopping until she shoved her face into his chest, turning it so that she was cuddling Knight and then sliding her arms around Eli’s waist. A rumble escaped him, one that had her replying with a snarl that was beyond snarky.
If it was clear Eli was beyond mad, it was just as evident that Sabina was not in a touchy-feely mood.
The snarl didn’t have Eli demanding she submit, though. If anything, it settled his temper. I knew why, too. Everyone was frightened of his wolf. Everyone apart from the three of us, and that Sabina wasn’t scared had to be like Eli’s version of foreplay.
I almost smiled when she grunted, “Now is not the time for a hard-on, Eli!”
Her rebuke had me outright snickering. “Yeah, Eli. Time and a place, boy.”
He glowered at me over her head, but I just grinned at him, unafraid and not scared to show it either.
“What does it mean when she smites you?” Sabina mumbled against Eli’s chest, her tone sulky now.
“She doesn’t smite people, she smites the pack. So, a wind might stir that causes a lot of the trees to break, which cuts down our running area until we can clear it. Or she might cause a nasty storm,” Ethan clarified, wandering over to her as I did and resting a hand on her back, while I kept one on her hip. He pressed a kiss to Knight’s head and murmured, “We’d just prefer not to deal with the aftermath of that.”
Eli grunted. “No, now is definitely not a good time for dealing with that kind of shit.”
She tipped her head back. “As bad as all that?” I wasn’t sure if she was impressed or not, but it figured that Eli’s unease would catch her attention.
He was rarely uneasy about anything, usually took most things in his stride, so for him to be wary said a lot about the last time the Mother’s shit had hit the fan.
“I was only a kid when it happened before, and looking back, I know why too,” he said with a wince.
She tensed. “When Merinda met her second mate?”
He rubbed his chin against her hair as he tucked her face into his throat. “I have a feeling it was more to do with my father… Well, with what he did to her second mate. The Mother wasn’t pleased with that, and we had one of the worst storms we’d had in decades. Twenty days and twenty nights of rain.”
“Well, if that isn’t biblical, I don’t know what is,” I said lightly, even though, deep down, it gutted me to think that my father might have been murdered by the man I’d called alpha.
“You don’t know Paul killed him,” Sabina said, trying to soothe, and I saw how the tables had turned now.
“I don’t know for certain, but I think it’s likely.” He soothed himself by rubbing his chin over her hair. “The clearing, after the wolf attack, scented of father. I know it sounds crazy, but I think that’s why Austin had the chance to take him down, because the Mother thought it was only right to test him, see if he’d changed, and when he hadn’t, when he still went for one of the twins, Austin had the right to seek vengeance.”
“You’re putting words in the Mother’s mouth,” she argued, then snapped, “And Austin, don’t you dare make a joke about that right now. This is serious. While I know you make jokes to cover up serious moments, this isn’t the time to do it.”
Because I agreed, for once, I didn’t rebuke her, just stroked her hip, telling her I was in agreement.
“Sabina’s right,” Ethan agreed woodenly. “We don’t know what happened.”
“We know Merinda lived,” Eli rasped. “If your father is dead, then she should have perished soon after, that has to mean that the claiming never happened. Not at the totem. It wasn’t sanctioned by the Mother.”
“And yet, we were born,” I tacked on, uneasily.
“There’s no pregnancy between mates without a claiming?” Sabina queried.
I shook my head. “Not usually, anyway.”
Ethan blew out a breath. “None of this matters.”
“Yes, it does!” Eli stormed. “I don’t know what the hell is going on here. I thought my mother stayed with him because he’d just sent your father off. Shipped him away. If he killed him,