Reborn (Shadow Beast Shifter, #3)(13)

When I left the bakery, I ate my pastry—which she hadn’t even charged me for because apparently I was the shit these days. Wandering into a few other stores, I dropped more questions, but all the answers were the same. I’d been with Torin over the past two months, getting our pack life back in order. Everything normal. No drama.

And yet for some reason I was missing every damn memory of that. Why did no one have a reasonable explanation for that?

As I continued down the street, having exhausted almost all the available store owners, an empty shop caught my attention. At first, it was because I couldn’t remember this street ever having an empty storefront, but soon after, it was the oddest feeling that I’d spent a lot of time inside those walls.

When I got no answers from peering through the partially boarded-up windows, I stopped in at the hardware store beside it, knowing Magda, my least favorite town gossip, would know what was up.

“Been empty for years,” she said without pause, chewing her gum loudly. “Some sort of water leak that no one could find or repair.”

“I could have sworn there was a shop here the last time I came to town,” I murmured, staring out the hardware store window toward it.

Magda scoffed, her wrinkles deepening so she looked every one of her hundred and fifty years. “You haven’t been into this part of our town for months, and before that, we were all in stasis, and even before that, there was a flood that washed the shop out. Nothing has been there in your lifetime.”

“And what shop was it before my lifetime?” I asked, wondering if I’d seen old photos or something.

She paused, her brow scrunching until her eyebrows nearly hit her yellow-blonde hair. “You know, I don’t remember.”

I pulled my gaze from the other shopfront to stare at her. “What? You’ve never forgotten a damn thing.”

She clicked her tongue at me. “Watch your mouth, missy. Alpha-mate or not, you will respect your elders.”

In what world was uttering the word “damn” not respecting my elders? But, for the sake of possible information, I shot a quick apology her way. The older shifters had the weirdest hang-ups, but at this point, I needed her more than she needed me.

“I remember books,” Magda finally said, but then her eyes tightened again, like that hurt her to say. “Or maybe I’m wrong. There’s never been a bookstore here, so I… don’t know.”

She wandered off then, looking mildly dazed as I continued to stare at the building. Books? That felt… right. The moment I had the thought, my temples were stabbed by invisible knives, and now I was the one walking off rubbing my temples.

Was the abandoned shopfront part of the mystery as well? Magda had acted odd, so it wasn’t just me. It was starting to occur to me that maybe the reason I couldn’t get anything other than the same “story” from the pack was that everyone else had had their memories messed with too. They might not even have realized because it was subtler than what had happened to me.

Truth be told, even if there were gaps in time for them, they didn’t care. They’d fallen into their daily routines, accepting the weird and questioning nothing.

Had that been the plan all along, by whomever had set this in motion?

Had they expected I would just be so happy not to be the shit under Torma’s boots that I’d fall into this new life and never question a damn thing?

If that was the case, the culprit had made a few fundamental errors. Firstly, they should have chosen someone less stubborn than me, and secondly, they should have removed my memories of the pack’s torment and Torin’s rejection. Huge obstacles standing in the way of me falling into pack life.

I supposed removing a few months of time was much easier than removing ten-plus years. I’d have been very surprised to wake up in a twenty-year-old body thinking myself a child.

Why had the culprit had to remove any time, though? If they’d allowed me just to wake with everyone else from the stasis, I’d have been none the wiser…

It just didn’t make sense. None of it, and my time in the main street had only helped to confuse me further.

With nothing else to do, I wandered back in the direction of the apartment, restless and bored. Plan A might not have panned out, but there were plenty of letters left in the alphabet, and it was time to move to “S” for Simone.

Simone’s parents lived in one of the more affluent areas of Torma. It might have only been a relatively small town, but it was still clear who held positions of prestige in the pack, solely through the land and house size they’d been rewarded with. When I walked through their neighborhood, with the acre-sized lots, huge double-level mansions, and perfectly manicured lawns, I tried not to think of all the times I’d been made to feel like I didn’t belong here.

Gerad and Mika Lewison, a.k.a. Simone’s father and mother, were two of the worst for withholding the welcome wagon. I couldn’t really blame them. Their daughter had suffered for her friendship with me, and even though I’d been too selfish to walk away from someone I loved and needed, I’d always felt guilty about it.

So, no, I didn’t blame them, but the scars were there nonetheless.

Their wrought-iron gates were open, so I walked up the path, and just as I reached their door and went to press the buzzer, I heard shouting. Simone’s parents were enforcers, but I’d never heard them yell. They tended to favor the silent and deadly style of intimidation… especially her mother, who was of Japanese descent and proficient in a variety of martial arts and fighting disciplines.