Filed To Story: In the Shadow of the Past Luna (Lily & James)
Facebook Twitter WhatsApp Pinterest
“NO! TELL ME!”
Just then, Rose decided to force herself through and respond to her wolf-mate herself.
“Back off, you big ape. Lily is not going to explain anything to either of you while you are yelling at her, and neither am I. Give your human his body back.”
“Rose, baby, I—“
“Do not baby me, Luke. Our humans need to work things out for themselves.”
“I want to spend time with you, Rose,”
Luke complained.
As I watched the interaction, I could not help but be amazed at how quickly Luke went from screaming cave man to pitiful pup. It was nothing short of bizarre, and all it took was Rose stepping forward.
“The humans have to figure things out, Luke. It is easier for us than it is for them. Let them try to make things work.”
“But they aren’t working anything out!”
Luke protested.
“Give James back control, Luke,”
Rose repeated.
Luke must have reluctantly agreed, because James’ eyes returned to blue and Rose stepped back again.
Unfortunately, James’ blue eyes were just as angry as Luke’s brown ones.
“So?”
he asked in a rude tone of voice.
“So what?”
“Tell me why Brady’s scent is on your pillow,”
he demanded.
There was no easy way around this. I decided to just lay it all out there.
“He spent the night here last night.
“WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!?!”
“Relax, James. Nothing happened. I mean, something happened, but not sex. We didn’t even get close to having sex. We just kissed.”
James’ jaw stiffened and his eyes got more and more angry. “Why. Was. He. Here?”
I sighed. “He was drunk and upset. I let him stay.”
“Do you let every drunk and upset male sleep in bed with you?”
James asked me accusingly.
Wow. Now he was starting to remind me of the old James, and I was getting angry. “No, you a&&hole.
Brady has done a lot for me. I was not going to just kick him out of my room when he was upset and needed me.”
“BUT I AM YOUR MATE, NOT HIM! YOU HAD NO RIGHT TO BRING HIM INTO YOUR BED.”
Yes, I was definitely angry now.
“Funny, because until today, you did not act like my mate. BUT BRADY HAS FOR WEEKS! BRADY CARES
ABOUT ME! HE HAS NEVER GIVEN ME ANY REASON TO DOUBT HIM! If I want to be there for him, I will be.”
“HE HAS NO RIGHT TO CARE ABOUT YOU LIKE THAT!”
James did not realize it, but that last sentence was a “mic-drop”
moment. With that single sentence,
James reminded me of our past, and of all the reasons that being with him did not make sense.
I spoke my next words quietly, and with as much venom as I could muster.
“I am glad to see that old James has re-surfaced. Welcome back.”
“WHAT?”
He exclaimed in both anger and confusion.
“Did you hear your words, James? ‘He has no right to care about you like that.’ Do you remember the last time you said those words to me?”
I watched as James’ face began to pale. Just like his wolf, James’ emotions could apparently change on a dime. “Lily —“
“I was 16. I had no friends anymore, because you made sure that everyone knew that I was to be treated as an outcast. The only parties and events I went to were the ones hosted by the pack that everyone was supposed to attend.
But then there was a transfer student from another pack, and he did not know about your st upid rules. He and I became friends. We hung out from time to time. He took me to a couple of smaller parties. And when the high school planned a winter dance, he invited me to go with him.
Somehow you found out. You came storming up to my parents’ suite. You and I had a fight very similar to the one we just had, except that I was arguing that Thad the right to have a friend who cared about me, and you insisted that Levi had no right to care about me like that. Because, why? Oh, I remember. Because I was a sl utty murderer.
You then went to his family and threatened to have your dad banish them from the pack unless Levi
Do you remember that James? Because I do. It was the one and only time in six years that anyone at your pack tried to be my friend, and you ruined it.”
(James POV)
I have never felt so angry or so jealous as I felt the moment that I found out that Brady spent the night in Lily’s bed. In fact, Luke and I immediately began fighting for control, not because I wanted to hold him back, but because we could not agree on which one of us got to confront Lily about it.
Luke won the original round, and he was doing great at first. However, as soon as Rose came forward, his anger immediately vanished. All he could see from that point forward was a rare opportunity to spend quality time with his wolf-counterpart.
When Rose demanded that Luke give me back control, I almost laughed. I knew she did it because she wanted to calm the situation down, but I was feeling anything but calm.
As soon as Luke gave me back control, I continued his interrogation of Lily.
As soon as Lily began to defend Brady, I began to fantasize about how many pieces I would have to slay the a&&hole into before I would feel satisfied. If I only cut off his arms, would that make me feel better?
Or would I need to cut off his legs too? Should I go all out and cut off his di ck as well?
The picture I had in my head of Brady with his di ck cut off almost made me smile. Almost.
But then Lily made the problem worse by suggesting that Brady had been acting like her mate for weeks, never giving her any reason to doubt him. I started to look outside for the fire escape that connected their rooms, thinking I may not want to wait until morning to teach Brady not to mess with the mates of other wolves.
Before I could jump out the window, however, I felt compelled to remind Lily that Brady had no right to treat her that way; she was MY MATE. Not his..
And that is when everything really started to go sideways.
Lily responded to my sentiments about Brady by reminding me of an incident involving a wolf named
Levi. I immediately froze.
I knew (now) how badly I had messed up with the Levi situation, but honestly there had been many Levis over the years, and I had dealt with all of them in pretty much the same way. I suppose Levi may have been one of the few that Lily knew about, though, and there was the added complication that I had actually chosen to confront her directly about his interest in her, which I normally never did.
Even so, recognizing that I did wrong in that situation and that at some point I owed an apology to Levi and many other male wolves in our pack- had nothing to do with the reason that I froze.
I froze because even though the incident had happened several years ago I could still hear the pain and hurt in Lily’s voice when she brought it up. And that was a sobering reminder of where she and I were in our relationship right now.
It might sound strange, but it had not occurred to me until right then how much pressure I had been putting on Lily. I had had weeks to re-consider and process my feelings, and to start to gather information.
In the course of doing all of that, so much had happened, and so much had come out, that to me it felt like a lifetime had already passed. And so, for me, it made perfect sense to ask Lily if she was willing to claim her rightful place as my mate and future Luna.
New Book: Veiled Desires of the Alpha King Novel
Dayson was the alpha of the largest pack in North America. Powerful figures from other packs sought to offer gorgeous girls as potential mates for Dayson. He steadfastly rejected these advances, he was not a pawn to be manipulated. But eventually there came a mysterious girl he could hardly say No. Who was she?