Chapter 4

Caden

He called his father at seven. If he waited for a good time, there would be no good time. He would have been waiting until he wasn't angry, and he did not plan to stop being angry anytime soon. He needed that anger to motivate him.

Elias picked up on the second ring. "Caden, I was about to call you." He had never heard his father sound nervous, but now he could hear how uncomfortable the man was.

"You got Marcus to keep it from me."  He went straight to the point.

"I did."

"Why do you think you can keep details of my life hidden from me for three months?"

His father was silent at the other end of the phone. The man had never been one to apologize before. He was an Alpha, and he did things without permission. Caden knew that this situation was new and uncomfortable for his dad, and he found this both infuriating and honest. 

He stood at the window of his study with the phone against his ear and watched Portland come awake below. He could hear his father’s light breathing. He took a deep breath.

"Tell me the reasoning," Caden said. "I want to hear you say it."

"Honestly, at first I didn’t want to believe it, and then later we realized we didn't know when activation would happen," Elias said. "We didn't know if it would happen at all. The letter described a trigger, a first meeting in proximity, and you hadn't met her yet. I thought if we found the witch, we could find a way and break the curse before the bond ever fired, you'd never have needed to know. I thought I was being kind, I was trying to spare you."

"You were trying to manage it. You always try to manage everything alone."

A pause. "Yes. That's probably the more honest word."

"You don't get to manage things that concern me. I’m not…." He trailed off, struggling to stay calm.

"I know," Elias said it without defense. Caden had been ready for defense and found the absence of it harder to work with. Before he could attack again, his father changed the subject. "How did last night go? Before Marcus told you."

Caden said nothing for a moment. He thought of the railing under his hands, his knuckles white. The room is shifting under him. He had scanned the crowd frantically and came up empty, and then the smell on the highway. The confusion on Sam's face in the rearview mirror.

"I don’t know how to explain it, but I’m sure that was the activation," he said.

"Marcus texted me when it happened."

"Then you already know how last night went. Why are you asking again?"

Elias was quiet. Caden looked at the wolf carving on the corner of his desk. His father put it in his hands the morning the pack was formally transferred and said nothing about the weight of what he was handing over. He said nothing about the weight he was lying down either.

“I was twenty-five when you handed me everything."

"Yes." His father's voice dropped. "I know."

His father didn't speak for a moment. When he did, his voice had gone careful. " Look, Caden, I’m sorry. I was wrong to step aside when I did, especially the way I did it. I told myself it was necessary. The pack needed leadership, and Clara needed me, and both of those things were true. But I put a weight on you at twenty-five that I hadn't carried until I was thirty. I knew you could hold it, and I’m proud of all you have done, but I should have been more open about things and your mother’s illness. I never asked you how you felt about everything, and this time, I made a decision concerning your life without you. I always make these decisions because I think it’s for the best, but I understand that you feel blindsided. I won’t repeat that."

It wasn't news. He had understood everything his father did, but hearing it said out loud was different.  For years, they had danced around the tension between them, but with this acknowledgment, Caden felt like they would work towards forgiveness. Even if it wasn’t going to happen immediately, he had hope.

"I called Marcus after that letter arrived," Elias said. "I told him I was handling it before we came to you. I thought if we could find the witch, find a way to break the curse before the bond ever fired, you'd never need to carry it. I actually threatened him, " Don’t be so mad at him. It’s my fault. " A pause. "I was wrong about how these things work."

"Yes," Caden said. "You were."

"I'm sorry, truly Caden."

His father apologized rarely, and he had done so repeatedly. Caden understood that this was harder than it looked and decided to give his father some ground.

"How is she?" he said.

"Good week." Elias's voice changed when his mother came into the conversation. "She'll want you Sunday. She told me to tell you. Then she told me again, which means she doesn't trust me to actually say it."

"Tell her I'll be there."

"I think she’s still going to tell you herself. She probably told me to say that because she wanted to give us something to talk about."

Caden almost smiled. 

"I'll come Sunday," he said. "We'll eat. You'll apologize again in person."

"And after that? What are you going to do?"

"After that, I'll start making up for the ten months I don't have."

Elias was quiet for a moment. " I really hope you find her, Caden."

"That's the plan."

Caden and his father said their goodbyes as he dropped the phone. Sam appeared in the doorway with more coffee. Caden took the cup and waited until the footsteps disappeared down the hall.

He sat down. He pulled the letter from the top left drawer, where he had put it last night, and read it again. He did not learn anything new from it. He had all but memorized it. He was looking for something he had missed, some detail that might help him narrow things down, and there was nothing. Mirabel had written everything she knew. The curse, the mechanism, the deadline, the only way to break it. 

He folded the letter and put it back.

He had known worse men. He had also been a worse man than he liked to admit in those years.

He picked up his phone.

Caden and Marcus

Caden: Where are we with the list?

Marcus: Female wolves, registered, northwest packs, unmated. 34 names confirmed present last night. Sending now.

Caden: Cross-reference against car park exits. Anyone who left the east or southeast.

Marcus: Give me an hour.

Caden: You have thirty minutes.

Marcus: Forty.

Caden: Fine.

He set the phone face down and read the thirty-four names. None of them did anything when he read them. He had not expected them to. He read them again anyway, building a picture of each one from what he knew or could infer. Occupation, pack affiliation or the absence of it, which events they had attended, and who they were connected to. 

He could not feel his way toward her. He would have to think his way there instead, and he had spent ten years learning to be good at that, so he sat at his desk in the early morning with the city awake below him, and he thought.