The day after the funeral, Knight dragged himself into work. Sue had tried to talk him out of it, but he needed to do something. He couldn’t stand sitting around with everyone at his grandparent’s house. It was like they all thought they had to wallow in the misery to honor Lenard. It was bullshit, of course. The last thing Lenard West would ever want was for people to mope.“Are you sure about this?” Sue asked as they drove into the office. “We could do something else. We don’t have to stay at your grandma’s place, we could go anywhere. It’s Friday anyway, is it really worth going back to work for just one day?”He knew Sue was trying to help but the fact that she had just referred to the house as his grandma’s place, instead of grandparents’, was pissing him off.“Honestly? I just want to go to work,” Knight told her. “I’ve got stuff that needs doing and a lot of paperwork to read through before I meet with Grandpa’s lawyers later.”“Okay,” Sue said as she wrung her hands on her lap

It was a relief when the weekend rolled around. It had been just over a week since they had buried his grandpa. Knight kept waiting for things to feel normal again, but he wasn’t sure it ever would.He had known that going off to London for a week would result in a backlog of work, and he was prepared for it. Heaping on top of that all that needed to be done for his grandpa’s businesses, and the pack members who wanted to have a sit down with him, Knight was starting to feel like he was drowning in paperwork.It was mostly the older members who wanted to make sure that Knight’s vision for the pack was the same as their last alpha. Honestly, Knight hadn’t even given it any thought. His grandpa had been a great alpha, Knight just hoped to be like him.In an ideal world, Knight would have spent his Saturday in bed with Sue, only venturing into his study after midday to make a dent in some of his work.However, his biological dad h

The West pack had four official meetings every year, one for each season. The one they had in autumn was during the week of Halloween. A big party was thrown at the estate with games and various other attractions outside. Sue had been to a couple of their parties so far but not the Halloween one. It was going to be the first pack gathering since Lenard’s funeral and the first gathering under their new alpha.As the alpha’s mate, Sue still didn’t really know what her new role was, if any. Knight’s mother and grandmother had organized everything. If she was honest, she was grateful that they hadn’t asked for her input so far.“So, things not to mention to your mom are the fact that we got married and the fact that you’ve not only met your real dad but have also been hanging out with him and his pack,” Sue mused out loud as Knight parked the car outside his grandma’s house.Knight turned and gave her a look. “No, I’m going to tel

Since his grandpa’s death, Knight had missed the old man every single day. Being at a pack party without him was a whole new kind of pain. Lenard had been so full of life. He was always at the center of every group, telling stories while everyone else hung on his every word.There was a light missing there today.Knight walked through the throng of people, trying his best to make small talk and act like he was interested in everything they were saying. After deciding he had mingled enough for the time being, he went looking for his cousins. If he was ever tired of people kissing his ass and telling him exactly what he wanted to hear, his cousins soon put it right. Particularly Leslie, who delighted in tormenting Knight.He found them over by the fortune telling machine that his grandma hired every year from a carnival supplier. As a kid, the thing had always given him the creeps. It was a glass booth with a creepy wizard-looking mannequin inside. You held on to a metal rod, and it pum

Knight had been feeling so bad about the fact he had been working so much the past week that he made sure to get home early. In the week since the fall gathering, Knight had hardly seen Sue. He knew it was his fault, but it couldn’t be helped. Still, he knew he had to make it up to his wife. He had spent the day working nonstop so that he could get home at a reasonable hour.What was early for him was still a full day’s work for anyone else. It was nearly seven when he let himself into the apartment. He had a bag of take out with him and a bottle of wine.“Sue,” he called out as he shrugged off his jacket. He didn’t need to wait for a response. His hearing and sense of smell would have picked up on something by now.He walked into the kitchen and put the bag of food on the counter. As he had been staying late at the office lately, Sue had been driving herself to and from work. Her car was in the underground garage, so Knight knew that his mate had come home after work.Pulling his pho