Crystal Lake Pack: The Complete Series: A Reverse Harem Shifter Romance

by Candace Wondrak

  Still. I could not get over the fact that my mom was here, raising her voice to Henry and saying some things she’d told me would send me straight to hell if I ever tried to say them.

  “Mom?” I asked, stopping ten feet away. Sarah and Henry were so caught up in their argument neither of them had turned to meet me, to greet me, to even acknowledge my presence. When Sarah unleashed a string of curse words that burned everyone’s ears, I said again, “Mom?”

  Sarah whirled on me, her eyes fuming. Not once in my whole life had I ever witnessed my mom so angry, even after being expelled by my college for attacking that professor. She’d been surprisingly calm about that particular incident.

  “What are you—” I didn’t have the chance to say anything more, because my mom stormed to my side, grabbed my arm, and started hauling me to the sedan parked on the side of the road in front of the house. Like I was a petulant child throwing a tantrum in a store.

  But I’d done nothing wrong.

  My mom had an iron grip around my upper arm, lugging me to the front seat. With her free arm, she yanked open the door and tried to stuff me in.

  “Mom, stop!” I shouted, finally breaking through the cloud of anger that hovered around my mom’s head, blocking everything else out. “You can’t just take me back.” I didn’t want to pull the I’m an adult and can make my own decisions card, but if I had to, I would.

  Her hazel stare narrowed at me. Today her blonde hair was pulled back in a tie-dye bandana, some of it braided and other sections of it free. She wore a shirt with a sun and moon on it, and pants that looked like they were taken straight out of a missing-the-nineties meme. I wouldn’t go so far as to say Sarah’s style embarrassed me, but. Well. The writing was on the wall.

  And it was Dylan’s and Landon’s first time meeting her, too. Somehow that fact made everything just a bit worse.

  “Oh, you think I can’t?” Sarah practically growled, sounding very much like the shifter she was, beneath all the hocus pocus. “You’re damn wrong there, Addie. I won’t let you stay when your life is at stake!”

  What was she talking about? “Mom, what are you doing here?” I asked, rubbing my arm as I stepped away. Darn, my mom had a good, firm grip. “And how do you…” Oops.

  “How do I know my daughter is caught in the middle of some psychotic war against the shifters? Because Maze called and told me! I can’t believe you’d try to keep something like this from me—ignoring your mother,” Sarah hissed. “I’m so angry I could—”

  As Henry muttered something behind her, I shook my head. “Maze called you?”

  Sarah nodded once, her mouth forming a thin line. “As he should’ve. He was right to, since apparently you’re not answering your phone anymore.” Her platform-wearing feet tapped the sidewalk angrily.

  “It’s in my room, which I haven’t been back to in a while,” I tried to explain, knowing it would never be enough. It never was, with Sarah.

  “This isn’t your fight,” my mom said.

  “Yes, it is. The shifters can’t fight this guy, but I can—with the magical side of me you’ve also kept a secret!” I wasn’t a fan of shouting at Sarah, but at this point, my patience wore thin and I needed to let it out. “Are there any other family secrets I should know, Mom? Anything else you’ve hidden from me that I have a right to know?”

  The look on Sarah’s face instantly changed. Instead of righteous anger, it was red-handed guilt, but even that didn’t last long because behind us, Henry quipped, “Finally, Sarah, your lies are catching up to you. I’ve waited nearly twenty years for this day.”

  Both Sarah and I whirled on him, saying in unison, “Shut up, Henry.” And then my mom and I met eyes, laughs bubbling up our throats. Neither of us liked Henry much, clearly.

  Who in their right mind would like a man like him, anyway?

  “Maybe,” Sarah spoke, “you should invite me inside. I think we have a lot to talk about.” Her eyes shot toward Dylan, who stood behind me, still holding onto his book as if it would protect him from the wrath that was my mom. She then looked at Landon on the porch, at his handsome but scowling face.

  I was going to smack him. He couldn’t act pleasant, even when my mom was around? Talk about rude.

  I knew what those looks to the guys were, too. I knew what my mom thought. She would happen to be correct in this case, but I was not going to say it. If anyone was going to explain things, it was Sarah, then, if I felt it was an adequate enough explanation, I would do my share of it.

  “Yeah, let’s go in,” I said, marching to the house. I stood on the porch’s bottommost step, sending a glare Landon’s way. I’d saved his ass from Clay; I could easily un-save it.

  My mom stopped in the grass, throwing Henry a dour look. “You are not coming in,” she said.

  “Bullshit, all of this involves me. I’m coming in, because you have a hell of a lot of explaining to do to me, too,” Henry roared, his face reddened with rage. Dylan was right—he was so upset he was spitting when he talked.

  “This is a family matter, Henry,” Sarah said, refusing to back down. I supposed she’d never been one for adhering to the pack hierarchy, so why would she start now? I definitely took after her in that respect. “And regardless of what you think in that tiny, peanut-sized brain of yours, you are not family.” She moved past him, leaving him speechless in the yard.

  I would’ve said go, Mom, but the smirk on Landon’s face made the comment die in my throat. “Sooner or later,” I said, stepping toward Landon, “I’m going to wipe that smirk off your face.” I meant it as a threat, but of course it was at that inopportune time when I remembered what Maze had said.

  Landon liked me. This smirking douche-ness was him playing nice.

  Oh, God. Now was most definitely not the best time to be thinking of that…or where else I could put that smirking face.

  Between my legs, I meant.

  I was the first in the house, leading Sarah to the living room. Both Dylan and Landon came inside after us, though they lingered back. Henry, I noticed, plopped himself down on one of the chairs on the porch. With his hearing, he could probably listen to everything that would be said in the room.

  Maybe we should turn on a loud radio, just to spite him.

  Sarah sat on the couch, looking mighty uncomfortable as she gazed around the room. At the bare walls, at the minimal furniture, the muted wall colors. Everything was so clean it was almost unnerving. I had felt the same when I’d first come in the house…though it wasn’t as long ago as I thought. My life had been a whirlwind lately.

  “Well,” Sarah spoke first after I gingerly sat beside her, “come in, boys. Let’s meet the rest of you.” Dylan hesitantly moved before her, though Landon did not. “Yes, I see one of you is overflowing with manners.” Her hazel eyes shot me a look, as if she wanted to say more, but she held back.

  Great. My mom thought I was in bed with the jerk, didn’t she?

  Dylan motioned for Landon to come in, holding his thick book behind his back, probably embarrassed to be caught by Sarah reading Gone with the Wind. Landon was slow to enter the living room, his arms crossed and a look of annoyance on his face, though it lessened when Sarah turned her glare on him.

  Sarah had a way with douches.

  “So, you’re the ones, huh? You and that Maze.” Sarah glanced at me. “I approve of Maze, at least. The boy was smart enough to call me while you three were off doing God knows what.”

  I would have to thank Maze for calling her, because it was about the only thing that could’ve made this situation worse. Marching myself into what might be a suicidal mission against a crazy death priest? Let’s call my mom and get her down here! She can have the front row seat.

  “Then again, none of you are good enough for my little girl,” Sarah went on, oblivious or uncaring to how completely mortifying this conversation was for me. “Even if she hides things from me, she’s my daughter, and I know none of you deserve her.”

  Landon looked as if he s
truggled to not roll his eyes at that, while Dylan hurriedly spoke, “I agree with you one hundred percent, Ma’am. We do not deserve Addie. She’s…” His voice trailed off, whatever compliment he planned on giving me dying before he could say it.

  I understood. My mom was an intimidating woman, when she tried to be.

  “I would probably not finish that sentence,” Sarah said. “And it’s Sarah, not ma’am, not miss. Not runaway. Sarah. Just Sarah.” She turned her eyes to me, and I was practically javelined to my seat. I could not move, could not run, even if I tried to.

  It was too late for that, anyway.

  “Why don’t you start explaining first?” Sarah’s voice was heavy, and I flinched. “And don’t you dare leave anything out, missy, or I’ll march through this town, find Maze, take him by his ear and force him to fill in the blanks. I doubt you’d want that.”

  She was, in this case, quite right—I did not want that. To have her marching through town, yelling for Maze, or even sniffing him out because she knew what the boy smelled like…it would put the embarrassment I felt now to shame.

  And I knew my mom would do it, too. It didn’t matter Sarah had run from this pack. When it concerned me, she was full mother mode, all parent. Sooner or later, I figured I’d be thankful for it, maybe, but now was not that time. Now I could feel nothing but mortification at the way Sarah looked at me, how she’d spoken to Dylan and Landon, and what she thought.

  Did she already think I’d pledged myself to them, accepted my role as their mate? I hadn’t. Not really. Not yet. Just because I felt something, an indescribable tug, a pull toward each of them did not mean I rolled onto my back and gave them my metaphorical belly. Or whatever it was they’d need to claim me. I knew there was some sort of ceremony, but that was it.

  A sense of dread filled me, because I didn’t want to tell my mom the whole story. Not only would it take time, but it would also just bolster her view that I shouldn’t be here, that I should go home with her. I had to make her understand.

  This might not have started out as my fight, but it was now. Clay had to be stopped, and I was the only one in the pack who could theoretically stop him.

  No pressure.

  Chapter Six – Addie

  All while I explained everything with Clay, the disappearances, the magic, the whole nature of the beast thing, Sarah looked at me like I was crazy for wanting to stay in this mess. Even after Dylan had made us all some tea, which I took a single sip of and then set down—not a fan of tea, or coffee, or hardly any warm drink, really—did not help to soothe my mom’s rattled expression.

  Sarah did not interrupt once, which was surprising. She sat with her back rod straight, hardly blinking, as she sipped her tea. Her hazel gaze was on the carpet, but I knew it was just her way of thinking, of concentrating.

  Landon and Dylan had found seats; Dylan sat on a recliner in the corner of the room while Landon had his backside against the windowsill, pretty much blocking out Henry’s view in. The old man had turned the rocking chair on the porch, trying to glare inside. Landon’s back stopped all glares to and from the annoying elder.

  When I finished explaining it all, I did feel a little better. I did not like keeping things from my mom; I just would’ve preferred to have the situation handled and Clay taken care of before telling her about it. Now Sarah would worry, worry, worry, and she wouldn’t stop. I would be lucky if I didn’t get ten calls a day with Sarah checking in.

  It was a few long moments of silence before Sarah muttered, “The pack always was one to get stuck in tradition. The ceremonies, the rituals, their archaic way of thinking. Only fools would’ve stayed when their packmates were literally disappearing one by one.” She shook her head, the disapproval written across her face.

  “Where would we have gone?” Landon asked, a bit too snippy in tone to be talking to my mom. I shot him a glare. He needed to be nicer, or else he’d have me to deal with later. With any luck, Sarah would pack up and leave after this; he would be stuck with a raging Addie if he wasn’t careful.

  “I don’t know, anywhere?” Sarah offered with a shrug. “It just seems that shifters are helping to dig their own grave. If they will not change with the times, the times will leave them behind. We’ll become extinct because we’re stubborn.” She heaved a sigh, turning to me, her tea steaming in her hands. “You do get that from me, I think. From your wolf. Henry always said I was one of the most stubborn pups he ever had.”

  I could totally see it.

  “Honestly, Addie, when you told me about your professor, how you were expelled because you attacked him,” Sarah started, eliciting a shocked what from Dylan and a smirk from Landon, “I thought it was your wolf trying to break out. Her last try. I’d be lying if I said I wanted you to find out about shifters. I never wanted this for you, honey. I wanted you to have a normal life—and by normal, I mean it in the human standard of the word. Eventually, I hoped, your wolf would grow so weak she would hardly be there at all. Then, foolishly, I thought we’d be safe.”

  I knew my mom had kept me from all of this to try and protect me, but what I couldn’t understand was why. “Mom, my wolf is a part of me. A part of me you hid. I never even knew she was there—it should’ve been my decision, not yours.”

  Sarah closed her eyes for a moment, lost in her memories. “Your father thought the same, but I begged him to help. He didn’t want to, but he knew I was right. He used a spell to build more walls inside of you, to help keep your wolf back. We did it for your own protection, Addie, because, like Clay, there are things in this world that would…” Her voice wavered, trembling in a way it never had before. “That would love to get their claws in you, to experiment on you.”

  Something about Sarah’s explanation did not sit right with me, but I couldn’t put a finger on what it was. I sat there quietly as Dylan asked, “Why? Because she’s a hybrid?”

  “Because,” Sarah said, “Addie should never have been born.”

  “Different species mate all the time,” Landon said. “We have over dozens of humans here, more children—”

  Sarah interrupted, “That is not what I mean.” To me, she said, “When I met your father, I didn’t know what he was. I thought he was human. We can sense other wolf shifters, but anything else? Usually a guess. I had no idea he was next in line.”

  Though my mind still lingered on what she’d said before, I asked, “Next in line for what?”

  “There are seven high warlocks in the world. I never understood the specifics, because your father was sworn to secrecy about their meetings, but each of the seven has immense power over something. Your father was the product of generations of breeding to ensure a good replacement for one of them.”

  All of this was news to me, and I didn’t know how to take it. Seven high warlocks? Did that make me a warlock, an heir to my father’s throne of power?

  “The seven, once sworn in, cannot have children. They are asked about familial ties, about loved ones and wives and previous children. Anything connecting them to the non-magical world is taken care of.”

  “Killed,” Landon spoke, frowning. “You mean killed. Say what you mean.”

  Sarah glared at him for a moment before begrudgingly nodding. “Yes. I mean killed. Your father knew this, and he tried to keep me at a distance, but I’m persistent, as you know. I was only sixteen when I first met him. He’d come to the pack in search of some old artifact our alpha had. A wolf totem of some sort. He wasn’t a high warlock then, just a twenty-year-old man. I fell in love at first sight, I think.”

  Shaking my head, I didn’t get it. “How? I mean, I’ve been around humans all of my life, and not once did I ever feel more for them than friendship. Not like how…” Oh, crap. I was pretty much laying my feelings bare to my mom and to Landon and Dylan. I clamped my mouth shut, though the damage was already done.

  Dylan’s dark eyes were on me beneath his glasses, and I pretended not to notice them. I also ignored the slightly perky and smug expression com
ing from Landon. Yeah, that douche need not get his hopes up too much. I was still mad at him for how he’d acted earlier.

  Sarah chose not to address my declaration, instead saying, “I was always under the impression it was fate. Plus, being the intended mate to a weaselly fourteen-year-old boy was not what I wanted, alpha or not.”

  Weaselly? Forest was far from weaselly, but I was not about to jump to defend him to Sarah.

  “I had you when I was seventeen. I’ve been with you, protecting you, for over half my life,” Sarah spoke, reaching to me as she balanced her tea on her lap. She swept a few stray tendrils of pink hair behind my ear tenderly, smiling. “I’ve always done my best, you know.”

  “I know, Mom.”

  “When you told me about that floating book, I thought you were kidding. I never imagined you’d suddenly show magical abilities, not after this long. You’re a shifter, I could sense it. I never thought you could be both.”

  “Clearly,” I muttered, “I’m not just a shifter.”

  “I’ve never heard of any shifter connecting with their wolf without shifting,” Sarah went on. “I can sense her in you stronger, now. I can feel her. You’re a wolf without actually being a wolf. Your abilities must be from your father. Maybe his genetics were so strong they weren’t blocked by the shifter gene.”

  The room fell into heavy silence. No one, it seemed, knew quite what to say. All of this was new information, and a lot of it to process at once. I studied my hands. So Sarah had kept all of this from me to protect me? But why did it matter if…

  “You said Clay was a death priest,” Sarah said, breaking into my thoughts. “All death priests follow the high warlock who specializes in death. I don’t know why shifters would matter to him, or what the nature of the beast is. There is no key to our kind. We just are.”

  Dylan spoke, “Addie said he wants to make something new with the strengths of all and the weaknesses of none.”

  “That would go against everything the high warlocks stand for. It would mean all-out war.” Sarah looked at me, staring hard. There was something else my mom wasn’t saying, something that didn’t make sense. The puzzle was coming together, but there was yet a piece missing.