The Alpha Captain's Secret Baby novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Grilled Cheese

In the lakefront suite Pia brings food, tears and an apology, and says Rhys hated Willa. Hattie arrives and will not sit in the same room, and a text says the Hall has called a blood test for Thursday.

The suite was on the fourteenth floor, and it had a window the size of a wall.

Lake Superior lay black behind the glass, with one ore boat lit up far out on the water.

Emil ran straight to the window and pressed both hands on it.

"Mama, there's a whole ocean!"

"It's a lake," I said, and set our two bags down by the door.

The man who had carried them up from the car grinned at my son.

"Bram Teller," he said, and held out a fist.

Emil bumped it with his own small fist.

Bram was the Northmen's alternate captain and Rhys's beta.

Six years ago he had been the one pack boy who sat with me at the Hall suppers when Pia was busy.

"Cap sent me to be useful," Bram said to me, more quietly. "I'm bad at it, but I brought snacks."

He had brought four bags of snacks and a toy wolf pup with a Northmen scarf.

"You're staying in the next room," Bram said. "If you need anything, you knock on the wall."

"Why would I need anything?"

"Because the Luna's coming up in ten minutes with a casserole, and I'd like to be near a wall."

I looked at him.

He shrugged, with his freckled face perfectly innocent.

"I'm not saying anything. I'm just saying it's a very big casserole."

He left before I could ask what he meant.

The casserole turned out to be a tray of grilled cheese cut into small triangles, and Pia carried it in herself.

She had taken off her coat, and her eyes were still pink.

"I didn't know what he likes," she said, "so I made everything. Is he allowed cheese?"

"He's allowed cheese," I said.

Emil took a triangle in each hand and said thank you with his mouth full.

Pia laughed, and then she put the back of her hand to her lips and cried a little.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I'm so sorry, Wills. I've thought about you every single day."

She hadn't called me Wills in six years.

It still made my throat hurt, and I hated that it did.

"I looked for you," she said. "I looked everywhere, and Rhys looked even harder. Then he stopped."

"He stopped?"

"After a few years." She wiped her eyes. "He hasn't said your name since. Not once, in six years."

"I wouldn't have thought he would."

"I think he hated you, honestly. I'm sorry. I shouldn't say that in front of Emil."

"He's eating, Pia. He can't hear anything but cheese."

She laughed again, wetly, and sat down on the arm of the couch.

"Can I hold him?" she said. "Just for a minute. I never had one of my own."

Rule three was clear in my head.

Never alone, I had said, and I wasn't going anywhere.

"I'll be standing right here," I said.

"Of course."

Emil let himself be lifted onto her lap with his sandwich still in his fist.

Pia put her chin on top of his head, and her eyes closed.

She breathed in, once, slowly.

My nails dug into my palms.

I waited through a long, tight silence and said, "That's a minute."

"Already?"

"He needs a bath."

Pia let him go and smoothed his hair down with a gentle hand.

The knock at the door was loud and sharp, three raps with a knuckle.

Hattie stood in the hallway in a green parka, holding a canvas bag in one hand and a casserole dish in the other.

She had flour on her sleeve.

"You said you were too old to drive five hours," I said.

"I lied," Hattie said, and walked past me into the suite.

She stopped as soon as she saw the couch.

Pia stood up, and her face crumpled into delighted tears.

"Hattie! Oh, I've missed you so much, I'm so sorry about what happened at the Hall."

"You said it, so you can keep it," Hattie said.

She didn't put down the casserole, and she didn't come any closer.

"I'll wait in the bedroom with the boy," she said to me. "You can see the Luna out."

Pia stared at her.

"I only came to help," she said softly.

"That's what you always came to do," said Hattie.

Pia's smile stayed exactly where it was.

I walked her to the door myself.

She turned in the doorway and took my hand in both of hers.

"I'll take care of everything," she said. "You don't have to be scared of me. You never did."

My phone buzzed in my pocket before I could answer her.

It was a message from Bram, and it was short.

The Hall has called a blood test for Thursday, it said. Before the whole pack.

Pia read it upside down, over my wrist, and squeezed my hand.

"It's only a formality," she said. "I'll stand with you."

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