The Wolf's Den

Bee

I felt numb as took it all in.

They were back.

Why now?

I bit my lip until the skin almost broke, worried about what this could mean for all the plans I'd started to put into action after all these years.

It was always harder to say goodbye to them after they came back. Harder to come downstairs and get hit with the realization that they'd left me behind again while they went God-knows-where.

I slammed my truck door and glared down at my black knock-off doc Martins as I stepped onto the ground. This time would be no different, and I really didn't feel like forcing a smile again.

Not one more damn time. I just couldn't these days it seemed.

And I honestly doubted they'd notice. They'd failed to notice anything for the past nine years as it was. I was too tired today.

So, so tired I just wanted to not adult today and go build a pillow fort to hide in.

I stomped up the stairs to the house I'd been taking care of, to the home they'd abandoned. The moment I stepped inside I had to pause and blink at the bags crowding my entry way floor that shared the living room space.

It was almost like they were moving back in.

More bags and items than they'd ever brought with them when they ''came back''.

My eyes went towards the kitchen door where I could hear their movements as they bumped 

into the cabinets and closed the fridge door again. I could've so easily opened the door and greeted them. Smiled and welcomed my only family left home, I could've hugged and sunk into their arms and been so glad they were back again.

That's what I'd done every other time they'd come home.

That's what I had thought I would always do.

But hell, after a long double shift at the diner in the next town over with nothing more than a few minutes stolen away to stuff a biscuit down my throat— that was the last thing I was going to do.

I quietly made my way upstairs, past the door and up to my bedroom. When they saw my truck they would know I was home, but it didn't change anything. I had never once seen them come to me in the past years. I was always the one bugging them and trying to have time with them.

They would leave me be, and it was the last thing I wanted, but all I needed at the same time.

They thought I didn't know their secrets. I didn't know what they were or where they went or what they'd done.

And maybe to a degree they were right... but they would always be my big brothers, Kal and Ansel, and their best friend, our childhood friend and my ex-boyfriend, Stryker.

I knew more than they thought, saw more than I should have, but I'd realized a while ago that changed nothing.

They would always be running and striving to grow their pack and I would always be home and safe in their minds— tucked out of the way and not knowing any better about the werewolves I was surrounded by.

As the one human in the Werewolf territory that my small town resided in, I was kept outside and in the dark about everything.

My family had no idea I knew what they were and what this town hid, and I pretended that I hadn't seen the largest wolves in the world turn into humans when they thought no one was looking. Or seen them watching me sometimes when I jogged through the woods on the path. Or hadn't secretly watched my brothers shift into their wolves for the first time when they were thirteen.