The next few days were busy, but Dante-less. Sapphire came, pretending my breakdown had never happened, the twins inhabited my time, and a few times, Finn made an appearance. But again, no Dante.
The King and Queen were around, but never long enough to spend time with me, which wasn't a bad thing. They were intimidating as can be, and I didn't need the added stress of the entire royal family trying to chat with me. That would be far too much to handle.
It must've been three or four days before Dante showed up again. He had sent no texts, and his siblings wouldn't give me any information. Not that I asked, because then I'd seen worried, and then they'd think something was going on. Which would lead to them thinking stuff like what had happened in the records room had actually occurred, and I was desperately trying to pretend it didn't. But every time it came back into my mind, my traitorous lips tingled.
Sapphire had told me Dante was working somewhere, and that's why he was gone, but I had a small suspicion he was avoiding me. I had totally rejected his kiss, well not entirely but I'd like to pretend I did, and I continued to tell him I wanted nothing to do with being with him or here. So maybe he was a little upset with me or something. I wasn't entirely sure. The small, dark part of me that resided in my chest felt bad, but the bigger, more trustworthy part in my head told me I was only helping the both of us.
The quicker he rejected me, the better things would be for the both of us.
Right?
I didn't dwell too much on that question. There was no way I wasn't right.
But finally, Dante showed up again. I was reading in one of the sitting rooms facing the snowy backyard, the light from the windows casting a beautiful glow over the room, when he burst in, a bright smile on his face.
"Get up, we're going somewhere." He greeted, walking over to the big armchair I was curled up in.
I glanced up, my eyebrows raised high. "What?" After four days, I get this? This was odd. Very odd.
Dante rolled his eyes, shaking his head. He leaned in close, to where our faces were only inches apart. My breath caught. He wouldn't try this again, would he?
"We're going somewhere. You can't say no. You're gonna have fun. Again, can't say no." His warm, peppermint smelling breath fanned my face, and my jaw dropped a little.
"I—what—why can't I say no?" I finally settled on a response. He pulled away from my face, standing at his full height.
"Because you're rotting away here, and I can just pick you up and put you in the car. So, you technically can say no, but not coming with is not an option." He held out a hand to me.
I stared at him. This was an odd response. Dante was usually calm natured, understanding, and not pushy.
"So I can't say no." I repeated, eyeing his hand.
He shook his head. "Nope!"
I raised an eyebrow at him. "I've been able to turn these things down before."
"Yes, and that didn't seem to be very beneficial. Let's go."
With a sigh, I set my book down on the table next to me, and stood up. "Where do you think you're taking me?" I questioned.
"It's a surprise."
"What if I'm not dressed properly?" I asked, glancing down at my attire. I was wearing some weird jeans that didn't feel like jeans that Sapphire had called 'jeggings,' as well as a soft orange tee-shirt. It wasn't very dressy.
"You're fine. You're also stalling. Come on." He turned and walked out the room, and with a roll of my eyes, I followed him. This wasn't going to be fun, but I didn't really have a choice.
Dante led me back down the floors of stairs and out the elegant front door, where a shiny sporty car was waiting for us. "Do I have to go?" I asked, taking my time going down the front steps.
Dante nodded. "No choice!" He reminded, and I almost groaned.
He walked over to the passenger door and held it open for me. "Excited?" He asked, that grin shining so bright I almost squinted.
I managed to send him a quick glare before entering the car. He closed the door before appearing on the other side in a second, getting in next to me.
"You're not going to hate this." He thought this over, and then added, "I think."
I crossed my arms over my chest and turned to look at him. "How do you know?"
He raised his eyebrows, turning the car into gear and pulling out of the palace gates. "I've recently come into a little bit more of information, and I think you're going to like this. Now, I've said too much. Tell me more about growing up with Max."
I stiffened. "I've told you I don't want—"
"Max and I are good friends. We met at some red carpet event years back, after Venice, I think. I'm keeping a sort of huge secret from him, and I'm just curious." He pointed out, glancing at me pointedly out of the corner of his eye.
Sighing, I leaned my head against the back of the seat. He was doing what I asked. He wasn't telling Max about me. And he was just curious.
"He was... always interested in law, as far as I can remember. He had left when I was eight to go to college to get into law school, and he was doing good. Really good. He was so smart." Unlike Isaac. But he had soccer to back him up, so my parents weren't worried. Nolan was the brightest, but he was always studying and reading and just away. Max was there.
"He wanted to be a lawyer?" Dante inquired, sounding surprised.
"Yeah." He was serious about it. He had chosen a lower-level college so he would have more money for a better law school. Yet he still wasn't as close to home as I would've liked for that last year. "He wasn't rambunctious or wild or anything. He drank, I think, but so did everybody." He was drunk when I shifted. My parents laid into him the next day. I was gone two days after that. "My parents weren't especially worried about the drinking. But he was never young enough to have wildly embarrassing stories for me to tell."
Dante raised his eyebrows. "What about Isaac?"
I rolled my head against the seat to look at him. "You asked about Max." Our surroundings had changed from snowy palace grounds to beautiful kingdom buildings, to finally the long, ocean bridge that led to the palace.
"I know. But you're talking." I got the hidden meaning; I'm not talkative very often. He was probing. Again.
Maybe it was the stupid mate bond, or just my weak resolve, but I couldn't deny his request. "Isaac was an idiot. He brought girls home all the time. My mom didn't like it. He was always busy with soccer, and he was more comfortable joking with my brothers than spending time with me. Not that he didn't spend any time, just not as often as most of the others. More often than Hayden and Harrison, though." They were so busy with each other all the time. Being born so close together, they were basically twins.
"But you liked Isaac, no?"
I loved Isaac. He was (is? I didn't know) my brother. "Yeah." I replied.
"Did your family belong to a pack?" He questioned.
I shrugged. "I don't know. We never did pack things, and we lived in our own little house, but we could've been rogues. Not sure. Nolan asked my dad once, I think. He got some vague answer, so nobody asked again." I had never really cared enough to think about packs. I had my family, and it was big enough that our wolves weren't desperate for more. It was our own little pack, in a way.
"Nolan, that's the second oldest?"
I nodded.
"I heard he's a professor at Oxford now." Dante added.
I closed my eyes, trying hard not to let this information get to me. It's been years. He's moved on. Obviously, this was amazing for him. "That's good."
I wondered if Nolan, Hayden, Harrison, or Isaac had found their mates and had kids like Max had. Did I have more nieces and nephews?
"What about your parents?"
I shifted my head toward him, and peeked out of one eye. "Are you going to ask questions this entire ride?" Knowing Dante, he'd probably drive around aimlessly as long as I was talking. I just wanted to be back in the library reading my book.
"I'm trying to get to know you. Would you rather talk about something else?"
"I think I'd rather talk about anything else than my family." I replied, opening both eyes fully now and looking at Dante.
"See, but I want to get to know you. And if we can't talk about you and your family—"
I got his point. "I'd much rather talk about my time with Batilda than my family." I interrupted.
Dante shook his head. "Why?" He asked, curiously.
"It's easier." I replied, staring up at the cars skylight. I liked watching the clouds move and the gray sky blend into the white clouds.
"I don't even know what to ask about that. How is that not more sensitive than your family? Talking about it won't upset you?"
I sighed, trying to piece together my thoughts. "It won't upset me," As much as talking about how much I missed and lost at home. "It was bad. Obviously. But it's not like she beat us all the time or anything. We were just kinda there, and there was no food and nothing to do. I was the only one she made mute, which was the worst thing. And there were no windows. We didn't know how long we had been down there." I didn't include the part about how we finally started counting the years by using the television celebrations of his mother's birthday. That was only slightly weird.
"Why were you the only one she made mute?" He asked. He made a left turn, and I slightly leaned toward him.
"I don't know. She got mad when I was trying to get away from her, and I was screaming, I think. That was a long time ago." Each word I said made me feel more and more pathetic. I was such a failure. She was only a witch, and I was a newly turned wolf. I didn't even have the strength to run from her, or scream loud enough to get my family.
Dante shook his head, glancing those blue-green eyes at me. "I don't know how you survived that. Eleven fucking years. Batilda has to pay." His knuckles turned white on the steering wheel.
I simply shrugged in response. She had done too much. I didn't believe she would reverse all her spells, and she had to stay alive to reverse them. Truly, I didn't think she'd pay. She'd simply live in that dungeon until she died.
"Let's go back to your family. You guys are super into human holidays, right?"
The thought almost brought a smile to my face. "Yeah, we loved celebrating them. Especially Christmas." Oh, how big an affair Christmas was in my family. We had the tree up the day after thanksgiving, which we also celebrated, and my dad put all the decorations up on our house. "Do you guys celebrate Christmas?" I asked. Many weres didn't celebrate the holiday, because it had to do with human religions, and not the moon goddess, but some did.
Dante shook his head. "I guess my parents used to, when they only had the Georgia packs, but then they came here and discovered they were supposed to live here and run the royal pack, and they just didn't have time. I've never celebrated it."
My lips turned downwards. "You should. It's fun."
"Tell me how Christmas goes down in the Abernathy house."
"Dante," I warned in a sigh, not knowing if I wanted to answer him.
"Come on. That wasn't super invasive. Please, tell me why you liked Christmas so much."
My shoulders sank, as did my resolve. "We always got a real tree. It's bad, because we're supposed to protect the forests, but we got them from farms, not forests. So we weren't killing any homes or packs or anything. It was always a huge thing. I always loved decorating, so that was my job."
Dante smiled at that. "Max always disappears from the public for practically the whole month of December." He informed.
"For Christmas?" I asked. "Shouldn't he be, like, making movies?" Being the ever-so-famous actor he was. I still couldn't wrap my mind around that. Max was famous.
"A couple of his directors complained about him being a diva because he wouldn't film for the entire month."
"How well did he take to being called a diva?" Maybe Max was one of those showbiz drama queens, now that he made it big. It would make me sad to know that he had turned into some vain, egotistical jerk. That wasn't the Max I knew.
Dante laughed. "He was fine with it in the papers, but he doesn't like it when I bring it up. Maggie's started teasing him with it, too."
I tilted my head. "Maggie?"
Dante glanced at me. "Max's mate. She's human. But I think she was adopted by werewolf parents, so she knew about everything already."
What wolf would want a kid that can't shift? The thought pierced into my brain like a blade. Humans were below wolves, in practically every way. They were also horribly ignorant and closed-minded, so wolves tended to try and keep separate.
But it wasn't just the striking fact that wolves chose to adopt a human. It was the fact that I knew I would never get my wolf back. She had been shut out and kept away for a decade. The constant wolfsbane Batilda would force into us kept my wolf locked away. Her voice had been so faint at first, until she finally silenced. I hadn't heard from her in what must've been over five years. I had no wolf. I couldn't shift.
What wolf would want a kid that couldn't shift? My mind repeated it again and again, until finally, my temples were throbbing. Dante hadn't said anything after he explained who Maggie was, and I was glad to finally have the interrogation stop. Peace. I needed peace.
Leaning my head against the window, I watched the snowy scenery change. I didn't know where we were going, or how long it would take, but we hadn't been driving for that long. Maybe just a half hour, forty-five minutes at the most?
"Where are we going?" I asked quietly. Dante glanced over at me.
"I was originally planning on taking us somewhere else, but now I'm thinking I should change my mind." He looked to be in thought.
I raised an eyebrow. "I'm thinking we should just turn around and head back. Save some time."
He rolled his eyes. "No. The second place is closer, though. You shouldn't be too upset with it." He nodded to himself. "Yeah, that's where we'll go."
"I don't like surprises."
He shook his head, but the faint smile on his face contradicted his actions. "You'll like this one."