Claiming the Spare Twin novel · Chapter 7 of 24

Chapter 7: The Kitchen Table

I didn't knock.

I went up the porch steps and rang the iron bell by the door, the one that has called the Marrow pack to council for a hundred years.

Three long strokes, and the sound rolled out over the dark town.

Behind me Dorran said, "That works."

"It's the only thing in this house that does."

By the time I pushed the kitchen door open, lights were coming on in the windows up and down the lane.

My father rose halfway out of his chair with his napkin in his hand.

Rosalie dropped her fork.

"Til!" She was across the kitchen in three steps, and she threw both arms around my neck.

She smelled of vanilla and our mother's cedar chest.

"Oh, thank God. Are you all right? Did he hurt you?"

"You're eating pot roast," I said.

She went still against me.

"I've been going out of my mind," she said into my hair.

"The camera at Main Street caught your car at three this morning."

She let go of me.

"Til, I can explain."

"Please do."

The back door opened, and in came the Marrow elders in their coats over their pajamas, three gray-haired men and a woman I'd known all my life.

Behind them the kitchen filled with neighbors, wolves I'd grown up with, and they stopped dead when they saw Dorran in the doorway.

"I'm only here as the bride's escort," he said. "This is Marrow's table."

He leaned on the frame with his arms crossed and didn't speak again.

Rosalie smoothed her sweater.

"I was scared," she said, to the room, in the sweet, wavering voice that had never once failed her. "The Claiming felt wrong, and I panicked. I drove around for hours and came home and hid in the cellar. Dad found me at dawn."

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