Alpha's Regret: The Seventh Time was Forever

Chapter 239 - They said bad things about Mom

Earlier, Voren spotted Ravyn the moment they crossed paths near the back of the building, and Ravyn, to his credit, didn’t waste time on pleasantries.

"Voren." He fell into step beside him, dropping his voice low. "Did you bring her?"

"She’s here," Voren confirmed. He glanced around the space they were moving through, the side corridor that ran parallel to the main gym floor, and came up empty. No Seraphine. No Damon. No Bryan. He put it together quickly enough.

She’d gone inside ahead of him, probably with the other two, because being near Voren for an extended stretch of time required periodic breaks for her sanity. He understood that, though he didn’t particularly like it, but he understood it. "Get me something to train in first."

Ravyn’s mouth curved. "Already handled. Changing room."

They took the back entrance into Ravyn’s private changing room, a space that most pack members never saw, set apart from the main locker area and separated from the gym floor by nothing more than a wall and whatever distance sound needed to travel.

As it turned out, it didn’t need much. The voices from inside carried cleanly, and Ravyn knew every single one of them without having to think about it.

Voren went still as he listened. The easy, coiled patience he usually carried with him had gone somewhere else entirely, replaced by something tight and low and simmering just below the point where it would start to show on his face.

He pulled on the training gear, white shorts, a white tank that fit well enough, and kept his jaw locked while the sounds from the other room continued to travel through the wall.

When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet. Controlled in the way that things are controlled when the alternative is considerably worse. "You made me bring her here for this?" He didn’t look at Ravyn while he said it. He focused on lacing his sneakers, precise and unhurried, like he needed somewhere safe to put his hands. "I trusted you."

tone of a man who wasn’t going to dress something up just to make himself sound better. "I’d heard a few of them making

lasted long enough to make its point. "Then you need to fix it," he said, low and without room for negotiation. "Because if she throws my shares back in

"I’ll handle it."

"See that you do."

wide doorway that opened onto the main floor with its high ceilings, scuffed mats, weight racks and long rows

enough that the pack used it for assemblies when the weather or the

it was full of bodies and the particular charged quiet of people who had been making noise and

in Diane’s expression, not in Kevin’s, not in the faces

easy confidence of people who had decided in advance that whatever he was about to say wouldn’t really apply to them.

at his side like he’d been launched from somewhere, all flushed cheeks and heaving chest and eyes that had gone deep red around

a child his size. "They said bad things about Mom." His voice

that he hadn’t expected to

time, and she had let every word land without raising a single objection. He turned the thought over as he looked at her. A Luna was supposed to be the heart of a pack,

Daisy and asking himself quietly, if she could ever fill in the role

gaze moved to Seraphine. He looked at her long enough that the look became something that leaned toward sorry without quite

conversation actually mattered. "Seraphine is a very busy woman, pup. She

that a child reaches for when everything else feels unsteady. "And you have something important ahead of