Lunar Whispers

Chapter 19

When Hunter woke the next morning, his chest throbbed with a sharp pain. He had been away from his mate for over fourteen hours. His head hurt, his mood was so low, it was just out of his reach.

Through the pain of bonded souls being far apart, the first thing Hunter could smell was his mate. Jacob's scent lingered densely in his room and the werewolf knew his parents smelt it last night. That was why he was so eager to go to bed. Hunter was ready to deny his bond with a human male at all costs. He had to develop his relationship with Jacob before his parents are told. He would struggle to stay strong if they didn't accept him.

Hunter climbed out of bed after aimlessly staring at the ceiling, and stretched. It was almost 7:45 am and he could tell that Jacob was still asleep. It dawned on the werewolf that today was Friday and Jacob doesn't start college until 11:00.

Hunter's mood was pushed even further down while he yanked on some jeans and wandered out of his room, not bothering to look for a t-shirt. Margo and Anthony were sitting at the table when he approached them. He didn't have to look to know that they were analysing him.

"Have you finally smelt it then?" Anthony sighed as his son slumped into the chair. He convinced himself that surely, the scent wasn't his son's mate. How could it be?

"What?" Hunter mumbled, rubbing his eyes as if to smudge the emotion, so they couldn't quite tell that he was in pain.

"The scent, it was all over your room. Your mother and I think that someone broke in yesterday."

Margo watched her son with a careful gaze. He had a secret, maybe the scent was part of it.

"I don't know what you're talking about." Hunter played it cool and clung onto his composure. He knew they could smell Jacob. He was fully aware that by bringing his mate home, they would get suspicious, but he needed Jacob's scent to be in his room. 

"I think you do," Margo said and linked her fingers together. "What are you hiding from us?"

Hunter was trying hard to keep his emotions locked away, but the key was turning without his control. "You tell me." He wanted to know their thoughts.

"I'm sick of this Hunter," Anthony crossed his arms with a grumpy shake to the head. "You're troubled by something. We only want to help you and you're worrying us."

Their son looked down to the shiny wood of their dining table. "You won't understand."

Margo moved closer and rested a hand over his. "We are your parents, you shouldn't feel like you have to keep anything from us."

"This is different." Hunter was slowly letting his guard down, but he didn't want to reveal the whole truth. "There's a chance you could hate me."

"You've done some stupid things in the past and we still love you," Anthony was talking about his pack adventuring too far and entering the rival pack's territory. "We could never hate you. Have you killed a human?"

"What!" Hunter stared with wide eyes and only for a second, he leaked the pain in his soul and his mother tilted her head. "Of course I haven't!"

"Alright, calm down it was just a thought. We're all guilty of it at some point in our lives. They've got a loud mouth when they see our wolf form."

Hunter ignored his comment, but it was true. If humans ever got too vocal about their existence, the wolves had to shut them up somehow.

"Not all of them," he mumbled. Jacob would never tell and he liked his wolf form. Warmth churned inside Hunter's heart, and it was hard to feel the love through the sorrow. They needed to be close and soon.