Winterstoke Wolves Collection : An MM Mpreg Shifter Romance Bundle

by Sasha Silsbury

  “Soon.”

  “Soon? Is this going to be the same way that you ‘intended’ to tell me?”

  “It’s not exactly a good time, Adam. He’s my son. I’m responsible for him. I don’t need to disrupt his life any more right now.”

  “He’s my son too. I have a say in this.”

  “Oh please. You didn’t even know that he existed until just now. You don’t know anything about him.”

  “That’s a low blow.”

  Thomas sighs. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

  It feels like they’re getting somewhere. It’s at a snail’s pace, but Ivan is their common ground. “So, let me get to know him.”

  “Yes, of course. When it’s the right time.”

  “When will that be?”

  “Soon.”

  Soon. Adam clenches his hands to his sides. He hates ‘soon’.

  ‘When all this is over’ would have been better. It feels like Thomas is stalling. Maybe he’s not intending to tell Ivan at all.

  “You have to tell him. Promise me.”

  “I told you I would.”

  “Promise.”

  “Would you even trust me if I did?”

  “I think I have good reason not to.”

  “Fine. I promise.”

  Damn it. Adam needs to sit down again. Pacing isn’t doing him any good. He needs to have that damn operation. He should have had it six months ago. He gets to the ground again, ignoring the flush of humiliation rising up from his gut. He’s an alpha who can’t even stand for ten minutes without needing to take a break. No wonder Thomas doesn’t want him to be Ivan’s father.

  “What is with you?” Thomas says. “You’re up and down like a jack-in-the-box.”

  “Just rub it in, why don’t you?”

  “For God’s sake,” Thomas shouts. “I’m just asking. You don’t have to take everything so personally. You know what? I think we’re done for now. I’m going back to the cabin.”

  “No.”

  “Excuse me.”

  “I’m not done talking to you. I want to know when I’m going to be able to spend time with my son.”

  “When I say it’s time.”

  “It’s not only down to you.”

  “Yes. It. Is.” Thomas spits out each word. Adam can see the fury rising in him.

  Adam can’t help it. He just has to keep poking. Let Thomas hurt the way he’s hurting.

  “Let me be clear. He is my son too. You can’t keep him from me. I won’t let you. I’ll take it to the courts if I need to.”

  “You won’t ‘let’ me? Are you serious? You aren’t my mate. I’m not your pack. I’m not your damn property! Ivan isn’t your property.”

  “For fuck’s sake. That’s not what I said.”

  “Don’t swear at me.”

  “I think I’m a little justified, don’t you think? You hid my son from me for ten years. I’m entitled to get a little sweary. Hell, I’m entitled to get a little shouty. A lot shouty! What the fuck were you thinking, Thomas?”

  Thomas’ eyes are bright with tears. The sight breaks Adam’s heart and infuriates him at the same time. “I was thinking that you might turn out like your father,” Thomas spits out. “And it looks like I was right. I’m done with this conversation.”

  Thomas doesn’t wait for Adam to reply. He just turns his back and walks away. Adam scrambles to his feet but his leg gives way under him and he falls back to the rock with a crack that reverberates up his spine and sends stars to his eyes.

  Thomas is out of sight within a minute, leaving Adam broken and red-eyed on the rock.

  THOMAS

  warm rain and cups of tea

  Thomas is trembling when he gets back to the cabin. Warm drops of rain are just starting to fall, sending the forest into a tizzy of bird song accompanied by the soft patter of rain on leaves.

  His whole body is hot and he struggles to get a grip on the door handle because his hands are shaking so hard.

  That could have gone better, he thinks. In fact, it couldn’t have gone much worse.

  Ivan isn’t in sight when Thomas enters the living room. The bedroom door is still ajar. He must still be sleeping and Thomas thanks his lucky stars for that. He needs a little time to compose himself before his son sees him.

  His son. Their son.

  Adam was right to be angry. How could it possibly have gone any differently?

  Back in the quiet of the cabin, he’s suddenly overwhelmed with a flood of exhaustion that makes his knees want to buckle under him.

  There’s nowhere to sit. The sofas are rotting out the back of the cabin, and the only chairs have been moved to the kitchen. He sinks to the floor, leans back against the wall of the cabin and tries not to cry.

  Ivan might still be sleeping, but someone is up. Thomas can hear them pottering around in the kitchen.

  God, he could do with a cup of tea, but he’s not sure he’s got the energy to move. He’s still shaking and if he moves, there is a real chance that he might throw up.

  The kitchen door opens and Cam’s slim figure appears holding two mugs. He stops when he sees Thomas. The scent of fear rises. He looks to the front door and then around the room.

  “Are you okay?” His voice is a whisper. It’s the first time that Thomas has heard him use it. He sounds even younger than he looks.

  “We had an argument. I’m all right. I just need to catch my breath.”

  Cam nods. He’s wearing shorts. His legs are stick thin and covered in scars: thin lines in different stages of healing that crisscross almost every inch of skin.

  Thomas looks away.

  “They were to keep me right,” Cam says in a low voice. “That’s what my alpha used to say.”

  “I’m sorry.” Thomas’ problems suddenly seem a lot less pressing in perspective. He’s never had an alpha hurt him. Not on purpose.

  Cam gives him a thin-lipped smile. He looks like he’s about to cry.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” Thomas asks.

  Cam shakes his head. “Maybe another time. Right now, I just want to have some tea and not think about it.”

  He gives Thomas another smile, then disappears into the other room with his mugs.

  Thomas draws a deep breath and gets to his feet. Stop being such a sap. No one’s been whipping your legs or making you do anything you don’t want to.

  The sooner he can get back to his life helping people like Cam the better.

  Cam is right about one thing though. Tea and not thinking about it will definitely help.

  He picks his way over the broken floorboards in the kitchen with care. The cupboard doors are warped with damp and either hanging off their hinges or swollen in place. All their food is kept carefully packed into a couple of large plastic containers with sealable lids that they keep on the floor.

  The water in the kettle is warm but not hot. He flicks the switch on the camping stove and the gas sparks to life.

  He makes tea for himself and Ivan, and instant coffee for Jacob. His little cousin is going to whine about the lack of decent coffee but until they can get an espresso machine hooked up to the non-existent electric supply, he’ll just have to suck it up.

  And as for Adam—

  He’ll work out what to do about Adam later. He should never have told him now. The memory of the look on Adam’s face sends burning tears to his eyes.

  Not now.

  He balances the two teas in one hand, the coffee in the other and walks carefully so he doesn’t spill any. He has to push the door to the bedroom open with his back.

  Jacob is lying flat on his back, watching the clouds through the hole in the roof, one arm under his head. He turns his head when he sees Thomas. “I am soooo bored. I really miss my phone. Did Adam say when he can get us one?”

  “I asked him, but it might be better not to have one. They can be tracked.” The other side of the blankets is empty. Thomas frowns. He puts the coffee down on the floor by Jacob. “Where’s Ivan?”
<
br />   “I thought he was with you?”

  “What?”

  “He’s with you. He followed you out when you got up this morning. Didn’t you see him?”

  Thomas’ heart stops. The air turns cold. He’s only half-aware of the tea spilling over his fingers.

  He’s out of the bedroom in seconds. He shoves the door open to Cam and Shannon’s bedroom. The two of them are sitting cross-legged, playing a hand of cards. They look up startled at the intrusion.

  “Have you seen Ivan?”

  They shake their heads.

  Thomas’ feet feel like they don’t even touch the floor, he’s out of the cabin so fast.

  Ivan isn’t on the porch or anywhere in view.

  “Ivan?”

  He’s half-aware of the other omegas following him out, calling his son’s name.

  He stands in on the pine needles at the front of the cabin and sniffs. He doesn’t have an alpha’s nose but he can still pick up the scent.

  It’ll be better if he shifts. He strips off where he stands and shifts immediately. He’s out of practice. He hasn’t spent time as a wolf for years.

  The scents and sounds of the forest assault his senses, but only one of them matters.

  Ivan was out here. He went—

  That way.

  He races, nose to the ground, following Ivan’s scent. The boy stepped off the porch, made his way over the pine scented ground, and into the woods towards the ravine.

  There’s a small voice in Thomas’ head telling him he’s overreacting. Ivan isn’t a toddler. He’s a boy in a cabin in a forest. He probably just decided to explore. He’ll appear through the trees at any moment, bewildered at what all the fuss is about.

  Behind him, Thomas can hear the others still calling out Ivan’s name, just as Ivan still doesn’t answer.

  His heart sinks as he realizes that the scent is taking him a familiar route.

  Just before the trees start to thin at the start to the rock, Ivan’s scent gets stronger. He stood or waited here for a little time, before moving on.

  Thomas feels his stomach sink.

  He followed you out when you got up this morning. Didn’t you see him?

  No. He’d been so focused on Adam and everything he had to say to him, that a cement truck could have rumbled past in the middle of the forest, knocking down trees, and he might not have noticed.

  How long had Ivan stood here for? How much did he hear?

  It might have been everything, Thomas realizes. Everything.

  What must he be thinking? Ivan has never asked about his other father. Not once.

  Thomas has been prepared for it for years, but the subject never came up. He’s always assumed that Ivan hadn’t really thought about it much in the way that children often just accept their lives for what they are, without questioning that things might be different.

  Thomas shifts again. He stands on the rock, the best place to make his voice heard and shouts at the top of his voice, “Ivan!”

  There’s no answer.

  How long has it been? He went back to the cabin, panicked a bit and made tea. It can’t have been more than twenty minutes. Ivan can’t have gone far.

  Oh God. Maybe he’s with Adam. He’s not sure whether that makes him feel better or worse.

  Thomas shifts again and puts his nose to the ground.

  Ivan’s scent circles back towards the cabin but it’s not overlaid with Adam’s. They weren’t together. Not yet.

  He races back to the cabin.

  Adam’s truck is gone. Ivan’s scent leads up to it, and then keeps going. Ivan wasn’t in the truck, but he followed it.

  Thomas keeps running, following his son’s scent down the mountain.

  ADAM

  falling rain and shaking hands

  Adam sits in the cab of the truck and taps out a message to Gregor with shaking hands: Got stuff to do. Please take over guard duty. ASAP please.

  He waits until the double ticks appear and he knows the message has gone through, then he turns off the phone and tosses it in the glove compartment.

  He turns the keys in the ignition and reverses the truck down the rough track that leads up to the cabin.

  His hands are shaking. He tightens them on the wheel. This is why he can’t stay at the cabin.

  His body is broken. His head is worse. He’s no use to anyone until he can control his temper or his mood, or his insane desire for a man who clearly doesn’t want him.

  He’s not going to react to a threat in any kind of rational manner. Gregor is the better option.

  His hands move on the wheel, and the truck bumps and rocks as he reaches the end of the track and turns the truck back onto the tarmac.

  He knows he should be thinking about what just happened, but it’s too much, and there are too many unknowns.

  All he knows is that the man he loves and his son – his son – are hiding like rats in a rotten hut in the middle of nowhere.

  That’s the first thing that needs to be fixed. Everything else can come after.

  The rain falls harder as he drives, and the rising sun glints off of wet tarmac. He rolls down the window, letting the fresh air in.

  He ignores the turn off to Aylewood and keeps driving. It’s the second time he’s gone this way in a week after keeping his distance for a decade. He wonders how long it will be before it feels normal.

  He doesn’t trust the conversation he needs to have to a phone call. Warwick paranoia is catching.

  The sweet scent of apple blossoms increases as he draws closer to farmlands. The memory of them makes his stomach twist.

  He wonders what Dad would have made of him like this: the latest Adam Winterstoke: teetotaler with a cane and a bad leg, stressed out by the scent of flowers. A man who spends his days rolling out pastry and decorating cakes.

  Dad was an asshole, Adam tells himself. It doesn’t matter what he would have thought. A little voice in the bottom of his head says that Dad might have been an asshole, but he would have been right about some things. And one of those things is that this latest Adam Winterstoke isn’t a very good leader.

  Adam keeps count of the tracks leading off of the main farm track as he drives, or at least the ones that are obviously visible. He counts at least seventeen before the farmhouse comes into view.

  Adam has never paid much attention to the Warwick farms. He knows that this isn’t the only farmhouse. Homesteads are dotted all over the Warwick territory, occupied by aunts and cousins, and surrounded by fields, meadows and orchards.

  There’s no one in sight when he pulls his truck up behind Barbara’s and gets out.

  He calls out as he walks around the back of the farmhouse and is rewarded with a distant ‘in here’.

  He finds Barbara in the living room, brushing glass into a dustpan. Torn pictures are stacked against one wall, ready to go to the dump. White stuffing bursts from rips in the sofa. There’s a single bookcase toppled over, books spilling like rotten apples across the floor.

  “Haven’t even had a chance to clean up after those assholes rampaged through. Pass the broom, will you?”

  Adam does as he’s told. Barbara takes it, looking up. “Is everything okay with Thomas? I assume you’d have phoned if it was urgent.”

  “He’s fine. He told me about Ivan.”

  Barbara stills, then bends down again. “And you want to have a go at me for keeping him away. Is that it?”

  “No.” He finds the bookcase, and heaves it up against the wall, then starts stacking the fallen books back into it.

  Barbara looks up at him. “What then?”

  “I want to know what’s going on. They can’t stay up on that mountain hiding away forever. I need to know that you have a plan. And if you don’t, then I need to come up with one.”

  Barbara snorts. “Like what? You ride in on your white horse? Save them all?”

  “I’d like to,” Adam admits. “but I think that’d just annoy Thomas.”

  There’s a sudden bur
st of genuine laughter. Barbara grins. “That it would.”

  Adam gives her a smile in return. He packs the last book back on the case. They’re higgledy-piggledy and in other circumstances, he’d like to put them back in an order that makes sense, but he doesn’t think Barbara cares about that kind of thing. There are certainly other chores to be done first.

  Barbara brushes the glass into a trash can, then straightens. She gives Adam a thoughtful look. “Actually, I do have something for you to do. Come with me.”

  He follows her out of the farmhouse and into the orchard. They pass Lex as they walk, but Barbara waves him away when he tries to approach.

  They’re far out among the trees and haven’t seen another person for a good five minutes when Barbara finally speaks and then she lowers her voice.

  “What has Thomas told you about what we were doing?”

  Adam hesitates, then answers honestly. There have been too many secrets. “Not a lot. I know you’ve been helping omegas getting out of bad situations, and I know that it has been going on for a long time. I know there is some kind of network, but that’s about it.” He reaches out and touches her arm. She looks up sharply, and her eyes narrow. “Barbara, you can trust me with this although I’ll understand if you don’t.”

  He withdraws his arm. Touching her was a bad idea. He forgets that not everyone finds it soothing.

  Barbara shakes her head. They’ve stopped under one of the older trees and the light is dappled on her gray hair, shimmering in and out with the breeze. “I haven’t told Thomas everything. All he knows is that our operation was compromised. What he doesn’t know is that it was limited. It was only one safehouse that failed.”

  “That’s good,” Adam says. “Isn’t it?”

  Barbara shrugs. “It depends which way you look at it. We got real lucky. They raided us between guests. The last two omegas staying there had just left, and the next ones hadn’t arrived. The alpha and omega who stayed there permanently, both Warwicks, I might add, saw Ronmin’s alphas coming and fled. They got no one, hurt no one. All they did was a lot of damage.”