When We Were Mates (Demetra and Emris) novel Chapter 135

Chapter 135

Demetra Pride Covenant.

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“Someone is coming shortly to take the kids to the Lion Pride pack. Make sure you let me know the moment they arrive-”

“Luna?”

Silver’s voice pulls me back from the mental list I’ve been running since I opened my eyes this morning. He’s standing in the doorway of the room.

“The elders are already gathered. Any sign of Alpha Emris joining us this morning?”

“I’ll check,” I say, and the Delta nods and steps back and I keep moving because if I stop moving I’m going to have to feel everything from last night all over again and I genuinely cannot afford that right now.

Silver follows me and I feel his eyes on the side of my face the whole time.

He wants to know if Emris is okay.

I don’t know if Emris is okay. He sent me out of his room last night and I walked out because he asked me to and because I didn’t know what else to do.

Because I have never in my life seen Emris cry like that and something about witnessing it made all my words disappear. What do you say to someone who lost a lot in one night? What sentence exists that covers your brother betrayed you and the child you raised might not be yours at the same time? I stood on the other side of that door for a full minute before I made myself walk away.

“Was he… okay last night?”

“Of course he wasn’t okay.” It comes out sharper than Silver deserves and I see him absorb it without flinching, which is why I like Silver.

“I’ll go stall the elders. See if you can get him.”

He walks off and I head straight for the Alpha Groove.

I didn’t hear any movement from his room while I was in the shower this morning, and I told myself that was fine…that Emris was sleeping, that his body was healing from the fight. I wanted to go in and help him clean the wounds. I wanted to sit with him in the dark and not say anything, just be there-

But he asked me to leave.

So I left.

I knock on his door which I never do.

I get nothing back. I push it open and move through the study, the sitting area, checking each room until I hear it. The shower, running. I lean toward the bathroom door.

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Chapter 135

“Emris?”

“Mmmh.”

“The pack meeting is about to start. I mean…it’s already started, technically. They’re waiting.”

“I’ll be there.”

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His voice comes through the door flat and cold in a way that sits wrong in my chest. Like something hardened overnight. Like he took everything from last night and compressed it into something dense and quiet that I’m not sure I know how to reach into.

I press my forehead against the door and my hand finds the wood beside it.

“Um – I’m sending Amira and Milo to stay with my dad. Just until we understand what’s happening in the pack. I don’t want them overhearing things right now.” I pause. “I’m sorry I didn’t ask you first.”

Silence.

The shower keeps running. Why is he not saying anything? Should I have done that?

I reach for the door handle…not sure what I’m planning to do, open it, stand there, something-

“Okay.”

Emris says and I let go of the handle. I press my lips together and tell myself very firmly that he is going to come out of that bathroom and come to this meeting and I am going to see his face. Demetra, calm yourself down. He’s going to come out regardless. I turn and walk away before I can talk myself into knocking again.

I make it around the corner before I almost walk directly into Derisha.

“Where the hell are the kids off to?”

“Lion Pride pack.”

“Does Emris know-”

“Yes.”

“Have you seen him this morning?”

“Not

yet.

What do you want to ask? The elders are already in there, Derisha, we don’t have time for-”

Her hand closes around my arm and she turns me around with a firmness that catches me off guard.

“There’s a reason Elena and Regan left this house as fast as they did last night! If Emris sees either one of them right now, he will rip their heads off their shoulders. And I am not speaking metaphorically.”

I look at her.

“A…and?”

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Chapter 135

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She stares at me like I’ve said something stupid.

“AND the last thing you want to do is walk him straight into a room full of elders asking questions he doesn’t want to answer. Demetra. He is not okay right now. His eyes were in slits last night… full slits and the last time that happened-” She stops.

“If you have not seen him this morning then it’s possible that his eyes are back in slits! Slits are fine in battle. But he’s not in battle anymore. He’s home, with his wolf running on grief and rage and that combination in an Alpha-”

“Psst.”

Silver pokes his head out of the office door. I look back at Derisha and then I catch Summer at the far end of the hallway, nodding that Aunt Scotty is here for the kids.

I walk into the office with a chill on my shoulder.

The argument happening inside it dies the moment I appear. Every head turns. Elders, senior pack members…all of them looking at me with the particular energy of people who have been talking about you and have not decided yet how much to say to your face.

I stand at the head of the table.

“Luna, the whole pack is saying the Lycan has a rightful claim to the Alpha seat—”

“They’re talking about how he demonstrated his strength last night in front of—”

“Is there going to be an Alpha contest? Because if there is, the pack needs to be prepared—”

“Can we address the more pressing issue? The elders were close enough to hear what the Lycan said about Regan and Elena. About Milo not being the Alpha’s biological son-”

“And what exactly was the Lycan’s reason for taking you, Luna?”

“It seems clear that the Lycan’s intention was-”

“Can all of you just-” I raise one hand and press my lips together before I say something I genuinely cannot take back. Deep breath. “Not say that word? Please. For your own good. All of you, sit down.”

Silver catches my eye from across the room.

The room shuffles and people sit.

“Luna-”

“Luna, we really must-”

“One after the other.” I stay standing, hands flat on the table, and look at the first face I find. “As for the Regan situation… it isn’t true. Milo is Emris’s son. Full stop.” I watch eyebrows, exchanged glances as they look at each other so I get up.

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Chapter 135

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“The Lycan said what he said because he wanted to destabilize Emris’s rule. He assumed Milo was the next heir of the Black Covenant Pack and he thought that lie would shake the foundation. It didn’t work. Partly because he apparently didn’t know Amira already carried the title. So please, end that rumour. Today.”

“Are you are you certain, Luna?”

–

“If Emris hears either of you asking me that question, I want you to know that I will not be able to stop what happens next. So you have two choices. You can take my word for it, or you can go knock on his door and ask him yourself. Choose.”

Every back in the room straightens simultaneously. Nobody speaks.

“Is there going to be an Alpha contest?”

“You watched what happened last night,” Silver says from the corner, “and you still need to ask that?”

“Then, is our Alpha going to win? Jasmine, you saw his wounds. How deep-”

“The Lycan ran.” Jasmine says simply.

“Damn right he did!”

“Thank you, Jasmine. Remarkably helpful. If there are any more questions, ask Silver. He’s the Beta.” I say and I’m out the door.

I am moving fast because if I stand in that room for one more minute someone is going to ask me directly why the Lycan took me, and if I have to sit across from elders and explain compulsion and that kiss that happened in that club. Who knows someone may want to insinuate that the Lycan did more than kissing?

They’ll want to know what exactly happened in those woods before the pack arrived.

“Luna.”

Summer screeches directly in front of me and I stop just before walking into her.

“Emris didn’t come out?”

“No. He went to the training area instead. And-” she shifts slightly, “-you have a guest.”

In the middle of Deltas moving back and forth through the corridor, I see Riley.

My brain takes a second to place the context and there! Last night, she was the one who saved me from the Lycan’s side kick.

I haven’t thanked her so I close the distance and pull her into a hug.

“It’s you.” I hold her hand when I pull back, probably squeezing too hard. “You saved me last night.”

“Hardly, Luna-”

“No… no, please, just call me Demetra. I need to feel like I’m talking to an actual person right now and not

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Chapter 135

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The corner of her mouth lifts. “Alright. Demetra.”

I look at her properly for the first time. Brown hair, long, a scatter of freckles across her nose that somehow makes her look younger and older at the same time. She’s tall in a model way and there’s something in the way she stands that makes her so confident.

I am immediately in awe of her.

“Thank you. Genuinely. Thank you for what you did.”

“The Alpha was already there and I was technically out of line….we were told to stand down and wait for command. But I couldn’t just stand there watching that girl put her hands on you.” She shrugs with one shoulder. “So.”

“Wait…we?” I squint.

Why does she say that…like she’s a Delta?

“Yeah. I graduated from Delta a while back and spent some time overseas training. Picked up a few things.”

A few things. She says it like she maybe learned a new recipe like she didn’t take down a trained Lycan ally.

I think about last night. About myself stumbling through those woods in a dress, crying and screaming and barely able to scratch Eva’s wrist before she bent my arm back like it was nothing. I am an Alpha’s daughter but I spent last night proving that absolutely none of that translated into any kind of physical capability whatsoever.

Like I’m literally powerless.

Why couldn’t I run faster? Why couldn’t I fight back harder?

I need to fix that. I don’t know how yet but I need to fix it.

“That’s amazing, Riley. Emris… he’s not really available right now, but I know he’d want to thank you too. As you can probably see, the pack is in complete shambles at the moment.”

“Oh, I can see that-”

“LUNAAA.”

Summer’s phone hits her ear and then she sprints back toward me.

“I just got a message from Jupiter! The Alpha is in the training area. He’s…taking down everyone. Both Zetas and Deltas. They’re sending the exclusive Zetas down now to try to pull him back.”

15:52 Tue, May 19

Chapter 136