Childish
Emory
I’ve just finished breakfast a couple of days after returning home when one of the maids lets me know I have a phone call in Kane’s office. Alarmed, I rush in to take the call. It’s not the appointed time for Coit to call me, and Mother doesn’t usually call this early in the morning.
“Hello?” I say into the receiver.
“I’m going to marry her!” my brother declares.
No longer worried, I let out a chuckle. I knew he was planning to visit Lydia in her packlands. I’m not surprised he wants to marry her. More amused than anything else. “When?” I ask. “Are we hoping for a wedding in the winter or early next year?”
“I want to marry her now. As soon as possible.”
“Slow down now, brother.” There’s the impulsive, annoying Coit again. “Have you even proposed to her?” “Not yet, but I will.”
“And have you gotten her family’s blessing?”
“I’m working on it.”
“Are you aware that weddings take time and preparation? Or are you just going to drag Lydia toward the nearest officiant?” I picture that and laugh again.
“How hard can it be to plan a wedding?” I hear the sarcasm in his voice.
“It’s pretty much like planning a Moon Goddess Ball which you would know nothing about since you left that to me and Mom to work on while you fucked off in the woods.”
“I helped you in the way I knew best,” he claims. “By getting out of your hair so you could plan the Ball and not waste time trying to kill me.”
“You know, technically, Darius is my Beta. I could get rid of you, and I’d be just fine,” I warn him.
He snorts, not believing my threat for a minute. “You would miss me. Darius is too nice. You’d be bored within days.”
“I would get so much done because Darius would actually be dependable and not chasing after every hot girl he sees.”
“Darius is married with a kid. He shouldn’t be chasing any girl at all.”
“Exactly. Darius would never be caught having an orgy in another’s Alpha’s house.”
“It wasn’t an orgy!” He sounds defensive about something he used to be proud of.
“What else would you call it?”
“A foursome with willing adults.”
“I’m surprised Alpha Nigel didn’t threaten you at gunpoint to marry his granddaughter since she was part
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Childish
of that.”
“Sally is not ready to settle down yet. She just needed a release from all the stress of school.”
“And you were just being a good guy and offering that release?”
“What can I say? I’m very altruistic.”
“We should have a statue of you built next to the one of the Moon Goddess in Her temple,” I mutter sarcastically.
Coit laughs for a moment but then continues in a more serious tone. “I didn’t know it would be like this. People always say finding your mate is wild and messy, but this is…”
“Peaceful?”
Coit’s voice softens as he agrees, “I always felt like I was running from girl to girl trying to find something I kept missing, and now I have it.”
“Home.”
“Yeah, it feels like home.”
smile, completely understanding what he’s talking about. I look down at the framed photos on Kane’s desk. There’s a family photo of me, Kane, and Mikey. Our wedding photo where we both look so happy and content hangs on the wall behind me.
“I’m glad you found your mate, Coit,” I say sincerely. “It’s about time you settled down.”
“I’m glad too,” he replies. “I was scared for a time that finding my mate would be like what Mother experienced with Father.”
“Our parents aren’t the norm. Father was the problem. He couldn’t love anyone. Even the magic of mating wasn’t going to change him.”
Our late father had been a selfish man. He’d been unfaithful to our mother, always taking her for granted and she stayed with him throughout all the hell he had unleashed on our family and our pack. Our mother wasn’t happy, and she was never truly free until his death. Now, she’s content with helping us run the pack, but there are times when I wonder if she’s longing for something more in her life.
“I know, but I’m still worried that maybe I’m more like him than I thought.”
“You’re nothing like him. And you could never could be,” I assure my brother. Coit is quiet for a moment. I wish I could see his face so I could try to gauge what he’s thinking.“Coit, listen to me,” I persist. “You are nothing like Bernard. He never cared about anything but himself. Anyone can see how much you care for our pack.”
“Do you think he started that way? I don’t think he was born like that and somewhere along the way he turned into a monster.”
“He made his choices. There’s nobody else to blame. It’s his actions and his unwillingness to face the consequences that defined him in the end. You could never be like that.”
“I’d like to think not,” he replies, softly. “When we were kids, he was everything I wanted to be.”
“You wanted to be like the person he was pretending to be. And I wanted to be like him too. He was my
Childish
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hero too, Coit,” I tell him. “And we made a promise, remember? That we would be better than him.”
“I can’t imagine treating Lydia the way he treated Mother.”
“I don’t know Lydia that well, but she doesn’t seem like the type to stick around if you treat her badly- mate or not. And Alpha Gerald would kill you if you ever hurt his granddaughter.”
These past few years I’ve gotten to know the Alphas of the other shifter packs, and despite Alpha Gerald’s more jovial predisposition, he isn’t the kind of man a person crosses. There are stories of his unforgiving nature and steely determination when it comes to his enemies. When my father tried to take over his territory, the Nightstone Pack stood strong and unbreakable against the attack. Our pack suffered a crushing defeat that sent Bernard running away with his tail between his legs.
“Not only would Alpha Gerald kill me. Lydia’s father and five brothers would help him,” Coit says.
“You always wanted brothers,” I point out. “And now you’re getting a whole litter of them. Aren’t you happy?”
“I’m ecstatic. Brothers are way better than annoying sisters.”
“I resent that.”
“Cry me a river, Emory,” he quips. “I have to get back to work. You have a great day.”
“Bite me, Coit.”
“Make Kane do that instead. I heard he likes biting.”
I grimace in disgust. “You are so gross.”
“I’m not the one with the biting fetish. Bye, Em!”
Coit hangs up, and I glare at the phone, wishing he were here in person so I could give him a wedgie, like we did when we were kidds. I’m glad he’s getting married so another woman can deal with him. Little brothers are the worst—but they’re also the best.
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