Chapter 217
Chapter 217
Gideon’s POV
Honestly, I hadn’t expected Avery to be right.
It wasn’t that I didn’t trust her.
It was more that I didn’t trust anyone.
Before the luncheon, when Avery had given me the warning about Dierdra’s instability, I had chalked it up to something more subtle. Dierdra being upset at our new working situation, for example. I had thought she was trying to tell me that I might need to work to keep things in balance, or Dierdra would act out and destabilize the new equilibrium that we had forged.
It never crossed my mind to doubt that she was truly pregnant. If I hadn’t been able to scent the pup she carried, I chalked it up to our relationship being somewhat unconventional and stifled. After all, I had trouble feeling the mate bond with Dierdra as well, but she had been a rogue, and everyone knew that sometimes it took a while for rogues to truly integrate with pack dynamics such as Alpha bonds.
All of those things had run through my head as the chaos of the luncheon increased. At first I thought that my inquisition calling out falsehoods had set Dierdra, and my family on edge.
Understandable, it was meant to.
But then Dierdra began to grow more agitated, and a small spark at the back of my mind flared to a flame.
What if she was behaving erratically because she was living a lie?
Her strange behavior and terse responses to the conversation at the table made me grow more and contemplative.
I had made it crystal clear that I would not forgive anyone who continued to lie to me after I gave them a chance at clemency. The threat was two-fold. It was meant to make the consequences obvious, and to flush out those who might have minor grievances and falsehoods.
Those happened quite often in a large and powerful pack. The power dynamics at play meant that some level of conflict was inevitable. The best Alphas anticipated and bulwarked against it.
A wolf functioning within the pack hierarchy would surrender when challenged by their Alpha. They knew that to do otherwise was to court their own destruction. That was the core essentialism of ‘pack’, that there was some room for deviance, but when your Alpha commanded you, your obedience was absolute.
Therefore, anyone who persisted in maintaining a deception after having been given the opportunity for a merciful absolution, was acting against both their own best interest, and that of the pack as a whole.
Truthfully, I had suspected Dierdra of being guilty of some low-level infringement. Bullying, or somesuch. The sort of behavior that was considered unsavory in a Luna, but which could be forgiven when she was so young and pregnant as well.
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Chapter 217
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At first, when she declined to speak, I felt relief.
Then, as the luncheon continued and her body language grew more tense, I grew concerned.
There were very few crimes I could think of that would prompt that level of mendacity. She carried the scent of fear, and she didn’t immediately throw herself at my feet and on my mercy.
Therefore, it must be something quite severe, I deduced.
I was about to deliver a lancet of questioning, when she excused herself. I watched Camila and Avery go with her, and pondered what it all possibly could herald.
Then she returned and began to complain about pains in her abdomen and my concern rocketed. It was enough to push my vague suspicions to the side, for the moment at least. That was my pup she carried, or so I thought, and I would do anything to make sure they were all right.
I felt grateful when Avery suggested a medical visit. I had been about to suggest the same. This was an area I knew little about, and it was a relief to place her in the hands of the best doctor in the local hospital.
I was grateful for Avery’s presence as well. Throughout it all she gave off the aura I expected from a competent Luna-she was calm, collected, and anchored me when Dierdra had shut me out. My mate refused to even look at me.
At first I assumed it was because Dierdra was afraid, and I wanted to reassure her, but found myself holding back for a reason I couldn’t comprehend.
Her distance emotionally made me spend those hours waiting re-examining our relationship. reliving all of our moments of affection and closeness that I thought were genuine, and trying to them through the lens of an outsider.
Then the doctor came and gave her final diagnosis and it was as though all of those pleasant memories flatlined in my memory as my vision grew red with fury.
Now I understand what it was she had been hiding from me, but for the life of me, I couldn’t understand why she would have deceived me in such a way.
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