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He exhaled slowly with a growl and she grinned.
They walked into the house, and her stomach rumbled as soon as she smelled the grilled steak. She hadn’t eaten anything since before she’d been taken, and she was starving.
Lucian said, “I’m being a bad mate already.”
“Because I’m hungry?” she asked as he pulled out a chair for her.
“Yeah.”
“Well, to be fair, I didn’t say anything. And I didn’t really feel hungry until I smelled the steak.”
Lucian took a seat next to her and draped his arm over the back of her chair.
“I prepared so much food because I’d hoped that you might come along with my son,” Jasper said as he set a large platter of meat in the center of the table, and surrounded it with ceramic bowls containing different side dishes.
“He mentioned needing to talk to you several times.”
Lucian put the biggest steak on her plate and set a baked potato next to it. She slid the knife through the top of the potato and pushed the sides in so it opened. As she loaded the interior with butter and sour cream, Lucian and Jasper filled their plates. Jasper kept the conversation going by asking her about her life and the pack. When the meal was over, they moved to the family room, where a comfortable couch took up most of the space.
Lucian didn’t sit. “I need you to tell me how to keep the berserker under control.”
Jasper paused, halfway to sitting in a recliner. “Okay. But you really don’t need my help, you know.”
“Of course I do! Newsflash, Dad, I’ve got a mate and a baby on the way. I can’t…I can’t let what happened to me, happen to my young.”
Jasper sat. “You don’tknowwhat happened.”
Lucian growled, and Mia stood, moving to him and wrapping her arms around his middle. The growl stopped as soon as it started, and he relaxed against her.
Jasper shook his head. “That right there is proof you don’t need my help. But since you seem to be really confused about what happened to your mother, sit down and let me talk.”
Mia tugged on his arm, and he followed her to sit on the couch. She realized she knew nothing about his past before he came to Wilde Creek. She’d known he was raised by his grandparents and that his mom had died, but she didn’t know that he blamed his father for her death. Or blamed his father’s berserker.
“Lisa and I met in high school. She was…damn, she was so lovely and sweet. We dated off and on for a few years, and she got pregnant with you. Then we found out you were a boy, and that meant you would be a berserker. Because she wasn’t my true mate, I offered to take you and raise you on my own and let her live her own life. She didn’t want to be separated from you. I married her before you were born, and we moved up here. Things were fine for a few years, and then the alpha of a small pack passing through town scented her and believed her to be his truemate.”
Lucian shook his head. “How is that possible? If she was your mate, then she wouldn’t smell unmated to another supernatural creature.”
“Lisa wasn’t my berserker’s other half. I never laid a hand on her, and she never riled the beast, so she wasn’t in danger from me. Ever. Her family hated me, though. They wouldn’t allow me into their homes, and they were afraid of you, too. When the alpha approached her, she said she had a mate and a child, and that she’d never leave either of us.
“I told her it wasn’t fair for her to stay with me and you, when the alpha was her truemate and I was just a guy lucky enough to have a few wonderful years with her. She was very loyal, though. She said we were married and a family, and that wasn’t going to change just because a wolf happened to scent her. She told him to take a hike, but he didn’t take the hint. He waited for me to leave for work one night, and then he came to the house. Looking for you.”
He leveled his gaze at Lucian.
“Me?” Lucian asked.
Jasper nodded. “He believed that as long as you were alive, Lisa would never leave me. I’d forgotten my wallet, so I turned around. When I got home, I saw wolves pacing around the house, howling and getting worked up. The front door was hanging off its hinges, and Lisa was screaming for help. I let my berserker out and raced into the house. The alpha had you by the throat. You’d gone limp, and I thought he’d broken your neck. The alpha threw you at me and tried to gut me with his claws as I caught you, but Lisa jumped between us and he took out her throat instead.
“He dropped to his knees with a howl and tried to help her, but she pushed him away and crawled to me. Made me swear to keep you safe, and then she died. The wolves scattered. I called her parents and they took you to the hospital.”
Mia brushed at tears with shaking fingers. “Did you kill them?”
Jasper nodded. “It took me almost a week to track them all down, but I did.”
Lucian looked stricken. “When I woke up in the hospital, my grandparents told me that you killed her and tried to kill me because of the berserker. Why would they lie?”
“They didn’t like me. And to be fair, itismy fault she’s dead.”
“It’s not your fault,” Mia protested.
