Chapter 769 Ghosts Of Our Past

Caleb tilted his head.

Fiona smiled.

“Summer has changed since you’ve been gone,” she said.

Caleb swallowed and looked away. He nodded.

“Of course,” he said. “It’s been five years. Recovery from war, expanding outside the territories, a new Alpha… how could it be the same?”

Fiona nodded.

“Two years ago… this place was much different,” she said. “The people… were different.”

“I heard,” Caleb said, looking at her. He reached out and took her hand. “I’m sorry. I know it was hard on you.”

Fiona let out a soft chuckle.

“It was hard on all of us,” she said. “The war destroyed entire sections of this city. We lost many of our wolves. It took time and effort to rebuild it all.”

Caleb looked out at the buildings before him, the people below.

“Your father’s lab, your treehouse… I had to order the official destruction of those places,” she said quietly.

Caleb felt that painful tug on his heart as he thought of the empty hole in the ground.

“You did what you had to do, Mom,” he said, “I know that.”

Fiona smiled.

“Of course you do,” she whispered. “You’re an Alpha.”

Caleb sighed and looked away.

“No,” he said. “Not anymore.”

Fiona reached over and turned his chin, forcing him to look at her.

“You’ll never stop being an Alpha,” she smiled. “It’s more than just a role you play, Caleb.”

He swallowed but said nothing.

“You will find a new role to play, but you will always be an Alpha. You will always lead, whether you want to or not. You will always put others before yourself, whether you want to or not.”

Fiona took a deep breath and laughed.

“It’s who you are, who you’ve always been,” she sighed. “It’s who your father was… and who Galen is… no matter how much he tried to fight it.”

Caleb took a deep breath and turned away from her again. He placed his hands on the railing, squeezing it.

“Summer has changed since you’ve been gone,” she repeated.

She licked her lips and took a deep breath.

“But it’s still the same if you really look.”

Caleb furrowed his brows and looked at her.

“For three years… I rebuilt, I bandaged, and I stopped the bleeding. I did everything I could to keep this pack the same, to preserve it in your place… to keep it just as you had left it.”

Fiona paused, lowering her eyes.

“I mourned when Cain’s lab was destroyed, when your treehouse was ripped from the earth,” she said softly. “And when Galen became Alpha.”

Caleb swallowed.

“Why would you…?” he asked quietly.

Fiona gave a sad smile.

“At the time, I thought I was just angry. For allowing him to convince me to give up on you,” she said. “But after I went through the mourning process in Broken Crag… when I returned to Summer, I realized something.”

Caleb felt his heart beating quickly. He felt as though whatever she was about to say was important, not just to her but for him as well.

“What?” he asked.

Fiona turned and looked into his eyes.

“When I saw the changes that Galen had made, the progress he had made in the three months that I was gone… I realized what I had been doing…” she said.

Fiona paused and took a deep breath.

“I had refused to let Summer move on,” she smiled. “I had locked us all in a constant state of grief. Frozen in time. Clinging to the past.”

Caleb felt a weight in his stomach, pulling, dragging. He swallowed and turned from her.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“No,” Fiona whispered.

Again, she reached out and touched his chin. She pulled gently, and he let her turn him to face her.

“It wasn’t for you,” she whispered.

Caleb furrowed his brow.

“What… do you mean?” he asked.

Fiona licked her lips.

“It was Cain,” she said with a sad smile.

Caleb swallowed. A strange fluttering feeling in his stomach made him uneasy.

“I realized,” she continued, “that I had been fighting for even longer than three years to rebuild, bandage, and preserve Summer, and so had you.”

Caleb’s eyes widened and then moved away from hers.

“The last few years of his life, Cain was so busy trying to solve all these problems on his own… he left the pack to me. I did what I could to keep it running, but I was not an Alpha… all I could do was maintain,” Fiona said.

She turned back to look down at the people below.

“When he died, I just kept doing it,” she continued. “Even when you took over, I still encouraged you to keep as many of Cain’s plans in place as possible.”

Caleb closed his eyes. His father had been at the front of his thoughts in all his most important decisions. There had been many things Caleb had done that Cain would not have agreed with, but he couldn’t deny that the way he ran Summer was almost exactly as his father had taught him.

Until the moment he met Ashleigh.

Meeting her had changed Caleb’s entire world. His priorities, his interests, his future. Before she came into his life, everything was planned according to what was best for the pack. What was best for the Alpha of Summer.

“I tried to keep Cain alive through the pack,” Fiona said. “Through his plans, his way of doing things.”

Caleb lowered his head, taking in a shaky breath.

“And so did you…” she said softly. “But neither of us ever realized it… we never knew how much we were holding ourselves back.”

Caleb listened, but his mind had already wandered to the memories of his father. Of watching how he worked through the problems of the pack and how he approached each situation. Of all the times, his father had reminded him that he would be Alpha one day. That it was his only role, his responsibility.

There was no future outside of being Alpha of Summer for Caleb. That was the only life he was ever meant to have.

“Summer has changed,” Fiona repeated for the third time, “the uniforms are different, and some of the buildings are gone. New programs, new people… a new Alpha…”

Fiona lifted Caleb’s chin. She looked into his eyes with a warm smile.

“But the people are still the same. The goals are still the same,” she whispered. “Galen is still the same.”

Caleb took a deep breath and nodded.

Fiona moved her hand to touch his cheek. He leaned into her warm touch and closed his eyes.

He thought of the family inside the house he had imagined, of standing outside the window. He felt as though, somehow, Fiona was opening that window for him.

“Everything has changed,” Fiona said softly, “and each of us… you, me, and Galen…. We’ve been given a chance for a life that none of us would have ever dreamed for ourselves.”

Fiona paused and lowered her eyes.

“It may have been forced on us… painfully,” she said with a sad smile. “But it is ours nonetheless.”

Caleb opened his eyes, looking up at the gentle expression on his mother’s face.

“Caleb,” she whispered gently, “it’s time that we let the ghosts of our past rest… and enjoy these lives we’ve been given… I think we’ve more than earned it.”