Pursuing My Rejected Luna by Cara Anderson novel Chapter 217

Chapter 217

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I push past my thoughts on sharing Skye with Nicolai, content with the conclusion they brought me to. But there’s one other consideration that’s keeping me awake. I don’t have a pack.

I’ve been turning this idea over since long before I spoke the plan into being and I’m turning it over now, in the dark, with the honesty that darkness allows. I’m not an Alpha in the conventional sense anymore. An Alpha by birth, sure. My Alpha wolf will always be a part of me. But I’m no longer a pack Alpha.

Consort Alpha is something else-something that carries weight but different weight than leading a pack of my own. Some mornings this sits in my chest as a loss. This is not one of those mornings. Instead, I’m choosing to focus on what I have.

I have the world’s most perfect son, Benji, down the hall with Rena, probably missing Mama and Dada and Ni, but blissfully unaware of the ordeal his mother suffered and everything that followed. I get to raise him to be a better man than me, and never miss a single minute because of a pack obligation I have to put before my own family.

I have Skye, asleep between me and Nicolai, marked by both of us and having marked both of us in return, looking more peaceful than I have ever seen her look. I get the privilege of spending everyday seeing her beautiful face, looking at me like a gift instead of the burden I’d been to her. I get to love her, and make love to her, and all the packs and power in the world can’t replace the joy that brings me.

And I get Nicolai, the man across from me who made room for me when he didn’t have to. When making room cost him more than I deserved, but did it anyway because she needed him to. And it turns out, that’s a bonus I never counted on but now that I have it, I can’t imagine it any other way.

I have a life that is-

Ironwood was what I had. But this is what I want.

Skye wakes while I’m still thinking. Her eyes open and find me immediately-she has this talent for immediately homing in on whoever is watching her, the wolf-sense of attention.

She reads my expression. “Stop looking at me like that,” she insists, but there’s a smile in her words.

“Like what?” I pretend I don’t know what she means.

“Like you’re doing math and I’m the equation you’re trying to solve.”

“I am doing math.” I admit.

“Jaxon.” She shifts slightly, careful of her wrists, which forces me to hold back a growl. “What’s the answer?”

I look at her. At the woman who has fought so hard to become her own person and build the life she wants and now this-mine, chosen by me and choosing me back with full knowledge of how little I deserve it.

“That you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me and I’m exactly where I should be,” I answer, leaning down to press a featherlight kiss to her lips because I can and I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of her.

She holds my gaze for a long moment. “Yes,” she agrees. “You are.”

“How are your wrists?” I ask, bringing up the topic I’d rather not but can’t ignore any longer.

“Sore.” She winces, like the question reminded her of more than the physical pain.

“That’s not “I start to rise, to find a first aid kit or… I don’t know, something.

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“They’re okay, Jaxon. Dr. Chernov looked at them.” She reaches up and puts one hand on my chest to calm me. Stop worrying about my wrists.”

“I’ll stop worrying about your wrists when they don’t look like that.”

“Then you’ll be worrying for about a week. Find something else to do with the energy.” she scolds.

I have thoughts about that.” I adopt a playful tone to lighten the mood.

The corner of her mouth moves. “The heat is over.”

“I know. I still have thoughts.”

She looks at me with the expression she has when she’s decided not to dignify something with a response but is also not disagreeing.

“Sleep,” she orders.

You’re not sleeping.” I point out.

“I was until you started doing math at me. I can feel you ruminating in the bond.”

“I wasn’t doing math at you, I was doing math near you.”

“Jaxon.”

“Skye.”

She closes her eyes deliberately. Then opens one. “Are you actually going to sleep?”

“Yes,” I sigh happily, pulling her tight against me.

She closes the eye again, humming a peaceful, contented sound. I watch her for another few minutes, reassuring myself that she’s real and she’s here and truly mine. Then I sleep.

When I wake next it’s already mid-morning and Skye’s scent has returned to normal. Benji arrives, Rena delivering him to our door with the characteristic efficiency of someone who has seen many things in this house and formed opinions about none of them. Especially not her employer helping his mate through her heat.

“He had breakfast,” Rena says, which is Rena’s way of saying he’s been fed so don’t be fooled when he claims otherwise.

“Thank you, Rena,” Skye rushes to take him from her arms, kissing his chubby little face and telling him how much she’s missed him.

Rena leaves and Benji surveys the room, his mother’s tight hold a momentary inconvenience to his plans. He reaches for me first, which I receive as the compliment it is, and I take him and he immediately attempts to investigate my face with both hands, which is his standard greeting protocol.

“Good morning,” I coo at him.

“Dada,” he says.

Just that. His chosen name for me, clear, with the confidence of someone who learned a word and has been waiting to impress us with it.

I smile so wide my cheeks hurt. “Yeah,” I say. “That’s me.”

He grabs my nose. I let him keep it.

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Breakfast is the specific chaos of a kitchen containing one almost-one-year-old who doesn’t want to sit still but does want to touch everything and three adults who are all, in their various ways, processing the events of the last fey-days.

Benji has decided today is a day for asserting dominance over his cereal. He picks up pieces and examines them. Puts some in his mouth. Returns others to the bowl. Puts one in his hair with a sense of purpose that suggests this was intentional.

Nicolai removes it without even looking up from his coffee.

“He did that on purpose,” I say, eyebrow raised.

“I know,” Nicolai admits.

“Are you going to say anything to him?” I poke at him.

“He’s eleven months old.”

“He did it with intent.” I keep poking.

“He has his mother’s stubbornness and your conviction that he can do whatever he decides to do. I choose my battles.” He states with complete seriousness, his expression never changing.

Skye, across the table, huffs indignantly. “I heard all of that.”

“You were meant to,” Nicolai shrugs.

She looks at me. I look at her. We both burst out laughing. But as the laughter trails off and her smile fades, it’s replaced by something deeper, something like pride.

Our gazes lock over Benji’s head, over the cereal that is now partially on the tray and partially on Benji and partially somewhere that will require investigation later-she looks at me with the expression that contains everything.

Look at this. Look at what we built. Look at this ridiculous perfect morning.

I do look. And I agree with everything she’s saying.

Nicolai disappears into his office after breakfast. But I hear the strain in his voice through the door-the tone that means he’s not having a conversation so much as conducting one.

I’m in the hallway with Benji on my hip when Skye appears beside me.

“He’s making calls,” she says pointedly. “About Savin.”

“And Volkov,” I add. “And the packs that closed their doors on us.”

She’s quiet for a moment, looking at the closed office door. “Should we be worried?” she asks.

I think about the basement room in this very house. The man who didn’t want to talk and what it took to make him talk and what it said about Nicolai Woolf that he was willing to do it-for her, specifically, for all of us-and that he did it without hesitation.

“We should not be worried,” I tell her. “Other people should be worried though.”

Something flickers in her expression. Not quite a smile-more the look of a woman who understands exactly what she chose and has no reservations about it.

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“Okay,” she grins and reaches for my hand. “Then let’s go see what he’s decided to destroy next,” she says, gesturing at Benji, who is currently investigating my collar with scientific focus.

“He already got the cereal,” I say.

“He’s ambitious,” Skye says. “He’ll find something.”

She’s right. She usually is.

I follow her down the hall, my son on my hip and her hand in mine, toward whatever ordinary extraordinary thing

comes next.

Cara Anderson Author

Thank you for reading!

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