Pursuing My Rejected Luna by Cara Anderson novel Chapter 221

Chapter 221

Skye

A year has flown by and I have no idea where the time has gone!

I suppose that’s not entirely true. They say time flies when you’re having fun. But I think time has a way of slipping through your fingers when you’re so focused on putting out fires that you don’t take the time to soak in all the good moments.

Going from watching Jaxon choose my sister over me to finally leaving him to navigating a new life, a new relationship, and the birth of our son and new motherhood has felt very much like firefighting. Not to mention falling in love with Jaxon all over again and the complications that presented.

But today is Benji’s first birthday and we finally have a chance to slow down and celebrate.

The garden is set up for it-not elaborately, but warmly. Flowers from the garden. A cake that Rena made and that Benji will almost certainly wear more of than he eats. Just an intimate affair with our closest friends and family.

My father and Diana drove from the southern pack. Marco spent the first twenty minutes after their arrival conducting his own assessment of Jaxon in the particular way of a father who knows his daughter was hurt before and is skeptical that it won’t happen again. Jaxon listens good-naturedly, taking it all in stride.

Noah, who drove from Ironwood -Alpha of his own pack now, standing differently than he did even six months ago. He holds Benji and Benji grabs his collar with the usual authority and Noah looks at him with an expression I recognize: someone who is starting to want something he hasn’t named yet. The purple under his eyes suggests he’s not sleeping much but I guess that’s to be expected for a new Alpha finding his way.

Dimitri attends too, of course, bringing an extremely practical gift of a toddler drum set and looking extremely proud of himself as Benji bangs away on it. He watches the proceedings with the affection of a man who has been in this family longer than most of the people at this party.

Rena and Mikhail, the people who have made this house function, are here as well.

And us. The three of us, and Benji, who is the reason any of us are here in the first place.

The cake moment arrives. Benji receives it with the focused intensity of someone encountering something new and deciding how he feels about it. He touches the frosting first. Examines his fingers. Makes a decision.

The decision is apparently yes. He proceeds with enthusiasm, smashing his piece into his tray and smearing more on his face than makes it into his mouth.

“He’s your son,” Nicolai says to Jaxon. “He barely examined that cake before bulldozing right through it.”

“He tested the frosting on the cake before he got it on himself,” Jaxon rebuts. “That showed an appropriate level of restraint.”

“He’s one.”

“He has his priorities straight.”

I’m not listening to this conversation. I’m watching both of them.

Nicolai, who showed up for me in so many ways before he ever admitted why, refusing to pressure me. Who has spent a year learning to hold his wants with enough looseness for all of us to breathe. Who dismantles networks that threaten his family, and then comes to the birthday party and removes frosting from his son’s hair without

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Jaxon, who gave up a pack and meant it when he said it was the right trade. Who is standing in this garden with

is-son on his first birthday looking at him with the expression of a man who finally knows what he has. An expression that says he has everything.

I wouldn’t change anything, I think.

Not the three years, even. Not the damage or the divorce or the custody battle or the kidnapping or the eleven months of missing heat or the bond that formed and broke and formed again.

All of it led here. And here is-

Here is my son with cake on his face. Both my mates arguing amiably about a one year old’s priorities. My aunt who I may never have forgiven if things hadn’t happened the way they did, watching Jaxon with the hopeful expression of someone who has provisionally decided he might be acceptable. My father presiding over all of it with the look of a man who couldn’t be happier.

All of it.

I wouldn’t change a piece of it.

Later, when everyone has gone home or retired to their rooms for the night and all is quiet, I do the math again. The same math I was doing this time almost a year ago. The kind you do in the privacy of the bathroom because you don’t want anyone to know until you’re sure.

Counting backwards in my head, I run through the calculations one more time; the same ones I’ve been doing for the last two weeks. The heat. The timing. The awareness my wolf has been carrying.

I’ve been here before-the secret appointment, the deliberate decision to gather information before burdening anyone else with it. But this time is different.

Last time I’d given up hope so the truth took me by surprise. Last time I was blindsided by my sister’s arrival and Jaxon’s ultimate betrayal. This time I know what’s possible. This time, I have two mates who will be by my side, holding my hand the whole way.

I’m not going to say anything yet. It’s too early-too soon after the heat to be certain. But I can’t help the excitement that washes over me every time I consider the possibility. So far from the heartache and anxiety I felt last time.

I’ll know in another week. I’ll tell them when I know.

I look at myself in the mirror for a moment. The mating marks on both shoulders-one a little older, settled; one newer, still with the quality of something that just found its permanent form.

I press my hand flat against my stomach.

One thing at a time, I think. There’s so much to celebrate in the meantime.

I step out of the bathroom to find our bedroom still empty. But I can hear them talking from somewhere inside the house. It’s a familiar sound now-the sounds of a life that has settled into its own rhythms.

My house. My life. My son, who is asleep upstairs, having just celebrated his first birthday. And my mates, who are somewhere inside, doing absolutely nothing special, but doing it together.

I look out at the garden where I’ve done so much thinking-where things have become clear to me, where I’ve admitted things to myself I wasn’t ready to say out loud, where my heat started and everything changed, becoming exactly what it was meant to be.

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“I’m home,” I say.

Not to anyone. To all of them. To the version of me who spent three years in another house waiting to be chosen, waiting to feel like she belonged somewhere.

To the version of me who stood in a garden at a different estate and thought: I can’t do this much longer. To the version of me who is standing here now, with two marks on her shoulders and a child asleep upstairs and a life that may not be conventional but is mine.

I’m home.

Cara Anderson Author

Thank you for reading! I’m only able to post one update today as I’ve been without power for 2 days thanks to Hurricane Lala. I am having a medical procedure tomorrow so I may not be able to update but will try to if I can. If not, I will resume the day after for sure. I appreciate all of you!

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