Where The Ice Gives Way (Charlotte and Blake) novel Chapter 253

hapter 253 A Whole Family

Charlotte

I really, really want to go after them. But I make myself stay, because I know my brother, and I know he’s got this.

The pack slowly returns to itself around me. Conversations pick back up, and people star: moving again. Mara drifts from table to table with gentle hands and a warm smile, making sure everyone has enough food and making sure Jess’s family feel welcome.

Callum and Elena sit with Gareth under one of the marquees, both of them wrapped around untouched mugs of coffee, their bodies turned slightly toward the house. I can see they are trying not to stare at the door their daughter disappeared through, but they do anyway.

Blake steps up beside me and slides his hand into mine. “She’ll be okay.”

I lean into his embrace as his hand smooths over my hair. “I know.”

After a while, when the urge to check on her becomes too much to ignore, I squeeze Blake’s fingers and pull away.

“I’m going to make sure they’re alright.”

He nods. “Take your time.”

I head through the house, past the kitchen where Emily and Theo are stealing something from a tray out of the oven, then up the stairs. I pause outside

Charlie’s door and knock gently.

“It’s me,” I call.

There is a second of silence before Jess tells me to come in.

I open the door slowly, already bracing for tears and panic.

Instead, I find my brother’s wolf sprawled across the floor with his massive head in Jess’s lap.

Titan looks ridiculous.

The great black wolf who has torn through rogues and wars is lying there with his ears relaxed, his eyes half closed, and his entire body sprawled across the

(* floor with Jess’s hands buried in his fur.

She looks up at me, her mouth twitching the second she sees my face.

“He’s basically a puppy,” she says.

Titan huffs before burying his head further into her.

A laugh slips out of me, and I slap my hand over my mouth. “Don’t let him hear you say that. He has a very fragile ego.”

Jess looks down at him. “Do you?”

Titan thomps his tail once against the floor.

11:16 am Ppp.

Chapter 253-A Whole Family

“Seet” I say: “Devastated.”

F

Jess snorts, and her smile fades almost as quickly as it came, but it leaves something softer behind.

I step inside and sit beside her on the floor.

Titan lifts one eye to me, then closes it again when I don’t try to move him.

“How are you doing?” I ask gently, nudging her with my shoulder.

Jess shrugs, her fingers still moving through Titan’s fur. “I don’t know.”

“Mmm. Fair.”

Her throat bobs as she swallows and her hand moves absentmindedly. “It’s happening anyway, right?”

I slide closer and wrap my arm around her shoulders.

She comes into me, one hand still buried in Titan’s fur, her forehead dropping against my shoulder with a small, broken breath. I hold her tight and close

my eyes

es as Shanti presses against my ribs, aching for her.

“It’s happening,” I whisper. “But you’ve got a whole new family here to help you through it.” I rest my cheek lightly against her hair

She takes my hand in hers, and we sit like that for a while, Jess tucked under my arm, Titan’s head heavy in her lap, the strange peace of it filling Charlie’s

room.

Eventually, I rub my hand over her shoulder. “Do you want to come downstairs and meet some of them? No pressure,” I add quickly. “But they came because

they care. Some of them have been through rough shifts and can be pretty helpful.”

Jess lets out a breath through her nose, then looks down at Titan. “Will there be coffee?”

I laugh. “Of course.”

“Good coffee?”

“Mara has the best.”

She nods once, as if that decides it. “Okay. I can meet a few wolves if there is coffee.”

1 squeeze her one more time before letting go. “I’ll see you down there?”

jess nods, and Titan lifts his head from her lap with the kind of reluctance that makes me bite back another laugh.

I leave them to it and head downstairs, feeling lighter than I did when I went up.

Blake is waiting near one of the tables with a plate in his hand, piled with eggs, toast, sausages, mushrooms, and enough bacon to make it clear he has

either overestimated my hunger or knows me too well.

“You got me food?” I ask, slipping in beside him.

He puffs his chest with a wide smile. “I’m a thoughtful mate,”

11:16 am

PPP.

Chapter 253 A Whole Family

I take the plate with a smile; and Blake sits beside me, hits knee pressing against mine under the table.

A few minutes later, Charlie conies out with less, hand in hand.

Charlie’s shirt is inside out, his grin wide as he heads straight for the coffee stand with her.

Mara heads straight for them, her smile gentle as she says something soft enough that I can’t hear it from here.

One by one, the pack meets her, and slowly, beautifully, less starts to look a little more relaxed.

Blake’s hand finds mine under the table.

“This is perfect,” he says quietly.

I glance at him. “What is?”

He nods toward the yard, toward Jess and Charlie, Theo and Emily, the pack moving around them, the whole strange future arranging itself in front of us

piece by piece. “This. Everyone.”

I raise an eyebrow at him suspiciously.

Blake smirks before he reaches into his pocket, pulls out a set of keys, and places them on the table in front of me.

“What are these?”

His smirk softens into something warmer, more nervous, and suddenly my heart starts doing stupid things inside my chest.

“With school ending soon, we’re all going to start taking on more of our roles,” he says.

Blake nods past the fence, toward the property on the other side of the Atlases’ house. Not Theo’s side. The other one. The large house I have seen a hundred times and never really looked at twice, with its wide porch, tall windows, and snow gathered along the roofline.

“I bought it for us.”

I suck in a loud breath as my eyes shoot from him to the house. “You bought it for us?”

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