Page 22 of Wolf Revealed

“Really? I’m not even sleepy,” Kal protested even as he yawned again. “Can’t I stay up a little longer?”

“Your father is right,” Lark said with a smile. “It’s time to head up to bed. You’ve had a really long day. You can spend more time with your dad tomorrow.”

Kal looked like he wanted to argue, but reluctantly hopped off the couch with a mumbled, “Okay.”

Mike was glad Lark had backed him up, because he’d had no idea what he would have said if their son had put up a fuss. He hadn’t perfected that part of parenting yet.

“I’m going to give Gage a call,” Mike said. “I’ll come up to say good night in a little while.”

Lark nodded, going upstairs with Kal.

Bringing Gage up to date on their plan to find Roman didn’t take more than a few minutes, and Kal was in the bathroom, getting cleaned up and brushing his teeth, when Mike bumped into Lark in the upstairs hallway. They ended up doing that weird thing when they each kept stepping left, then right, in their attempt to get around each other. The dance ended with both of them laughing, then leaning back against opposite walls to smile at each other. It had been such a long time since they’d had fun together that even something so simple felt good.

“I appreciate everything you did to help get Kal back safely,” Lark said, taking a step closer and gazing up at him warmly. “Without you, I don’t want to think about what could have happened.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” Mike assured her, subconsciously moving a little closer himself. “He’s my son, too. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for him. Or you.”

Silence fell between them, and in that moment, Mike heard Lark’s heart beat faster as she gazed up at him. The urge to completely close the distance between them and kiss her was strong.

But before he could, Kal charged out of his room to throw his arms around Mike and hug him tight.

“Thanks for coming to rescue me today, Dad,” Kal said, turning his head to smile up at him. “And for letting us be a family again.”

Mike’s heart was the one that beat faster this time. The warm sensation that crept into his chest at hearing his son call him Dad was like nothing he’d ever experienced. But he liked it.

Lips curving into a smile, Lark came over to wrap her arms around both of them. And Mike couldn’t help but wish this moment would last forever.

Chapter ten

Last night was the best Mike had slept in a decade. A lot of that was probably because Lark and Kal were under the same roof as he was. He and Lark might not be back to where they’d been before she’d left, but it was a start. And spending time with his son was beyond amazing.

He was smiling and still thinking about sitting down as a family to share the pancakes he, Lark, and Kal had made for breakfast that morning when Connor’s voice intruded on his daydream.

“This place always creeps me out,” Connor muttered as they walked into one of the labs at the Dallas Institute of Forensic Sciences along with Xander and Trey.

Mike looked around the room, taking in the freezer units along one wall. Counters and shelves of various scientific equipment were situated along the other, while stainless steel autopsy tables took up most of the space in between.

“I hear you,” Xander agreed. “It’s like the start of every bad horror movie I’ve ever seen. You know, the part where they hear a thump coming from the freezer and open it to find a zombie.”

Mike snorted even though he couldn’t disagree. The room was definitely unsettling. And while the bodies on the tables were covered by sheets, there was no escaping the smell. The odor of decay was nearly overwhelming to his werewolf nose, even though the bodies had obviously been kept in the freezer units along the wall prior to their arrival.

“Thanks for putting that image in my mind.” Connor grimaced as he glanced from one sheet-shrouded body to the next. “I’ll never understand how Samantha can be comfortable around dead bodies.”

Besides being senior medical examiner for Dallas County, Dr. Samantha Mills was also engaged to Trey. It was an understatement to say having an ME around who knew about the existence of the supernatural world was helpful. It made things easy whenever those kinds of situations popped up—which they did a lot.

Samantha had come damn close to outing the Pack to the entire world when she and Trey had first started seeing each other though. After realizing there was something weird going on with the Dallas SWAT Team, she’d agreed to go on a date with him purely so she could accidentally get some of his blood and send the sample to a lab for DNA testing. To say that had caused some issues would be an even bigger understatement. Luckily, everything had worked out, and Trey had found The One for him.

Samantha walked into the room then, blonde hair up in her signature messy bun. She flashed a smile at Trey before greeting the rest of them. Mike was surprised to see Wayne with her. Then again, maybe he wasn’t that surprised. Wayne was sharp, so he knew there was almost certainly a connection between Roman and the dead man they’d found in the warehouse yesterday. Besides, Wayne had known Stewart from back in the day. Finding out who’d killed him would be personal.

“I know you guys came to talk about Stewart,” Samantha said. “Unfortunately, his isn’t the only body we’ll be looking at today.”

Before Mike or any of the other guys could ask what Samantha was talking about, she reached for the sheet covering the nearest table, pulling it down carefully to expose Stewart’s bruised and beaten body. Then she moved over and pulled the sheets down on three other corpses. It was impossible to miss the similarities between the bruises on their bodies and Stewart’s.

“These three other bodies were discovered over the past two months in different parts of northern Texas,” Wayne said. “The different jurisdictions meant no one considered they were connected. At least, not until yesterday, when we figured out Roman was back in the country.”

“Who are they?” Xander asked. “And what’s their connection to Roman?”

“I think I’ll let Mike answer that question,” Wayne said, glancing at him. “I’m pretty sure he’ll remember their faces, if not their names.”