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“Did they?” I asked.
Nadia gave a slight head tilt. “Jameson can be a total dick, and he follows in his dad’s footsteps in a lot of ways, but he took her in because she’s blood.”
Blood was everything in the shifter world. You did whatever you had to do for family. If we turned our backs on the people we were related to, there was a serious reason for it.
Like, for instance, my dad treating me like property he could hand out whenever he felt it like. Or something else hideous and disgusting that broke all the rules of being family and sticking up for each other.
“It had to be hard for them,” I said, but I wasn’t thinking about the alpha and his sister. I was thinking about Delaney. I knew what it was like to be abandoned and forgotten, to be treated like an outsider, to have nothing and be at someone else’s mercy. My heart went out to her.
“Jameson and Carletta loved Delaney like she was their full-blooded sister, born and raised in the house alongside them.”
“What do you mean,loved?” I asked. I’d caught the past tense, there.
“They lost her,” Nadia said sadly. “The alpha’s pain ripped right through our whole pack.”Shared trauma.Now I understood what Nadia was trying to say.
I’d lost my mom when I was fifteen, just eleven years ago. I knew what it was like to deal with the trauma of losing someone.
“How did she die?” I asked in a small voice.
“I don’t know,” Nadia said. “It’s all under wraps, and Jameson loses his shit when anyone tries to talk about it. It’s really the only thing around here you shouldn’t talk about, so remember that when you’re at the club, too.”
I made a mental note. That was good to know about.
“Since he lost her, he’s turned into this man of stone. He became more like his father when that happened. Well, I guess not exactly like his father. Jameson still has some redeeming qualities, but he rules with an iron fist. He’s all work and no play, except for that club of his. His temper is something terrible now, too. Nobody even dares cross him, except his beta, Felix. That cat can get away with murder.”
I leaned back in my chair. “Met him. He’s the one who interviewed me.”
Nadia pulled her mouth into an O of surprise. “What’s he like?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. He’s a cat shifter.”
“Yeah, I know. It’s weird that he’s working for Jameson, right?”
“The bear and the cat,” I said with a grin.
Nadia laughed. “It sounds like the start of a joke or something.”
I giggled.
“Rumor has it he doesn’t date,” Nadia continued. “He doesn’t even sleep around since he lost Delaney.”
“That’s weird,” I said.
“No, it’s not.” Nadia shook her head. “Again, I don’t know Jameson on a personal level, so these are all just rumors. But not sleeping around doesn’t have to do with the sex. He doesn’t want to be like his dad—breaking hearts and leaving kids behind without a care. And supposedly he doesn’t want to get close to anyone.”
“I thought you said he started to follow in his dad’s footsteps?”
Nadia shrugged. “I guess we become what we try our hardest not to be, right?”
“I guess so,” I said. “So… he doesn’t sleep around, but he owns a sex club.”
Nadia didn’t respond to that. She kept talking, instead.
“The women around town are all trying to get him to notice them, now. It’s become this game where they want to see if they can seduce him, but everyone’s a little scared of him, too. So it’s this weird dynamic with those who can get close enough to him.”
“Ugh,” I groaned. “I hate it when people are so desperate for attention.”
“Oh, it gives them clout. To be able to say they could bring back the alpha is a big deal, like this huge thing on a resume or something.”
