The Banned Daughter

I tried to kill my mother. The thought has been running through my head for three days now, but it still doesn't feel real. It should. I remember every terrible second. The flour dusting my fingers. The smell of yeast and cinnamon. My mother's smile. Then… My claws buried in her throat. Her eyes wide with confusion. A strangled gasp. Blood spilling between my fingers. And her voice, hoarse and terrified, trying to say my name. I press my forehead against the cool truck window and watch the pine trees flash by in a blur of green. The farther we drive, the farther I get from home, and every mile feels like something being peeled away from me. My room. My parents. The kitchen where my mother and I spent every Sunday baking. The porch swing where Grady and I used to sit and talk about everything and nothing. I don't deserve to miss any of it. "You know if you keep staring at the window like that, it's not going to magically take us back home." I don't look away from the trees. Grady's voice is soft, carefully neutral, like he's approaching a wounded animal. A pretty accurate description of me these days. "I could ask Harrison to turn around," he says after a minute. That gets my attention. I turn to look at him, and he gives me a small smile, one that doesn't quite reach his eyes. "You're a terrible liar." "Yeah, probably." A laugh bubbles up unexpectedly and dies just as quickly. The silence that follows is thick and uncomfortable. I used to be good at filling silences. I used to be a lot of things. "I liked me better before I tried to kill Mom." The words fall into the truck like a stone. Harrison's hands tighten on the steering wheel. Grady's smile disappears completely. No one says anything. What is there to say? That I didn't mean it? That it wasn't really my fault? The doctors certainly seem to think so. According to them, my mother's cancer had weakened her enough to trigger some long dormant instinct in me, and spending the past five years at college, away from my wolf and my pack, somehow made things worse. I don't know if I believe any of that. I just know that one moment my mother had been laughing at something I'd said, brushing flour from my cheek, and the next I had my hands around her throat while she looked at me with complete and utter shock. I can still hear her gasping for breath. I can still see the fear in her eyes. I close mine against the memory. "Lib." Grady's hand settles over mine. I hadn't even realized I was shaking. "You didn't mean to hurt her." I stare at our joined hands for a long moment. "No," I say quietly. "But I did." The words crack something open inside me. Because that's the part I can't escape. Intent doesn't matter. I hurt her. I hurt the person I love most in the world. And now I'm being sent away because of it. Outside the window, the trees begin to thin, giving way to stretches of open land. I straighten. No. No, we're not here already. "We're here," Harrison says softly, confirming my worst fear. The truck slows to a stop. I don't move. For one ridiculous moment, I think if I stay perfectly still, maybe time will stop with me. Maybe I won't have to get out of this truck and walk into a new life that doesn't feel like mine. Then I look up. The house steals my breath. It's beautiful, all weathered stone and dark wood, tucked beneath massive oak trees draped in Spanish moss. Warm light spills from the windows, and for one terrible second, it looks like something out of a dream. Like home. My throat tightens. Because it isn't home. It never will be. This place exists because I failed. Because I became the kind of wolf who attacks her own mother. I swallow hard and look away. A group of people waits outside the house, their attention fixed entirely on the truck. On me. The future Alpha female. The girl who almost committed the unthinkable. I suddenly can't seem to pull enough air into my lungs. "Lib?" I look toward Harrison. His expression is gentle in a way I rarely see from my oldest brother. "You don't have to do this alone." Before I can answer, movement catches my eye. Someone breaks away from the group and starts toward the truck. Tall. Broad shoulders. Long dark hair tied back at the nape of his neck. Even from here, I recognize him instantly. Rowan. Something in my chest loosens. After everything that's happened, after all the phone calls filled with tears and apologies and fears I couldn't put into words… He's still here.