Chapter 22
1320 Words
RAPHAEL
Damon drops the information on my desk and stands back.
I read through it twice.
It's not enough to act on.
But it's enough to tell me that Serena's presence here is not what she's representing it as. Enough to tell me I need to watch her more carefully than I have been.
I put the paper down.
"Where did this come from?" I asked.
"Someone outside the pack," Damon answered
"Someone I knew back then,"he added.
"How certain are they?"
"Certain enough that they came to me with it," Damon says. "They wouldn't have if they weren't sure."
I look at the paper again.
Serena had contact with Kael's pack three weeks before she arrived here.
Not one contact,it was multiple contacts.
judging by this history, I don't think it was just a mere contact. For some reason, there seems to be some loopholes.
I don't know what this is all about, I desperately wanted to figure it out at least. That way, I would be able to know what is wrong and know how to go about it.
This was three weeks before she arrived.
Three weeks before she arrived is right around the time I found Nora in the forest and also right around the time Nora's presence in my pack became something that people outside these borders would have started to notice and talk about.
This is not just a mere coincidence.
"Keep digging," I say.
"I already am," Damon says.
He leaves afterwards, and I sit back at my desk for a moment. Then I got up and started pacing around my office.
So many different thoughts were running through my head.
I couldn't place my head on one. I had suspected something was off about her the moment I saw her.
Now that I can finally place it, I don't know how to deal with it anymore.
Not without it affecting Nora or her baby.
*****
I find Nora in the garden.
She's sitting on the ground with her son in front of her and she's talking to him quietly the way she does when she thinks no one is watching.
Her hands are moving and he's watching her hands and his face is doing that thing babies' faces do when they are completely focused on one thing.
I stand at the doorway.
She hasn't noticed me yet.
I watched her with the baby and I couldn't help but imagine, whose child is he and why Kael had to treat her that way, despite the fact that she gave birth to his heir.
Speaking about his heir, these eyes.
Dark brown caramel eyes, they are exactly like mine.
Could this be a mere coincidence too?
I watch as the child looks at her and then looks past her and his eyes land on me and they are the most specific shade of caramel brown I have ever seen on a child that is not from my bloodline.
Or was not supposed to be from my bloodline.
That thought.
It's been sitting in the back of my head for weeks. I keep pushing it back. I keep telling myself I need the confirmation before I let myself think it fully. But every time I see those eyes it pushes forward again and gets harder to push back.
Nora looks up.
She sees me standing near the garden gates.
We look at each other across the garden for a moment. Neither of us says anything. The baby makes a sound and she looks down at him briefly and then back up at me.
I walk over.
I crouch beside the baby.
He looks at me. Completely unafraid. Curious in that direct way that children are curious before they learn to be careful about it.
He reaches out one small hand toward me and I let him grab my finger and his grip is surprisingly firm.
Those eyes.
Caramel brown.
I look at them and the thought pushes all the way forward and I push it all the way back and I look up at Nora.
"How is the preparation going for the next meeting," I say.
She blinks.
Not what she was expecting me to say.
"Fine," she says. "I have the documentation ready. The presentation needs one more pass but it will be done tonight."
"Good," I say.
The baby is still holding my finger. I let him keep it.
"The alliance terms Marcus proposed," I say. "The third clause. Did you flag it."
"Yes," she says. "I flagged it and drafted an alternative. It's in the folder I left on your desk this morning."
I nod.
"I saw it," I say. "It was good."
She looks at me.
She is waiting for me to say something else. I can see it. She is sitting there with her son between us and she is waiting for the real conversation to start because she knows the same thing I know, which is not about the document or meeting.
"The timeline for phase two," I say.
"Marcus wants to accelerate it. I want you to read it and tell me whether that's manageable."
"It's manageable," she says. "It will require more hours from the documentation side but it's manageable."
"Can you handle that with everything else you're doing?"
She looks at me steadily. "Yes."
One word. No hesitation.
I believe her.
The baby makes another sound and lets go of my finger and reaches for Nora instead and she picks him up automatically and holds him against her and he settles immediately.
I watched it happen and I couldn't help but admire her.
The way she holds him. The way he settles. The specific ease of it.
I stand up.
"There's one more thing," I say.
She looks up at me.
"Serena," I say. "Has she approached you?"
Her mood swings when I ask, and I notice some discomfort in her. But surprisingly, it was coming from her.
It was coming from her wolf, and she seems to be fighting it.
"She brought me lunch yesterday," Nora finally answered, after a bit of control.
"And."
"And we talked," Nora says. "It was fine."
She says it is fine in a way that means it was not fine. I know that particular fine very well by now.
"If she approaches you again," I say.
"I can handle Serena," Nora replied immediately,she cut me short of my words.
"I know you can," I say. "I'm not saying you can't."
She looks at me.
"Then what are you saying," she says.
"I'm saying tell me if anything she says feels off," I say. "That's all."
Nora studies my face for a moment. She's trying to work out how much I already know. I can see her doing it. She is very good at reading situations and she is reading this one accurately.
"Is there something happening with Serena that I should know about," she says.
"I'm looking into something," I say. "Same answer as before."
"That answer is getting old," she says.
"I know," I say.
I hold her gaze.
She holds mine.
The baby is watching both of us with those eyes.
Those eyes.
I look away first.
"Tonight," I say. "I'll need the updated documentation by the end of the day."
"You'll have it," she says.
I nod and turn and walk back toward the main building.
I don't look back.
But I know she watches me go.
And I know that neither of us said the thing that was actually sitting in that garden with us the entire time.
The conversation that needs to happen.
The one about the baby's eyes.
The one about what I suspect and what I'm afraid to confirm and what it means for both of us if I'm right.
That conversation is coming.
I'm just not ready for it yet and it's not right now, not when everything is heated .
- Writer
