Scratch the Surface (Wolf Within) (35 page)

They’d been bond mates for almost two decades. They’d always been a triad. Peter and Vaughn had grown up together in the same birth pack. They’d been inseparable since they could walk. Peter had been older by only a year.

They’d met Callie at a Regional in Maine when Vaughn had been sixteen and Peter and Callie had been seventeen. They’d bonded four years later at another Regional, this one in Connecticut, and they’d formed Riverglow with Jonathan and Nora.

They’d been Alphas of the pack for seven years before Jonathan and Nora took over.

When Grey and I had joined, they’d been Alphas. The transition to Jonathan and Nora had happened the same year Grey and I had bonded with Elena.

Vaughn had spent more than half his life with Callie and he had nothing to say at her funeral.

Reverently, he picked up Peter’s urn and removed the top. He had to stand very still for a moment before he brought himself to take a handful of the cremains.

“My brother,” he whispered, a cheated smile flashing across his face. “I try to tell myself that this is the way you’d have wanted it. That you wouldn’t have wanted to know the truth. Died loving her as much as you always and ever have. I’ve been telling myself that for days now but I don’t think I believe it. Maybe that’s why I’ve been left behind because I don’t believe in anything.” He closed his eyes and a flock of starlings burst from the tree tops and swirled together high above his head. I could hear their flapping wings, the muted flutter of their rapid heartbeats before they were gone, as if they’d never been.

“Goodbye,” said Vaughn and he sprinkled Peter’s ashes in a circle around himself.

He came to stand beside me and I took his hand. He leaned against me for comfort but kept his eyes fixed to the center of the circle.

One by one people stepped into the center of the circle. Everyone had something good to say about Peter. Jonathan cried. Nora didn’t. Today she did not smell of alcohol, only perfume.

Murphy said things in Irish for Callie but he spoke English for Peter. He said, “Of everyone in Riverglow, you tried to make it right and, at least with me, you did. I would have been proud to call you friend if time had allowed. You’ll be missed, Peter Gardiner, of that I have no doubt.”

Then it was my turn and I had to let go of Vaughn’s hand to step into the circle.

I picked up Peter’s urn first and, although I told myself I wouldn’t cry, I did.

“There’s a lot of things to remember about you, Peter,” I said when I could. “But I’ll always remember you’re the one who showed me how to put ketchup on my eggs.”

Nora started to laugh a little then even she began to cry.

“You made the best breakfasts in the world, but they were always just a little bit better with lots of ketchup.”

Even Vaughn smiled then and I sprinkled some of Peter’s ashes around in a circle, remembering him standing behind the stove in the kitchen Callie had never liked, spatula in one hand, beer in the other because, just as much as ketchup, Peter had loved beer with breakfast. Of course by the time all of us had rolled out of bed the morning after shifting and gotten our bleary asses to the table, it had been past noon so it wasn’t so much breakfast as brunch.

I remembered the handful of times Peter and I had gone to bed together—how he would pick me up in a bear hug and nail me against the wall, my legs locked around his waist as he told me how goddamn hot I was and I’d be reduced to shivering jelly, secretly wishing Grey would do me against the wall like that but he never had.

My eyes shut, I let myself think about Peter for a moment. I hoped like hell he wasn’t walking like Grandfather Tobias, that he wasn’t still lingering like Grey and Elena had for me. “
I’ll watch over Vaughn,
” I whispered inside my head to him, not knowing if he could hear, but compelled to say it anyway
.
“
You go ahead and I’ll take care of him, Peter, I swear
.
”

Callie’s urn wasn’t heavy but it seemed to weigh a ton in my hands. It was mostly empty by now because I was the last inside the circle.

At first I didn’t know what to say, if I could say anything, if I’d be like most of them who’d gone before me, who hadn’t said anything, but had simply sifted her ashes through their gloved fingers and walked away.

But the words suddenly came to me and I spoke them aloud in a voice that was steady and determined. “I’ll remember you too, Callie. I’ll remember you and hope for myself that I never want something so much that I forget what I already have.”

Vaughn bowed his head. Devon Talbot stood beside her bond mate, tears coursing down her cheeks. Colin Hunter nodded and looked across the circle at Murphy, who stared at me.

I stared back, while above our heads the starlings swirled out of the tree tops and darted in and out of the branches before flying away to find a quieter roost.

Amy Lee Burgess

Why do I write? Since I was a child I’ve sent myself to sleep by planning stories. It took me until I was ten to figure out I needed to write them down as well as imagine them. After that, I tortured my friends reading them all aloud and if they were nice to me, they got a character named for them. Yeah, okay, I usually killed them off, but every story needs some dramatic tension, right?

Nowadays I only kill off purely fictional characters who may or may not be based on hot Hollywood actors. Unlike my friends, they never complain.

I grew up in Connecticut and the towns and parks mentioned in this novel are all real, although I’ve taken certain liberties with some of them. I live and work in Houston these days, but New England remains a limitless source of inspiration.
 

I’m fascinated with the concept of shapeshifting and what a person might discover about herself if she could find and release the wolf within. Stanzie’s continuing story is my exploration as much as it is hers.

Amy’s Website:

http://amyleeburgess.blogspot.com/

Reader eMail:

[email protected]

Also by Amy Lee Burgess

The Wolf Within

Beneath the Skin

Hidden in Plain Sight

Inside Out

About Face

Across the Line

Lyrical Press books are published by

Kensington Publishing Corp. 119 West 40th Street New York, NY 10018

Copyright © 2012, Amy Lee Burgess

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

Lyrical Press and the L logo are trademarks of Kensington Publishing Corp.

First Electronic Edition: March, 2012

ISBN-13: 9781616503499