Page 70 of Shadow of Fury
“Darren and the other elders will have a better idea of the order things need to happen in but I know there’s a ceremony the new Pack Alpha has to undergo for it to be official. We’ll want to get that rolling as soon as possible. Then, as soon as that’s done, I want to announce that our mating ceremony will be on the new moon.”
“So soon?” Wren blinked in surprise.
She’d expected that their mating ceremony, aka their wedding, would have to take a backseat to the important responsibilities the new Alpha would have to the pack. She had been okay with that too. She and Logan were mated in all the most important ways. They and their animals were bonded. Nothing could come between them. The mating ceremony was for celebration and to be honest, as much as Wren would like to celebrate that the evil Pack Alpha was dead, he had still been Logan’s father and there was a funeral to plan, plus Vivian was still in the hospital. A wedding could wait given everything else they had to deal with now.
“We’ve lost enough time together already. We both know this is forever and it’ll give the pack something to celebrate. They’re going to need it after I spill all my father’s dark, dirty dealings to them. Besides, it’ll officially make you my Queen in the eyes of the pack and this Alpha needs his Queen.”
“Well, if you need me, I suppose I could find a dress before the next new moon.” she teased as he played with her hair but when he remained quiet she glanced up at him again, “What are you thinking?”
“We should go and talk to your parents before I make any announcements.”
Wren winced at the very mention of them, “This isn’t the middle ages. You don’t need their permission to marry me and besides, we’re already mated.”
“Still, considering our history, I think they should hear it from us, don’t you think?” He met her gaze and she saw the worry hidden in the glittery depths. “I need to tell them the truth about Lark’s death as well but maybe those two things shouldn’t be broached in the same conversation.”
She groaned and rolled off of him to her back. She stared up at the trees overhead instead of looking at him. He was right of course, that her parents had to be told, and not just about their mating. She just didn’t want to be the one to do it, and she certainly didn’t want to do it today when finally, for once in her life, she felt happy and content.
“I know your relationship with them can’t have been easy so if you want…” Logan started and she glanced at him quickly.
“We can wait?”
He chuckled, “I was going to say I could go alone while you talk to your sister.”
She groaned, “Ugh, why do you have to be such a good guy? It makes it really hard to hate you when you insist on doing the right thing all the time.”
“I thought you said you didn’t hate me anymore?” His eyes sparkled as he leaned up on one elbow to look down at her.
“Thin line between love and hate, right?”
“Wren Culvert, are you saying what I think you’re saying?” He grinned and she rolled her eyes.
“You need me to say the words?”
“I do.” He nuzzled his lips against the spot on her collarbone where his mark resided. “I really do.”
“I love you, Logan. I didn’t want to. I’m still not one hundred percent convinced it’ll work considering everything we’re up against, but I love you and you’re mine and I’m yours and the rest will just have to work itself out.”
He chuckled, “Maybe we can work on you sounding less pained by the idea the next time you say you love me.”
“Shut up and say it back.” she prodded and he grinned.
“I told you already, I love you.” he grunted when she elbowed him, “I don’t care if you think it didn’t count. It does. Because everything with you counts, everything with you matters, Wren, because you matter more to me than anyone or anything.”
“Even more than your pack?”
“Our pack.” he corrected, “But yes. If I had to choose between you and this pack, between you and anyone or anything, I will choose you every single time.”
Wren’s heart clenched tight in her chest and she blinked back a rush of tears. She pulled Logan down and kissed him hard, telling him with her mouth if not her words just what that meant to her. Nobody had ever chosen her, but he had, and he would, and that was the foundation they would build the rest of their lives together on.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Logan stood on top of a hill in a large clearing that wasn’t on any map he’d ever seen of Shadow Pines pack territory. It was a strange field, with what looked to be rows carved into it. Some lines were higher and others sank lower. The whole field was covered in grass and a few small trees were beginning to grow in one corner. If he’d stumbled across this place on his own, he’d have been captivated by the wonder of nature, that she could create such a place in the middle of a forest of trees, but he hadn’t come across it by accident and he knew for a fact it was manmade. exactly what each of those rows held beneath them.
The field was a graveyard and each of those hills hid a body. An unmarked grave for a pack member was usually a sign that the wolf had wronged the pack in some way. The people buried here though, had only slighted one man. The sheer magnitude of unmarked graves and the dishonor his father had given these pack members, even in death, made him sick to his stomach.
The night he and Dominic had gone to see Darren McMurtry, Logan had learned some of his father’s most horrifying secrets. Like Logan, the power of Byron’s hold on Darren had been lessening as the Alpha weakened. The elderly man hadn’t been able to tell them everything but he’d said enough that Logan had gotten a pretty horrible picture of just what his father had been up to, and what his mother had been trying to tell him from her deathbed.
She had been right. His father was the illness. The fact that she had spent her last moments on this earth trying to undo the damage her mate had done, trying to do right by her children, had given Logan the solace he needed to truly forgive her for the role she’d played in his childhood of cruelty and neglect.