that you're out of trouble. The only reason I haven't grounded you is because Ashley said that Ian beat me to it."
She sighed. "Yeah, he's making me take wolf lessons. Like all the time."
"Good, and you should be thankful that's all that's happened so far. I seriously thought about pulling you from that play."
"Mom," she groaned, but then Gabby paused. "Ok. Maybe a compromise? Like, I can see him if one of our parents are home and we stay in the house? Please, Mom?"
I let out a heavy sigh. "No, not yet. I need to get used to this, ok?" And I had a funny feeling Kim would be even more restrictive than I was, but I still wasn't ready.
"Ok," she breathed. "But can we at least stay in Wolf's Run? I don't want to move again."
"Ian already talked to me about staying," I admitted, hoping this was a little safer ground.
"And staying with him?" she asked. "Because I'm pretty sure that's why he was standing so close when I came home. C'mon, Mom, he's into you. You're into him. Put your morals aside long enough to tell him you're sorry and let him make it right. Isn't that what you always told me about marriage? That it takes work? Well... Work!"
"Why do you care?" I asked her. "You're in the pack. We're staying here. It won't change anything for you."
She leaned her head back and faked a scream of frustration, proving she was a far cry from an adult. "Because you actually like them! Because it doesn't matter if you have this disease too. All the cool kids are doing it. I dunno, Mom, maybe because I think you're all caught up in them not telling you before you spent the weekend being all kinky, thinking I wouldn't know, and now you're freaked out because I do?"
She wasn't wrong. She also missed the biggest part of all. "Because Ian decided to make me his mate without asking if I was ok with it?"
"So?" she asked. "Oh no, he wanted everyone to know he liked you. See, that's kinda all it is. And it's like their way of telling the rest of the pack that they're totally whipped. Doesn't mean anything else for you."
I honestly hadn't expected her to say almost exactly what Ian had just told me. Somehow that made me believe it a bit more. It also made it hurt a lot less.
"Really?" I asked, almost expecting her to say it was a joke.
Instead, she nodded. "Really. That's why there's no asking part, because there's nothing to ask. You can't make him not like you. You can't make him not be willing to roll over when you scream at him. You really don't get a say in him feeling something for you. All you can do is make him miserable because it's one-sided, and he really doesn't deserve it. Never mind the other four!"
And once again, she'd backed me right up into the corner filled with things I really didn't want to talk to my daughter about. The problem was that I expected her to talk to me when the situation was reversed, and so far she was the best listener I had. Man, this had to be some record-breaking failure for a mother.
Still, I might as well just put it all out there. "So how do I even have a relationship with them, Gabby? You seem to have all the answers, and this is where I'm stuck. They have a disease. I don't. Grownups have sex, and that's how it's transmitted."
"I love you, Mom," she said, the words sounding almost spontaneous. "I mean, you are now, officially, the coolest mom ever. Olivia said you wouldn't admit it."
I groaned, dropping my head to thump it on the counter a few times. "Olivia's such a bad influence - and such a good kid."
"I know, kinda like me. Look, here's how I see it. If you get lycanthropy, that's cool as hell. If you don't, I'll still love you. If you get it and do like Roman's dad, pretending to be human and never shifting? Then what's the big deal? But, see, that's the thing. You could get it from me. I mean, tell me that if I cut myself, you're going to put on gloves first?"
"Probably not," I admitted.
"And condoms work," she fake-whispered. "Trust me, the guys already made sure I understood that no matter what, never ever am I allowed to do things with any human man, not