Golden Destiny

Chapter 15. Backtrack

"Mia!" We heard dad's voice after what was presumably the door hit the wall hard.

Mom looked at my four older brothers, Harper, and myself and gave us a knowing look. Dad came into the kitchen where we all were.

Only a few words had been said once we got home, my brothers as their wolves, myself in skin wearing Harper's coat, which thankfully came down to mid-thigh.

As soon as the rogues ran into the woods, my brothers quickly went to where I was standing in front of Adam and herded me out of there. They told me to shift once we were out of sight of the rest of the teachers and students, but not before we ran into Alpha Andrew and his cavalry.

He was clearly surprised at seeing a fifth wolf among my brothers, but since Harper was there with us, I guess he quickly added things up.

His parting words to us were, "I want to have a meet with all of you later tonight at the pack house."

After I had shifted back to skin, my brothers kept on urging me towards the direction of home and when we got to our house, they all rushed to their rooms except for Jervin, who waited until we were inside and the door was closed, only then did that weird glow leave his eyes. The moment it did, he shook his big wolf head, licked my cheek, and headed upstairs as well.

I looked at Harper to say that I was going to my room as well to shower and change, but my mom's voice stopped me.

"What in the Goddess' name happened, Mia? Where are your clothes? Did you shift? In public?" She asked, clearly panicked.

"Don't worry, Your Highness. Jervin did a great job at glamouring her," Harper explained.

My mom relaxed and nodded as though she understood what Harper was talking about. I, on the other hand, had no idea what that meant.

Mom told me to shower and change and as I was on my way upstairs, some of my brothers were going down. Jameson was the first to reach the kitchen, obviously, because I heard mom's voice ring out, "Jameson Larkin, tell me why your sister had to be in the position where she had no choice but to shift to wolf. And make sure that explanation will be good, young man."

I snickered, as did some of my brothers. We all knew Jameson wasn't in any real trouble with mom as soon as she heard about what had happened at school.

After I cleaned myself and changed into a pair of jeans and a hoodie, I went downstairs to find my older brothers and Harper sitting around the breakfast table looking properly chastised.

"What's going—" I started to ask, but Harper shot me a look that clearly told me to shut my mouth.

I took one of the open seats and sat as my brothers and best friend did, silent and waiting.

Until dad got home and banged the door open.

When he entered the kitchen, he immediately went to me and pulled me up. He wrapped his arms around me so tight, and considering he hasn't done this before, I felt like he was squeezing the water from my body, forcing it to leak from my eyes.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my mom smile and Jameson, who was beside her, looked down at his hands on the table.

When dad loosened his hold, he cupped my face in his hands and said, choking up, "I was so afraid I was going to lose you, sweetheart," as his eyes started to fill up.

I saw him take a moment to reel his feelings in, and wondered at how he was able to do it, and then I realized, he had always done it. When I was growing up, he was able to mask his true emotions from the world, even from me, and he did this at a high cost.