And there it was. She nodded. “Just hit you, did it? Blew your mind with a moment of, Oh crap, I’m marrying a Kincaid?” She sighed. “I feel ya. I really do.”

“No.” He huffed out a breath, big bad wolf style. “I know you’re in love with another man. I can’t marry a woman who’s going to resent me and make my life miserable for something I can’t help, so we need to work this out now.”

She stared at him, wondering how he’d come to that conclusion. “Um…what?”

“Are you saying you’re not in love with someone else?”

“I’m saying there’s no other man, and I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He growled, his eyes sparking gold. “Do not lie to me. I hate lies. I heard you on the phone. Heard you asking for Charlie.”

“Calm down, Merrow.” She frowned, but her stomach rolled with a greater anxiety. The secret she’d been sworn to keep was on the verge of surfacing and it was very clearly too soon. Duty or not, Hank probably didn’t like her enough at this point to forgive her for the whole thing. “For someone who hates lies, you sure have no problem eavesdropping, huh?”

That took the vinegar out of him. “Just tell me the truth. What am I getting into?”

She closed her eyes for a moment and took a breath. She could tell him the truth without revealing everything. It was the only way to hang on to her hope for a better life. The only way she might avoid her father’s wrath and a lifetime of looking over her shoulder. She tensed in anticipation of his reaction. “Charlie is my son.”

Hank’s shoulders dropped and his face went slack, the frustration draining away. “You have a kid? Where is he?”

“At my parents.” Anger had begun to simmer down deep. A little of it was because Hank was judging her for something he’d only overheard, but the bulk of her anger remained directed at her father for using Charlie as a pawn. And for being such a crappy human being.

A few beats passed before he spoke. “Why didn’t you say something? That’s an important detail, don’t you think?”

Her anger hit a boiling point but Clemens wasn’t there for her to lash out at, so Hank got the brunt of it. “My son is more than a detail and I didn’t tell you yet because we’ve barely learned each other’s first names. Maybe I was going to tell you at dinner.” She wasn’t. “Ever consider that?”

“No,” he muttered.

He didn’t deserve her ire, but she couldn’t stop herself. There was too much built up emotion in her and it needed an outlet. “I get that you think your job makes you above the law but eavesdropping is a pretty crappy way to start out a new relationship.”

So was withholding information, but what choice did she have? “Maybe it’s stupid to think this can work. We don’t know each other at all. I’m not sure we can even like each other. I need some air.”

“Ivy.”

She stormed out of the kitchen with no idea where she was going. Wasn’t like the place belonged to her.

She ended up in the garage, next to her motorcycle. She wanted to leave even though she knew she couldn’t. She had to stay here and see this thing through, but hearing Charlie referred to as a detail, like he was just one more box to be checked off, really riled her. Like the way Clemens had referred to her precious Charlie as a “weapon of mass humiliation”.

She sighed and wrapped her arms around herself. She missed Charlie so much. She just wanted to pull him close and bury her nose in his hair and smell his sweet little boy smell.

Hank stomped down the garage steps. “Ivy—”

“What?” She whipped around, knowing her eyes must be gilded with the storm of emotions inside her.

He held his hands up. “I’m sorry. You’re right. I shouldn’t have eavesdropped. And your son is definitely more than a detail. But you should have said something.”

“Again, you were one meal away from finding out.” She hated lying to Hank, but protecting Charlie and preserving the sliver of hope that she could make a better life for her son meant more. And what was she going to do? Tell Hank her father had sworn her to secrecy? That her father was trying to pawn off his unwanted grandchild onto another pack?

Hank raked a hand through his hair. “How old is…Charlie?”

“Just turned seven.”

Hank nodded. “Just had his first moon, did he?”

“Last month. His birthday’s May fifth.” That wasn’t adding to the lie, just answering in the vaguest way she knew how.

His eyes narrowed. “Does that date have anything to do with the five tattooed on your wrist?”

She smiled a little, feeling bad for dumping her anger on him. “You’re pretty perceptive.”

He shrugged, his broad shoulders pulling at his uniform in the most distracting way. Heaven help her, he was unfairly beautiful. “It’s my job.”

A moment of silence passed before he spoke again. “You understand why my knowing about your son is such a big deal, right?”

She understood. Too well. And there lay the crux of the whole thing. “Because if we marry, you have to take him as your firstborn. Unless you have another kid I don’t know about.”

He shook his head.

She put into words what she knew he must be thinking about. “I can understand if finding out about Charlie makes you want to back out of the deal. A lot of men, especially those in line to be alpha, would demand their firstborn be a child of their own blood.”