of here?”
She glanced at Brandon, who eagerly nodded.
“Definitely,” she said.
Chapter 3
After what the kid had gone through that morning, Diego expected Brandon to be quiet during the drive across town to the SWAT compound. Instead, he talked from the time they’d left the parking garage until Diego pulled Bree’s SUV into the visitor parking lot across the street from the fenced-in facility. Brandon had asked a few general questions about being a werewolf, like if they turned every time there was a full moon—Hollywood was doing the werewolf community no favors with that crap—but mostly it had been a nonstop monologue on everything he’d experienced over the past month and a half since going through his change.
Brandon also admitted how scared he’d been during the hostage situation that his claws and fangs would come out and someone at the diner would see them. In his teenage mind, being called a freak would be the worst thing ever.
But as frightened as Brandon had been for himself, he’d been more concerned for Bree. The thought of the crowd turning on her for being the mother of a monster had terrified him. The words had brought tears to Bree’s eyes and done a number on Diego as well. The thought of someone going after either of them made his inner wolf’s fangs and claws come out.
He led Bree and Brandon through the gates of the compound and headed for the admin building, where the commander of the SWAT team and the alpha of their pack of alphas, Gage Dixon, was waiting for them. If anyone could help a werewolf still going through puberty, it’d be Gage. The man was a Jedi master when it came to dealing with bizarre crap like this.
They were barely halfway across the compound when Brandon paused, instinctively turning into the breeze, his nose twitching as he took in the many scents around him. Diego almost laughed both at the intense expression on the kid’s face and the baffled one on Bree’s.
“What’s that I’m smelling?” Brandon asked, turning his nose this way and that curiously. “I smelled it earlier at the diner, but it’s a lot stronger here.”
Diego grinned when he caught Bree sniffing the air, trying to figure out what her son was smelling when he knew for a fact she couldn’t smell anything.
“You’re smelling the other werewolves in the compound,” Diego told him. “There were only five of us at the diner this morning. This place serves as a second home for the eighteen alpha werewolves in my SWAT pack. Not to mention the other werewolves that frequently hang out here. It’s not surprising you’re picking up the scent even if you didn’t have a clue what you were smelling yet.”
“Alpha werewolves?” Brandon considered that. “Does that mean there are other kinds of werewolves? Am I an alpha, too?”
“Wait a minute,” Bree said, holding up her hand. “Did you actually use the word ‘pack’ to describe you and the other members of the SWAT team? As in a pack of wolves? Is that how you see yourselves?”
“Will I be able to join your pack?” Brandon jumped in before Diego could answer, practically bouncing up and down in excitement. “Can I be on the SWAT team, too?”
Bree threw Diego a look of utter panic, her dark eyes silently begging him to say something to stop her kid from starting down this path. Diego opened his mouth to say something wise and insightful only to close it again when he realized he had absolutely no idea how to start. He considered himself above average when it came to giving advice, but right then, with Brandon desperately wanting answers to all his questions, he simply didn’t know what to say.
Hopefully, Gage would.
“Let’s put a hold on the really complicated questions until we get inside,” Diego finally said, glancing over his shoulder to catch Bree’s eye and give her a little nod of understanding. “There’s someone I want you to meet who will be able to explain all of this to you better than I ever could.”
Brandon looked like he didn’t want to wait that long but nodded anyway.
When they got to the admin building, Diego held open the door for them. His gaze automatically locked on Bree’s butt as she moved ahead of him. After the day she’d had, he felt bad about looking at her that way, but his inner wolf seemed to have a mind of its own and simply wouldn’t be denied. And yeah, his inner wolf