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Loren’s voice barely reached him, distorted as the wind picked up. “Who?”
It was a second before the woman’s reply reached him, a snarled hiss. “Lukas Grehmaine.”
Bill gritted his teeth. This wasn’t quite how he expected his old mentor’s name to come up again. “What do you mean? Why would he want to hide a young girl?”
“Why else?” the figure replied, still lurking out of view. “Power. I warned her what would happen.” A low wail pierced the quiet. “I did. But she never listened.”
Loren took another step. “Who?”
“Eveline.” Suddenly, a figure appeared from behind the oak. They were small and slight, with matted brown hair that obscured their delicate shape. Though barely larger than Loren, Bill could sense they were far older. Early forties, perhaps?
“Eveline?” Loren’s voice broke. “What happened to her?”
The figure crouched as if desperate to hide within the scraggly underbrush. “She let herself be part of the trap, only it ensnared her in the end. She trusted them. They lied—”
“How?” Bill’s voice mingled with Loren’s as they voiced the same question at once.
Another wordless howl echoed in response. “We were outcasts, left behind by our own and driven further east,” the figure recounted. “We wanted to join one of the local packs, but both were hostile because of our ways. They blamed us for the local human killings, but we knew who the true culprit was.”
“Then what happened?”
“She got too close to the pack leader. I warned her to stay away, but she trusted he would protect her. He didn’t. The other one made sure of that. He drove her away, but she didn’t go far. When she knew her child was of age, she tried to bring the girl to her home pack. Then she wound up dead. You all will suffer the consequences of the same naivety. I’ve heard the rumors out here, boy. You think you can win on fair footing? Think twice. He’ll rip your throat out while she watches, and you won’t ever see the blow coming. I won’t die like they did. I won’t be a part of this anymore. Now go!”
The figure scurried behind the oak, but Bill sensed even if they tried to follow, they wouldn’t find her again.
“Wait!” Loren started forward anyway. “Please. Just—”
“Let’s go.” Bill approached her. When he grabbed her forearm, she didn’t resist, allowing him to guide her back. “I think we’ve overstayed our welcome.”
Besides, they’d gotten more than enough answers. At least one mystery was solved. Loren’s mother truly had been a Scolera—one who interacted with both Loreck Eislander and Lukas.
Fuck, what a mess.
“But I don’t understand…” Her mouth fell into an anguished frown that tugged at his heart.
“I think I do,” he said grimly. He didn’t like this suspicion one damn bit, but it was the only one that made sense. “I think Lukas thought he was protecting his bloodline the only way he knew how. By denying his rival of an heir. You.”
29
Bill drove them back toward the campsite, but he barely touched the speed limit. Urgency didn’t seem to matter for the time being. Loren needed to digest what she’d learned. Even he didn’t know how to process the slew of information. Instead of Fred Connors or some low-level wolf, Loreck Eislander might have been her father.
Talk about a plot twist.
That wasn’t even the most stunning bit of information revealed. Not only had the Alpha of a rival pack taken pains to obscure her true identity—he’d left her under human jurisdiction to be abused. Neglected. The various implications churned his stomach, and he could barely keep his focus on the road. Though, his feelings didn’t matter. Only Loren’s did.
Without the mating bond, observing her was his only method of gauging her emotions—and it was proving more difficult than he would have thought. Her face was angled from his, her gaze on the window.
The building tension was too much, even for him. “Talk to me,” he rasped.
Suddenly, she sat forward.
“Pull over.”
Bill didn’t question, parking immediately on a sliver of pavement that bordered a remote stretch of forest. The second he killed the engine, she exited the truck, and he followed, keeping his distance. For a few seconds, she just paced. He could hear her taking greedy, deep pulls of fresh air, and a part of him winced in sympathy. He ached to touch her. Provide comfort in a way he had no right to.
In the end, he settled on words of encouragement. “It’s a lot to take in. Your real father… You deserve to meet him. He deserves to know who you are—”
“I don’t care about that.” She turned to face him, and he recoiled at the expression he saw straining those delicate features. Rage. “You could die tomorrow. You’ve been dancing around the issue, but that’s what’s at stake, isn’t it? You coulddie.”
