Page 381 of Pucking Feral: Part Two

Wraith's eyes find mine.

"You don't have to do this."

He huffs, signing. I'm fine. Promise.

His hands are steady when he signs it, but his knee is bouncing hard enough to shake the whole SUV.

Thane told me before we left that his mom has only ever seen Wraith's face once, by accident, and she sobbed for hours. Sobbed until she made herself sick, actually, while Wraith hid in the broom closet and heard all of it.

He made sure there was never a second time.

"Okay," I say, unbuckling. "Then let's do this. I'll do the talking, Valek will do the charming, and you just stand there being seven feet of mysterious boyfriend material."

He softens. I can do that.

"I know you can. It's what you're best at."

Valek opens my door before I can and offers his hand like we're arriving at a gala instead of a meet-the-parents dinner I might genuinely throw up during. Hopefully not at the table.

Wraith unfolds from the back seat behind me, slow, enormous, keeping the SUV between himself and the house for an extra moment.

We head up to the porch like the ragtag pack we are. Whiskey at the front for some reason, Thane annoyed behind him, Plague and Valek a few feet back, and Wraith and me bringing up the rear because he looks like he's about to be sick.

Thane's mother is already coming out to the porch. She's a tiny omega. Like, my-sized tiny, which is hilarious given the sheer size of Thane. She has silver-streaked dark hair and a cute green blouse that I know cost an arm and a leg.

Oh boy. I hope I'm not underdressed in my sweater and jeans.

"Hi, Mrs. Belmont," I say, suddenly not sure what I'm supposed to call her.

"Ivy," she says with a giant smile, wrapping me in a hug before I've fully climbed the steps. "Oh, look at you. You're even prettier than on the⁠—"

Her eyes lift over my shoulder.

Her smile stays exactly where it is, suddenly nailed in place, while everything behind it freezes. Her eyes skate across Wraith's exposed jaw, his teeth, the scarred muscle where cheeks should be, and then flee upward to his worried blue eyes and cling there.

Wraith goes still behind me.

"Wraith," she says softly.

She crosses the porch to him, reaching up, way up. For a second, he doesn't move, but then he bends down so she can wrap her arms around his neck. His hands hover behind her back before carefully resting on her lower back, but barely.

"I'm so glad you came," she whispers.

She's not looking at his face while she says it. She's got her cheek pressed to his chest, eyes screwed shut tight, and I don't think she knows I can see the tear she blinks away before she pulls back.

"Maureen," she says to me, with a slight sniff. "None of that Mrs. Belmont business. And that's Arthur lurking in the hall pretending he wasn't watching through the curtains."

"I was checking the weather," Arthur Belmont says from the entryway.

"There are apps for that, Arthur!" she tells him.

I would recognize him instantly, even if I hadn't seen him in countless photos. He's clearly Thane's father. Arms crossed, feet planted, his face carved from the same granite as his son. The NHL Commissioner is gray at the temples and shorter than I was expecting, which makes the size difference between Thane and his mom even funnier because I have no idea where his height came from, but that doesn't keep his handshake from feeling like I'm shaking a goalie glove.

"Ivy. A pleasure," he says.

He claps Thane on the back next, then turns to Wraith, and his jaw does the same clenching thing Thane's does when he's absorbing a hit and refusing to show it.

"Son," he says roughly.