Merely Human

Chapter 20

That night seemed to break the seal on our relationship. Now officially dating, Caden had started walking me to classes so we could share more about ourselves with each other. I learned a lot about his duties as alpha and found it wasn't as complicated as I would have thought. The pack was a lot like a commune, or even a company: everyone had a job and an associated income that came from Hartwood Steel, the corporation named after the city that the pack inhabited. Caden's dad was technically still the CEO of the company, but when Caden finished his degree he would officially turn it over to him and make him the alpha in more than just name.

He was eager to take me back to his city and introduce me to everyone, but we both understood how complex that situation would be so had held off for now. Instead, I had gone to the house he and a few of the other pack members lived at while in college here. Nicole no longer lived there, which was a shame because I really could have used an ally. Caden's future beta, Ben, lived there with his mate Sara, another mated couple, and three more guys. While they had been perfectly polite, I could tell that all except one of the males were only acting that way because Caden was there. When he wasn't looking, they shot each other disbelieving looks and didn't seem to care as much if I noticed.

After that visit, a pit had formed in my stomach whenever Caden mentioned his pack. Now that I had accepted our connection, I knew I would have to deal with them at some point, but I also wasn't in any doubt of how they would react to a human being his mate.

Needing a break from my thoughts, I had ended up driving to school on a Saturday. I had wanted to finish up a little bit of homework at the library, but my real goal had been to visit the ghost boy by the river. He wasn't there when I first approached, so I sat down next to a tree on the grass and got out a book. It was cold, so I pulled my coat close to me but otherwise tried to ignore the numbness as my nose and cheeks turned pink.

I could feel it when he decided to come out of hiding about ten minutes later, the barest hint of a rustle disturbed the leaves as if a wind had picked it up. I looked up from my book and saw his blue eyes, normally so sad, were expressionless.

"Are you alright?" I asked him, studying his face. His appearance never changed, always dripping wet with what looked like ice in his hair. His ashen cheeks and lips were almost blue, even his fingertips seemed to show the beginning of frostbite. He must have fallen in the river sometime in the winter.

"You're here."

His voice was stronger than the girl I had laid to rest, but it still had an almost crystalline quality to it.

I reached a hand out as if to touch his cheek and gave him a small smile. "I wanted to see you, what's your name?"

The sad look came back to his eye, a single tear escaping.

"That's ok, sweetheart. Why don't you sit with me?"

He hesitated for a second, but when I pulled my hand away from by his cheek he seemed to miss the sign of affection and sat next to me, hands pulling his knees to his chin.

"Here." I pulled out my tablet and rested it against my bag in front of us. "Do you like movies?"

He looked up at me blankly and I wondered if he knew what I was talking about. His clothes looked relatively modern so I assumed he knew what a movie was, but maybe he'd been gone too long and had begun to forget anything except the pain from dying.

Since he looked to be around ten, I decided to put on Cars by Disney and sure enough, he became engrossed quickly. He didn't laugh, or even smile, but his eyes were wide and never moved from the screen. Since he was distracted, I pulled out my phone and searched in a browser "Boy drowned in Kendall Creek". Something came up for a creek in a different city, so I tried narrowing it down by location and still got nothing. I frowned and looked back up at him. You would think his death would have made the news, but even after digging through a few pages I still couldn't find anything.