"…And that's what they were talking about at the—Bailey!" Clare snaps, waving her hand in front of my face.
"Sorry. Too many mimosas." That's a lie. I'm not even tipsy after two of them. I try to focus on what she was telling me. Something about renovations on her master bathroom. "You were saying something about how they couldn't take a wall down?"
"Are you okay?" Tara asks me with genuine concern.
Do I admit to them that my head is all over the place after the ball? That I'm not sure where I belong in the pack? Because if my best friends don't trust me after that, there's no guarantee that my sisters will. Plus, their husbands don't seem like big fans of the new king.
And it's impossible to feel like my sisters' mates aren't an invisible presence at the table with us.
"I'm fine. I just…" I laugh and shrug. "I don't really get the renovations thing. Or the domestic stuff. It's not that I don't care. I just can't relate."
"Yet," Clare reminds me. "Have you gotten an event planner? Lupercalia is right around the corner."
"Um." I look between them. "I don't know—"
Clare waves me off. "Sorry. I'm jumping ahead. Mother's probably got every hour between then and now packed with preparations."
"Exactly." I'm relieved for the excuse to avoid potential talk about Ashton.
I don't want to be with him. I'm not as excited about me getting a mate as everyone around me is.
"Besides, she has a whole year," Tara says, swallowing some water. "They can't do the mating rite until after her first transformation, and Lupercalia is on the full moon this year."
"Get the party locked down now. The sooner the better," Clare presses on. "Mother and Father will be so relieved when everything is settled."
Since deflecting didn't work, I confront her head on. "Relieved how?"
She rolls her eyes like I'm a child. "You're not stupid, Bailey. You know that after the stunt you pulled invoking that loophole—"
"A right, not a loophole," I interrupt to correct her.
She doesn't pay attention. "—we're all hoping that Ashton can be a stabilizing influence for you."
"A stabilizing—" I begin, my fists clenching under the table.
"Are you coming to the full moon ceremony?" Tara asks, like it's at all possible to change the subject now.
"Um, yeah." My own sisters don't want to be seen in werewolf establishments with me; maybe Tara is asking because she wants to be forewarned. "I'd like to attend before my first transformation. If I'm not too much of an embarrassment to the family."
Tara and Clare share a look, before Clare says, "We're not embarrassed to be seen with you, if that's what you think."
"Really?" I look around the restaurant, where there is nary a werewolf in sight. "Then why aren't we at Minelli's? Or the Chophouse?"
"Because every time we go to the Chophouse, Clare orders something she doesn't like and then she complains about it through the whole meal," Tara says with a snort.
That's true, but it's not the reason.
Clare, at least, has the guts to be honest with me. "Bailey, you put our whole family in an incredibly awkward position at the ball. Ashton's father is powerful and well-respected in the pack, and he might view your actions as support for Frost's claim to the throne."
"How?" I scoff. "I just got back."
"You just got back from London," Tara argues.
This is absolutely ridiculous. "Would you guys stop acting like I'm part of an international spy ring? It was one dance! And you said he was in love with some lady named Amber."
"You had one dance. With the king," Clare reminds me, as if I need it.
"I didn't even know who he was until I went to the fucking ball!" I snap. "Are you actually worried about this? Or are you just parroting whatever your husbands want you to say?"
"That's not fair!" Tara makes her patented wounded face.
It might work on Mother, but it doesn't work on me. "What was I supposed to do? Tell him no? Tell our pack leader no, I don't want to dance?"
My sisters remain silent.
"Ashton was there. He could have said something. He could have stepped in," I point out.
"He has more to lose than you do." Clare frowns as if she's confused that I don't understand that automatically.
Which is bullshit, because I fully understand what she's saying: my supposed future mate shouldn't have to risk a damn thing for me, but I should risk everything for him.
They both stare at me in silence, and I realize in this moment that they're complete strangers to me. Whoever they were before I left, before they took mates and started the adult werewolf lives we're all required to live for the good of the pack, they are not those people anymore.
It's all my fears confirmed. I know that once I'm mated to Ashton, I'll be expected to support and agree with everything he might do or say. And these expectations won't be exclusively his; everyone around me, even my sisters who balked at that kind of behavior in the past, will believe that I'm not fulfilling my purpose in the pack if I don't fall in line and be the ideal mate.