Chapter 195

Cara’s POV

For the rest of the time at the carnival, I felt like I was in a bliss-filled dream. Alaric, the kids, and I truly acted like a couple, and not just for show. Toward the end of the evening, Alaric even held my hand as we walked through the game stands, the kids taking turns trying their luck at games for prizes.

Eventually, the kids started yawning, and I was tired too. Alaric noticed without saying anything and herded us all to the car. Then he drove us back home.

As the kids carried their prizes into the house, I stayed outside to speak to Alaric.

“I should get back to the hotel,” he said. “I’m sure you and the kids want to rest.”

“Yes,” I said, but then hesitated in saying goodbye. For a moment, a wild thought crossed my mind. What if I asked Alaric to stay. Not just for the night, but for the foreseeable future. We were supposed to be spending all of our time together after all, so it would make sense for him to move in.

Then, too, he wouldn’t have to keep spending money at the hotel.

Yet, when I opened my mouth to suggest it, the words wouldn’t come out.

Things between us were on the mend, but this new blossom felt too fragile to test. Living together was a step I wasn’t sure we were ready for yet, even if we were supposed to be spending as much time together as possible.

So, instead of suggesting it, I smiled at Alaric and said, “Thank you for today. I had fun, and so did the kids.”

I had noticed, despite what should have been a taxing day spent walking around on my feet, I didn’t feel particularly exhausted. Perhaps it was from Alaric’s closeness, I wasn’t sure. It was too soon to guesstimate, but I hoped Richard and Grayson’s theories were proving true.

If I could have my wolf back while growing closer to Alaric, that would ideal.

I could only hope, and maybe pray.

“I had fun too,” Alaric said. “I’m staying at the hotel, but I’m only a phone call away. Whenever you want to be near me, any time of day or night, you only have to call. Seven digits, and I’m here, okay? No questions asked. We don’t even have to talk. I can just sit next to you.”

I felt so very lucky to have a man like Alaric in my life. We’d always had a rocky time of it, but since our reunion, he’d been here when I needed him. I needed to stop trying to push him away and embrace what he was trying to give me.

Soon. In time, as we continued to grow, I knew I would be able to more easily accept him.

Every day I moved closer to being in love with him again.

“I will remember,” I said.

“Good.”

Then, slowly, he leaned in as if to kiss me. I stilled, closing my eyes, anticipating the press of his lips to mine. Instead, he turned at the last moment and placed a soft kiss to my cheek instead.

“Goodnight, Cara,” he said, and then pulled away.

I watched him walk back to his rental car.

“Goodnight, Alaric,” I said.

The next day, I sat in the backyard of Ryan, Aidan, and Colin’s house. Eamon and Richard were there too, as well as Landon, who had returned home for a break between his travels. With him, he brought new fruits and other foods for me to try.

“These have been said to have healing properties,” he said as he loaded up my plate with all kinds of delicious-looking and not so delicious looking foods.

After eating, my brothers made me stand in the grass, barefoot, as to help connect me to the earth, per Landon’s research. My eyes closed, they tried to talk me through a shift.

“Pretend you can hear a howl in the distance,” Landon said. “Focus on that howl.”

I didn’t hear a thing, but for his sake, I tried to imagine what Lucy’s howl sounded like. It broke my heart a little; it had been so long since I’d last heard it that I almost couldn’t remember.

Still, I tried to focus.

Remember the howl.

Remember Lucy.

There, I could almost hear it. I focused on the sound.

“Can you hear it?” Landon asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Almost.”

“Focus hard,” Landon continued. “Let the sound wash over you. Feel it down into your core, so that it becomes you. You are one with that howl, and the wolf that emitted it. You are the wolf, Cara. Feel the call of the wild within you. Allow your senses to open up. Chase that feeling, don’t let it escape.”

I tried to do as he said. I focused on the howl, I brought it into myself.

Yet, even as I tried to convince myself I was one with my wolf, I still felt the empty shell of the place she used to occupy within me.

There would be no mind games to fix this. I couldn’t convince myself to feel Lucy when I knew she just wasn’t there.

She was gone from me.

“Now, shift,” Landon said, unaware that I’d already surrendered.

I opened my very human eyes.

“Cara,” he said, some disappointment in his voice.

“I’m sorry, Landon. She’s not there. I can feel her absence. I can’t convince myself otherwise.”

It wouldn’t work anyway. Without Lucy, I didn’t have a wolf to shift into, no matter how much I wanted to.

“We can keep practicing,” Landon said. He looked at Eamon. “How soon until the full moon?”

“Another week,” Eamon said.

Landon considered this.

The full moon did make it easier to shift for werewolves, but without Lucy, I still didn’t think it would matter.

“There are some wolves that only shift during the full moon,” Landon said. “And some refuse to let others shift with them. I wonder if you’d have a better time of it, trying on your own. That’s how Noel does it.”

That was news to me. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, I’ve known him for a long time,” Landon said. “And he has only ever shifted during the full moon and never in front of anyone else. He has a lot of control, that one.”

“Or a lot of secrets,” Aidan said.

Landon gave him a withering look. “Don’t be so negative. The man has proved himself trustworthy, hasn’t he?”

Aidan looked away, scolded.

“What does his wolf look like?” I asked, curious. I knew Noel was from one of the more secluded packs. The secrets there were well-kept, with no one even knowing the size, color, or shape of the wolves from the pack.

“Even I don’t know,” Landon said. “I tried asking him once, but he’s tight-lipped on the subject. He might not be from that pack anymore, but he’s still guarding their secrets.”

“See? He has secrets,” Aidan said. “There’s nothing wrong with what I said.”

“Protecting a pack’s secrets is different than keeping your own,” Colin said.

It did make me curious, though. What did Noel’s wolf look like? And how could he have so much control?

I wondered, could Noel teach me some of that control? Maybe that was a way to reach Lucy.