Wolf's Call (Wolves Next Door #2) - Auryn Hadley Page 0,159

there was no point pushing, because it wouldn't make a difference right now, and we had bigger issues.

Then Kim handed Elena a cup of coffee. "He's adamant that he's both her mate and her beta. When pressed, he always reverts to the language of a beta, though. The problem is that he doesn't see her as a sibling or merely a friend."

"Thank you," Elena whispered as she accepted the cup. "So, could this be something Gabby's doing? Because she doesn't understand, or wasn't raised with the same rules all of you take for granted? Or maybe because she met him before she turned?"

Actually, she had a point. A good one. "I don't know," I admitted. "I'm just not sure how Roman wants me to treat him. There are certain considerations for mates that betas don't get. Then again, there are certain privileges that betas have that a mate will never understand."

"As a beta," Roman told me. "Sir - "

"Ian," I corrected.

He nodded, more nervous than I'd ever seen him before. "I love her, and Dad says I'm too young to know what that really means, but I do. And I'm still her beta - but that's not how it's supposed to work, so I don't know. I just know that Gabby is my alpha. Olivia is like my sister. That's why I had to protect them. Olivia pushed in front of Gabby, and Gabby was trying to shield Sam, and - "

"Sam?" Kim asked. "Why is this the first time I'm hearing about that?"

"He told Elena," I assured her. "Samantha is one of Gabby's human friends. Evidently, she saw Roman shift, but she didn't say anything."

Kim dropped her head and gaped at me. "Are you so sure, Ian? Someone said something."

"The video," Elena said, "isn't from the school security. That means whoever leaked it had to be there. The bigger question is what we're going to do about this. Roman, what happened?"

"Mason was in the biology room," he said. "No, let me start over. See, it was in the break between classes. Gabby, Olivia, and I had just gotten to biology. Sam was already there, and we always sit together. There were like three other kids, but when we heard the first shot, they ran out of the room. Sam wanted to follow, but Gabby said we needed to hide."

Elena was nodding. "Because her last school did regular drills."

"Yeah," Roman mumbled. "Well, the shots kept going, and Gabby left her phone out there, but she said we needed to call our parents. Olivia knew that if we got the alpha, then he'd tell all of them, so she called Ian. And then we heard Mason come into our class. He knew where we were, and he was saying something about coming, talking like he was calling a dog, right? And then Xander yelled. I mean, I knew his voice. The gun went off, so I started stripping. Sam gasped, Olivia shoved a hand over her mouth, and then I heard the gun go off again. So, I shifted to a lycan, and I was going to stop him from killing Xander."

"Which is exactly right," I assured him. "Pack always comes first. If we get exposed, then that's what happens. I'm not mad at you."

Roman sighed, clearly relieved to hear that. "Well, Mason stopped trying to shoot Xander and tried to shoot me. He missed, though, but I roared, and he ran. I went after him, thinking I could chase him out of the building. You know, away from where everyone else was, but then I remembered the cameras, so I changed to a wolf, and that's what's on the video."

I looked at Kim and David. "Lane and I showed up just as Roman got him outside. Lane told him to back up, and Roman went back into the school. We subdued the boy, and then the cops took - " A banging on the front door interrupted me, so I finished with, "Over."

"It's me!" Gabby yelled from the other side. "Mom, don't let Ian hurt him!"

Kim went to let her in. I just dropped my head and grabbed Elena's hand. "I don't know why they're so sure I'm going to be upset about this," I told her.

"Because you kept them apart when he bit her," she explained. "To a teenager, that's basically torture. Hormones, remember."

I chuckled, aware that she was just so wonderfully calm under all of this pressure. Elena had a way of making everything around her seem planned,