The Lace-Marked Wolf

8. Class Reunion

~ GENNY ~

Reid blinked a few times before shaking his head, his shaggy sandy-blond hair flying from side to side as he returned to his food. The other three were staring at me with their mouths slightly open.

What the hell was their problem?

Emmett was covering his mouth, trying to hold back a laugh. Allison's head was lowered, but her shoulders trembled. She was definitely laughing.

I placed the box safely on my lap and then snacked on my fries as I scowled at them. It took a few minutes for the four brothers to snap out of their trance and return to their meals.

At one point, I noticed that all of the Ashcrofts were mind-linking. Emmett was probably telling them about the increased security measures and required documents.

My suspicions were confirmed when my father consulted me regarding sending the documents to Beta Evan back at Stonehaven. He also gave me a look that told me we needed to talk later.

Chatter continued around both tables, sometimes flowing between them. Mirabella and Aribella were still enjoying their game of "Who's my mommy?"

A few times, my brothers had to hide their faces either by looking down or in their hands. On one occasion, all three had to excuse themselves.

Aribella looked up at Charlie and me and asked, "Mommy, when the baby in your belly comes we will be big sisters, right?"

Mirabella nodded in agreement and her little head swiveled between us. "Yeah, Mommy. Ari and me will be the bestest big sisters."

What made it better was that without any planning or prompting, Charlie and I both leaned back and patted our bellies at the same time.

I subtly glanced over and watched as four identical faces instantly paled with pain.

I guess my brothers saw it too because they instantly stood and hurried out of the room. But their laughter rang clearly in our minds.

When Darren turned around and announced, "Yeah! Ari and Mira will be great big sisters!" Emmett suddenly felt the need to look for something under the table, with Allison assisting him.

Eventually, my brothers returned and sat down. Emmett and Allison managed to find Darren's "missing" toy.

As I finished my lunch and cookies, the mood shifted when they approached the tables and stood behind my nieces. When I looked up at the four men, I masked my panic with a face of innocent curiosity.

Benedict's voice pushed into my mind. "It's okay, sweetheart. You're safe. Stay strong. They can't hurt you anymore."

At first, they didn't look at me. Instead, they greeted the Ashcrofts, specifically the quadruplets.

Surprisingly, the quads barely acknowledged them. Before everything went wrong, the eight of them were always together, while the Ashcroft brothers pushed me farther and farther away.

Even before the guys drifted away from me, these four would taunt and tease me. But once my four best friends drifted away from me and toward them and the four succubi, the bullying got worse.

I tried to confront the quads and tell them what their new friends were doing. But the four boys who had proclaimed their love for me only months earlier didn't believe me. They said that their "friends" had promised to be nice to me.

Eventually I learned the truth. The girls had managed to corner me in a school bathroom. The boys were there, caught me off guard, and held me down while the girls punched and kicked me as they laughed and said the quads knew what they were doing and didn't care.

After school that day, I hid on my branch in the great oak tree, waiting for my wounds to heal. The quads appeared and acted as if I hadn't just been beaten by their friends.

They kept trying to coax me off of my branch, wanting me to help them with their homework. I refused. They called me a brat and told me I was being unreasonable.

My anger grew, and I momentarily lost control of my power as fire erupted around the base of the tree. Damien's pants caught on fire and his leg was burned. Reid caught a flame on his hand.

As soon as I saw that they had been burned, regret and horror filled me. The flames were extinguished as soon as I landed on the ground. They ignored their own injuries when they noticed the still-healing bruises on my face and arms.

I didn't give them time to ask what had happened because I already knew. Their little friends already told me. The Ashcrofts had known and didn't care. So I ran.

Despite their werewolf healing, they were still left with scars. The memory drew my gaze to the back of Reid's left hand, and there it was, the burn mark I caused when we were seventeen.

For some unknown reason, I looked up at him, and our eyes briefly met before he looked down at his hand. He lightly grazed the scar with his right hand before looking back at me.

I looked away, fighting back the tears that threatened to expose my guilt for causing Damien and Reid to be hurt that badly. But then I remembered.

They threw me away first.

Charlie pulled me from my thoughts by jabbing me in the side. "Oww!"

She nodded toward the other side of the table, behind the girls.

Four men stood looking at me with small smiles. "Hey, Guinevere, Charlotte. It's been a long time," Caleb said to me.

I turned and looked at Charlie, giving her a confused look. I kept a look of confusion on my face and forced a tight smile. "Hi. I'm sorry, have we met?"

Charlie pinched my leg under the table. I ignored her.

The four men looked at each other, their brows furrowed in confusion. Adam looked at the Ashcrofts and Reid shrugged with an amused smirk.

Adam stepped forward, clasping his hands in front of him. "We all went to school together, we're friends of the Ashcrofts."

Four annoyed scoffs sounded, cutting him off. Adam briefly glanced behind himself before giving an apologetic smile.

"You don't remember us?" Adam asked.

Charlie and I looked like we were deep in thought trying to place them. I slowly shook my head.

"Sorry, I don't." My gaze slowly drifted to each man.

All four of them looked as if they had come straight from work and made themselves comfortable. Neatly pressed slacks with a crisp crease ironed in the front of each pant leg. Their dress shirts had a few buttons undone, and their sleeves were rolled up to the elbows.

Their hair was still neatly styled, similar to Alexander. The difference was that it looked natural on Alexander. On these four it looked like they were trying too hard to be impressive.

Caleb and Alex's brows were still furrowed in confusion, and their mouths were set in twisted frowns.

Silas looked a bit rougher. His hair looked as though he had tried to fix it before approaching the table after pulling on it repeatedly. He repeatedly averted his eyes whenever I looked at him. His arms kept moving as if he didn't know what to do with them.

And then there was Henry. More of his buttons were undone, exposing a good deal of his chest. He stood straighter with a cocky smirk permanently plastered to his face. His dark brown eyes twinkled with a mixture of malice and lust.

I really wanted to punch his smug face.

I looked at him and narrowed my eyes before pointing at him. "Wait. Aren't you the kid that was always getting pissy whenever my scores were higher?"

Anger and hatred flashed across his face for a split second, but I caught it. I'm not going to lie, I did that on purpose. And it felt good.

His face transformed with a sheepish smile as he scratched the back of his neck. "Yeah, I guess that was me." He shrugged and stuffed his hands into his pockets in feigned embarrassment.

He then cleared his throat lightly before adding, "You have beautiful daughters. What are their names?"

So many eyes were now on me. Some people tried to hide their smiles, while others paled. You can guess which four looked as if the life had just drained out of them.

Before I could respond, Charlie spoke up. "Oh, Genny isn't their mother. I am. I'm mated to her three brothers."

She then pulled the collar of her shirt down to display her three marks, while my brothers displayed their own with their chests puffed up in pride and wide grins on their faces.

Those who were in on our little prank snickered, while the quads sagged in relief. But I noticed the corners of Rowan and Damien's mouths twitch up just a bit.

Damn, there goes the game.

"Yeah, Charlie is our beautiful mate," Gideon stated proudly.

"And these are our gorgeous daughters Aribella and Mirabella," Malcolm added.

Theodore followed up by announcing, "Charlie is pregnant with our next pup."

Silas barely hid his panic as he quietly asked my brothers, "Guinevere is your sister?"

"My four children here are quadruplets. Guinevere is the oldest and my heir," my father proclaimed with a look of disapproval.

We all looked at Silas in confusion. We have always told everyone that not only were we siblings, but we are quadruplets.

"Wait, we always thought the Arclaine triplets were the future alphas of Silvercrest." Sally's whiny voice broke through the conversation.

The other she-devils stood around her, all with their arms crossed and scowls plastered on their painted faces.

Great. Lunch just became a class reunion.

Dad stood and crossed his arms as he glared at the group of barely dressed women. "Why would you think that, young lady? Every pack has known about our quadruplets since their birth. As the oldest and a fraternal child from the pregnancy, my daughter has always been next in line as the Alpha of Silvercrest."

"We don't want to be Alpha," Gideon stated between bites.

"We actually like being the Lunas of the Moonvale pack. It's fun!" Theodore said excitedly.

Malcolm wrapped an arm around Charlie and added, "We love being arm candy for Alpha Charlotte." Then he kissed her neck.

Caleb and Adam exchanged barely disguised looks of disapproval, but quickly masked them. Silas looked like he wanted to disappear.

Crystal and Sally's disgust was obvious. Estelle was blankly staring at Charlie and April looked genuinely confused.

"Ladies, I see you missed the part in the guidebook about the dress code. If you can't dress more appropriately and follow all of the rules, I will be contacting your Alphas after you are escorted out of our territory," my mother scolded.

Crystal quickly recovered and smiled politely. "We meant no offense, Luna Celeste. We just wanted to be more enticing in case we met our mates before the veil was raised."

I leaned back and smiled. "The veil was raised this morning."

A high-pitched "What?!" came from Alexander as he shot up out of his seat.

I gave him a dismissive glance before casually inspecting my nails. "Yeah. When the Crown Princess learned of early arrivals, she became concerned about attendees trying to skirt around the rules. So she recommended to the Queen to have the veil raised as soon as possible."

"The Queen agreed, so the veil was raised shortly before everyone arrived," my mother said casually with a small shrug.

As Rowan pulled Alexander back into his seat, I noticed that all four Ashcroft brothers were staring at me with inexplicable heat in their eyes.

What I didn't expect was to see the same look in Henry's eyes.