Claiming My Wolf
Chapter 13

~~Logan’s PoV~~

After I tell Sadie she’s a werewolf, she just stares at me blankly, not blinking, and I start to get a bit worried. Was that too much? Maybe I should have eased into it a bit more. But I thought it might be better to just rip the band-aid right off and tell her the whole truth. It might be shocking at first but it was better to know.

Gradually her blank look turns to disbelief. “Are you high?” she asks, a look of concern on her face.

Again, I almost laugh. It’s weird how often that happens when I’m with her. “No, Sadie, I’m definitely not high. I know it might be difficult to accept at first, but it’s true. Your mom was a shifter, and you are too.”

She shakes her head, definitely not believing me. “I can guarantee I have never turned into a wolf before.”

“Of course not,” I quickly agree. “You won’t get your wolf until you’re 18. That’s not for a few weeks yet, right?”

I don’t know why I remember that. It was mentioned at the assembly when they told us about Sadie, but there’s no reason it should have stuck in my head.

“But you can turn into a wolf?” she challenges me, smirking a little. “Okay, then. Show me.”

My lips tighten as I anticipate her reaction to my answer. “I’m not 18 yet either. I will be at the end of the month, and that’s when I’ll get my wolf.”

“So I’m supposed to believe you just because you say so?” she asks, shaking her head again. Obviously she doesn’t believe me at all. “I don’t know what kind of joke this is, Logan, but I don’t like it.”

“It’s not a joke,” I promise her, frowning as she starts to stand up. I take hold of her arm to stop her. “Sadie, wait. I can prove it to you. Just come with me to the pack house.”

Her brow furrows at that. “Pack house? What’s that?”

“Werewolves live in packs,” I explain. “Westbridge might look like just a regular town, but everyone here is a member of the same wolf pack. The pack house is the main building for all the pack business, and it’s where the Alpha lives.”

“Alpha?” she repeats curiously, and I know she’s remembering that Micah mentioned the Alpha in the cafeteria either. Maybe that will help her to believe me, so I latch onto that.

“That’s right. The Alpha is the head of the pack, the one in charge. Everyone listens to him or her. In our pack, it’s a man.” I don’t mention yet that he’s my father. I figure I’ll let her get used to the whole idea first.

“So you want me to go with you to some random house?” She sounds unimpressed. “I grew up in a city, Logan. My parents taught me not to go home with strangers.”

The words are out of her mouth before she even thinks them through, and I see the moment she realizes what she’s said and how the mention of her parents makes her wince in pain. It’s a pain I know all too well.

“Then let me walk you home,” I offer instead, not wanting to cause her any more stress. “You can talk to your aunt and she’ll explain everything.”

Sadie looks a bit uncertain. “You want me to tell my aunt what you told me?”

I nod. “Yeah, she can prove to you that it’s true. She’ll shift for you if you want. She’s a werewolf too, Sadie. Like I said, we all are.”

I can tell she still doesn’t believe me, but she’s a bit thrown off by my suggestion that her aunt will back me up.

We both get up and start to walk over towards the Miller’s house.

“Okay, let’s say I believe you,” Sadie says after a couple of minutes of silence. “Which I don’t, but for the sake of argument, let’s pretend I do. If my parents and I are werewolves and werewolves like in packs, why didn’t we live in a pack?”

That’s a pretty easy one to answer. “Your mom was a werewolf but your dad wasn’t. He was human. I don’t know exactly why they chose to live outside the pack, but they did.”

I could guess why, but I don’t want to get into anti-human prejudice with Sadie right now. She has enough to deal with without bringing that into it.

I also don’t know why her parents never told her the truth. Were they planning to before they died? What were they going to do when she turned 18?

“So humans and werewolves can… intermingle?” she asks, looking a bit embarrassed.

I know exactly what she’s asking. “They can mate, yeah. When we’re in human form, we’re just like humans. The DNA’s close enough that we can have babies with humans. It’s not that common though. Most werewolves are mated to other wolves.”

“Mated?” she repeats curiously. “Like married?”

“Kind of,” I agree. Should I explain to her about mates right now? It’s a pretty big subject. Probably better to convince her that werewolves are real first, but I try to explain at least a little bit. “Our wolves recognize their mates, the person that they’re meant to be with. It’s all planned for us ahead of time by the moon goddess, she pairs wolves up with the partner they’re meant to be with.”

“So you don’t get any say in it?” Sadie asks. Her nose wrinkles in disapproval. “Like an arranged marriage. What if it’s someone you hate?”

“You can reject your fated mate,” I explain. “But it’s usually not necessary. There’s a reason mates are chosen, even if it’s not obvious right away.”

She doesn’t say anything else so I stay silent too until we get to her house. Her aunt comes rushing out the front door as we walk up.

“Sadie, are you okay? The school just called and said you left, I was so worried.”

Sadie looks between her aunt and me. “Things at school got a little intense. I just had to get some fresh air.”

I’m not sure if she’s going to tell her aunt what we talked about, so I decide that I will. She needs to talk about this with someone she trusts. “Mrs Miller, I was just telling Sadie about the pack and her place in it, but I think she still has some questions.”

Mrs Miller’s mouth falls open as she looks at me. She definitely wasn’t expecting that, and her eyes move nervously from me to Sadie. “Oh. Well, thank you, Logan. Do you want to come in?”

I kind of do, but I think it’s better that they talk in private, so I decline. “No, thanks, I need to go check in with my father. I’ll see you at school tomorrow, Sadie.”

Then I turn and walk away, leaving them to what I’m guessing will be a very awkward conversation.

By the time I get back to the pack house, my dad is already back from Northaven, they must have called him back after the infiltration at the school.

“Where have you been?” he asks as I walk into his office. He’s not angry, just curious. “I called the school but they said you’d gone.”

“Just looking out for someone,” I say vaguely. He’s got more important things to worry about than Sadie right now. “What do we know about the guy from the school?”

“Not much,” he admits. “Aldric is questioning him now.”

Poor bastard, I think. I’ve never met anyone who can stand up to our Beta’s interrogations.

“But it’s Northaven I want to talk to you about,” my dad continues, pointing at the chair on the other side of the desk. I sit down, waiting for him to explain. “It’s pretty much exactly the same thing that Moon Valley reported, except this time it’s even more obvious that it’s a mistake.”

I frown as I try to figure out what that means. The report we had from Moon Valley last week was the first time I’d ever heard of anything like this happening. Two young werewolves, one 19 and one 20, suddenly discovered they were mates. On the surface there was nothing odd about that, except that they had worked together in the same team for more than a year, seen each other every day, and there had never been a hint of them being mates before. Then out of the blue, both of their wolves declared that they were mates after all, even though their human sides had no attraction to each other.

Confused, they’d gone to their Alpha for help, and he in turn had reached out to the other Alphas in the area, including my dad, to see if any of them had heard of this happening before. Nobody had.

Until now, I guess. “What happened in Northaven?”

“A girl turned 18,” my dad explains. “And found her mate at her birthday party.”

So far it sounds normal enough. I wait for the catch.

“It was her brother.”

I wince. “That’s not possible, is it? Unless he’s adopted or something?”

“He’s not adopted,” my dad says. “Neither of them are. They’re biologically brother and sister, and no, it’s not possible. So I think we have to accept that something very strange is happening. The moon goddess’ instructions are getting scrambled somehow, and if we don’t figure out how to fix it, we could all end up in a very big mess.”