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If she thought I might fight her request to leave, there was never a chance of that. I want to keep Paxton’s family safe but not at the expense of their own wishes.
Now that I’m alone again, I trail over to the window that overlooks the back of the Anchorage Lake Pack grounds. There are several familiar plants back there that serve as a reminder of my mother. I stare out and can almost imagine her kneeling to tend to them the way she used to do in the garden of our childhood home.
It’s one of the few things I can distinctly remember about her. I was older than Tess when she disappeared with my father, but in those last years, they were barely around. I guess we just chalked it up to work.
And Tevin covered for them a lot. I wonder now if he knew more than I did.
I so desperately wish we could track my brother down. There are so many puzzle pieces missing that I can’t form a complete picture. I’m struggling to decide how to move forward when I can’t figure out which of the things we’ve been faced with are connected and which are less consequential.
The best way to deal with a snake is to cut off its head, but I don’t know where our problems end or begin. I need answers. That’s really all there is to it. Until I have them, we’re stuck reacting with problems as they arise instead of being proactive.
I’m tired of playing games without all of the pieces.
The truth is, there’s one obvious way to find most of the answers I’m looking for. I have to go straight to the source.
It’s time I pay Jeff Langston a visit.
28
Paxton
I wake up to a bucket’s worth of water to the face. “What the fuck?” I shoot up in bed, blinking water away so I can glare at the asshole who decided this was the right wakeup call. Tess has the nerve to glare back at me.
The second I meet her blue eyes, I whip my head toward the empty side of the bed where my own blue-eyed mate should be.
“Where is she?” I demand, throwing covers as I scramble out of bed. It barely causes a twinge in my back that’s now mostly healed.
“Why don’t you tell me?” Tess crosses her arms over her chest, eyes blazing with pure unfiltered fury. “You’re the one who was in bed with her, soyoushould be the one that knows she got up and left this morning. You sleep like the dead.” She jiggles the empty bucket in her hand as if my deep sleeping justifies her giving me an impromptu shower in bed.
“Left?” I shove past Tess, ignoring her hum of displeasure. Where the fuck has Tasha gone? I thought we were past her disappearing on me. How the hell did I even sleep through her leaving the room?
Out of the corner of my eye, I see paper sitting on the pillow she abandoned, the edge of it dampened from the wakeup call. I can just barely make out her handwriting from here telling me she was going to the library. But Tess wouldn’t be waterboarding me to wake me up if she only went as far at the pack’s library. I stomp across the bedroom toward the door, determined to go find some actual answers.
“Don’t you go rampaging around my pack house.”
“Would you fucking stop nagging me? I want to know where the hell my mate has gone.” I can feel my face pull taut with anger, my mouth tipped up in a snarl. My angry expression might scare most people, but Tess only glares harder. I’m trying really hard to not strangle my mate’s sister, but she’s wearing my patience thin.
I yank open the bedroom door just to find a strange man on the other side.
“Who the hell are you?” I don’t have time for this shit. I brush past him, but I pause when I hear the familiar voice.
“Don’t bother searching the house. Dominic and I have already tracked her thanks to the GPS in the SUV she took.” Enough time has passed that I didn’t recognize the man’s aging face, but I do recognize his voice.
“Dimitri.” I hesitate, torn between the need to brush past him to get to my mate and stopping long enough to show respect for the man who once trained a whole slew of fighters I greatly respected.
“Let’s go.” His voice is no nonsense, and I’m relieved to not have to pay lip service to the man. This is the first time I’ve seen the man around here; I’d almost forgotten Dimitri Parker is Dominic’s father. The Anchorage Lake Pack basically forced the man into hiding years ago, but he’s always been a legend among those of us who chose to use training to fight rather than to protect a pack.
“Stop fangirling and go.” Tess nudges me from the back, earning her the best glare I can muster while I’m distracted by the fear that settles in my gut.
“Where is she?” I ask Tess again. They’re rushing me out of here like they all know what’s going on already, and I’m the only one in the dark. I want to know where the hell my mate disappeared to.
She’s mine, my wolf rasps. No one should be keeping secrets from me about my own mate, and it’s quickly causing my wolf to burn with rage.
Tess doesn’t say anything until we reach the stairs, but her next words cause me to misstep and nearly stumble down the next steps.
“We think she’s going to see Jeff Langston.”
“Why would she do that? Did someone go with her?” I already know as soon as the question leaves my mouth that she didn’t take anyone with her. If she planned to, it would have been me, Dominic, or her sister.
