Page 59 of Oakheart

I shrugged, glancing at my knees. “Houses. Whatever.”

“So you’re a carpenter?”

“I apprenticed with one.”

His face lit up. “That’s great! Of course we could find something for you to do here. I mean—there’s always something to do around here, and to start, our place by the lake?—”

I frowned. “That burnt last night.”

“Yes, that. We’ll need to rebuild it. It’d be a place to start, when you’re feeling up to it. If you want to stay.”

I wrapped my arms around myself and brought my knees to my chest. I wasn’t anybody to be making choices for anyone else, and I wasn’t like my mother. I couldn’t justleave. I wouldn’t.

“I’ll . . . I’ll think about it.”

The weight of his gaze was too much then, and I wanted him to go but I didn’t have the heart to say it.

Jax, of course, didn’t need me to. He was a good alpha. He paid attention, and excused himself moments later.

I just hoped one day Wildwood would be lucky enough to have an alpha like that, and that I’d get to see it.

CHAPTER 30

Aleks

For some reason,there was little fallout from the disastrous night of the challenge.

Oh, Grant continued to whine about how Giselle had been his only true ally, which was funny, since I thought at least two or three of his goons would put themselves between him and any danger, whether he deserved it or not. Giselle certainly hadn’t been the type to jump in the way of danger, not even for Grant. She’d always done what she had done strictly for self-preservation.

Maybe that was it. Maybe he’d seen her as a kindred spirit, since everything he ever did was the same. All for Grant, only for Grant.

I couldn’t imagine thinking that way. Not putting my family above myself. Never thinking of how my actions affected others. Even strangers didn’t deserve to be dismissed so thoroughly. Like the woman Giselle had locked in the pantry. What had she done to deserve death?

Exist, and leave Wildwood?

Bullshit.

But we stayed in San Francisco. Mama said the challenge would simply be pushed to the next full moon, and Grant could technically push it further, since he was “mourning” a pack member, and I supposed in the only way he was capable, hewasmourning Giselle. Not that he’d shed a single tear.

I doubted he was capable of that.

It seemed fitting, that even the only person who was sorry she was dead would never cry for her.

Some people didn’t deserve to be mourned.

Certainly, no one would mourn Grant. I doubted anyone had mourned my father, least of all Mama or me. Just as we hadn’t mourned when my grandfather had died fighting soldiers. We’d been frightened of what would come next, but it had never crossed anyone’s mind to be sad he had died.

I’d spent years thinking that was the way of alphas. To be the person in charge, you had to be hard. Distant. Separate.

I’d spent years thinking that I could never be a successful alpha because I knew I could never be as remote and untouchable as the men I knew who had held the job. I had emotions that weren’t anger, and I’d never been able to hide them entirely. I loved my family with a ferocity that sometimes made me nervous, and sometimes made me rage—the only times I showed the kind of anger my father had been prone to. If someone hurt Mama, I wanted to tear them limb from limb. When I’d thought Grant had killed Cash, it had been all I could do to keep from attacking him, even though it had been a terrible idea.

But... ithadbeen a terrible idea. I had retained enough of my mind to know that, and so I had kept my calm.

I’d thought that kind of thing a failing.

But then there had been Ajax Fyse. Who clearly hated all of us from the Wildwood. Who hated all we stood for. Who wanted to tear Grant apart. But who had only ever been at all violent inthe moments of the actual challenge fight. Who had swallowed down his irritation even when I’d openly flirted with his mate in front of him.

Sure, he’d been protective and territorial, but he hadn’t so much as bared his teeth at me.