Mated to my Stepfather

POV: AVA

“This is Lucas Blackthorn.”

The voice was smooth, rough, tense, but it ignited something inside me by just hearing it.

I froze in place, my hand shaking as I held the phone against my ear.

I knew the name. Not well, but enough. My mother’s new husband. The man she married after disappearing—again—from my life. I had never spoken to him before and never met him in person but in the literal sense, he was my stepfather.

There was a breath on the other end of the line.

Then, softly but firmly he said, “I’m calling with... difficult news. Your mother passed away last night.”

The words didn’t register at first. They just sat there, shocked and silent. “She... what?”

“She died in her sleep peacefully.” His voice didn’t shake. It didn’t crack. “I’m sorry to be the one to tell you.”

I stared blankly out the coffee shop window. The trees outside swayed gently in the wind, students walked past in groups, laughing. But I was underwater. Floating. No—drowning.

I hadn’t seen my mother in years. When I turned twenty last month, she didn’t even bother to call. And now she never would again.

“I thought you should know,” Lucas continued, “The funeral is tomorrow evening at the Blackthorn packhouse in northern Oregon. She’d want you to come.”

Packhouse.

That word echoed somewhere in the back of my mind, stirring up half-buried memories—of sharp teeth and soft howls—of the way my mother would stare at the moon sometimes like it was speaking only to her—of the life she chose over a life with me as my mother.

My voice came out stiff and unaffected even though I was wrecked inside with feelings I couldn’t even comprehend. “Okay.”

“I can send someone for you or give you the address if you’d prefer to come on your own.”

“I’ll drive.”

“Very well. I’ll text you the coordinates.”

There was a long pause, where I thought about hanging up but didn’t.

“She asked about you, near the end,” he said. “She hoped you’d come.”

I said nothing in response.

“I’ll let you go,” he said finally. “Safe travels, Ava.”

He hung up before I could think of something—anything—to say.

I stared at my phone for a long time after. My name looked foreign on the screen. Like I wasn’t real anymore. Like I didn’t know who I was.

***

I didn’t cry—not in the car—not while packing—not while staring at the old photograph I kept at the bottom of my sock drawer—the one of her holding me as a baby, her face tired but bright with her wild golden hair tangled in the wind.

She’d been gone so long already. She used to say the wolf inside her was always louder than the world around her. That it pulled her away from the ordinary. That’s why she left my father, that’s why she left me. I told myself for years it was okay and that I didn’t need her. But now, as I stared at the Oregon wilderness unfolding outside my windshield, I realized I hadn’t believed that. Not really. She was my mom.

I drove north for hours, further into the wilderness, and further from my old life. Out of the city, away from everything familiar. The large pine trees thickened, taller than they had any right to be.

The Blackthorn territory wasn’t listed on any GPS. I had to use the coordinates that Lucas had texted, typing them in manually.

The road narrowed to gravel, then to dirt. Mist crept in through the trees. Moss hung from the branches.

By the time I pulled up to the towering gates, I let out a heavy breath. I stepped out of the car, gravel crunching under my black leather boots.

I didn’t know what I expected—maybe a gatekeeper, or a guard. Maybe even Lucas himself. But there was no one.

The gates creaked open as if responding to my presence. Automatically. Silently. Beyond them, the road stretched upward through trees older than time itself. The forest loomed on both sides of the property—vast—abundant. The air was sharper here. Thinner. I could smell the pine waver in the air.

I followed the winding path until it opened into a clearing. And there it was.

The Blackthorn packhouse.

The packhouse was more fortress than home. It rose from the earth like it had grown out of it. Wood and stone, massive timber beams, arching rooftops, a thick-cut roof.

I parked at the edge of the driveway and sat in the car for a full minute, heart hammering and breath unsteady.

I was half-wolf, half-human, and in this moment I didn’t feel like I belonged to either side.

No one came out to greet me. No one even looked out a window. I felt like an intruder at my own mother’s funeral.

My fingers trembled as I grabbed my overnight bag and stepped into the dark night.

The front door loomed ahead, carved with symbols I didn’t understand. Spirals. Claws. Crescent moons. Wolves.

I raised a hand and knocked as loud as I could.

Nothing.

I waited, then knocked again—still no answer.

Then the door creaked open slightly, revealing the interior of the packhouse—warm—silent—unwelcoming. I hesitated. Then stepped inside.

The scent hit me first. Pinewood, ash, fur. Old smoke. Wet earth. My mother’s scent lingering in the air.

The entryway was empty. Beyond it, a long hall stretched into plain view. Dark wooden floors. Animal pelts on the walls. Tribal relics.

I clutched the strap of my overnight bag tighter and called out softly, “Hello?”

No answer. The silence was too complete. I didn’t know if I was welcome here.

A single note lay on the wooden table by the long wooden staircase. My name was written on it in black ink.

Ava—your room is at the end of the hall. The funeral is at sundown tomorrow. Rest well.

No signature, but I knew who it was from. Lucas. My stepfather. My mother’s husband.

There were no photos of my mother on mantels or tables. There were no faces peeking from doorways. Only the sound of the wind against the windows and the darkness from outside covering the artificial light inside the home.

I followed the hall to the last door, my boots echoing on the hardwood flooring.

My room was simple—warm enough, equipped with a bed, a wooden dresser, and a small window that overlooked the endless tree line. Moonlight spilled across the bedding and my figure.

I set my bag down but didn’t sit. I stood there for a long time, arms wrapped around myself, staring at nothing.

This place wasn’t home. It wasn’t grief, not exactly, that filled me. It was the hollow ache of something unresolved. A wound that had never really healed.

I didn’t know who my mother had been in her final years. I didn’t know why she’d stayed away, why she hadn’t called, why she’d built a life without me.

But I was here now. And tomorrow, I’d bury her in a place I’d never been. Among wolves I’d never known.

I hadn’t yet seen Lucas. I figured it was kind of odd, considering he had invited me here and was supposed to be my stepfather, but Mother mentioned that he was the leader of the Blackthorn pack, and I’m sure he had responsibilities of his own to handle.

It was seven o’clock p.m., and I was lying in bed like only a half-breed would.

I didn’t know how to be a wolf. I wasn’t accustomed to a packhouse, and the few times I tried to shift, I was helpless, I couldn’t even bring my wolf fully forward. I was more of a human than anything else, even though my wolf stirred inside me.

Every creak of the old packhouse seemed magnified in the dark. The wind scraped against the wooden walls like it had claws, and the distant howl of wolves—real wolves, not half-breeds like me—pierced the night.

I lay on the unfamiliar bed with eyes wide open as the quilt twisted around my legs.

Part of me wanted to believe that I was just tired, just disoriented. But under my skin, something hummed—restlessly. It was a low thrum in my blood that had nothing to do with caffeine, but maybe something else.

It was the land. The air. The silence. It all felt… expectant.

I rolled over, hugging a pillow to my chest and trying not to think about the scent that still clung to the room. Her scent. My mother’s. Elle.

Even just thinking her name tasted like regret.

She had been a force of nature when I was little—blinding smiles, wild laughter, kisses that smelled like sandalwood and rain. But she always disappeared. She always came back thinner, quieter, with eyes a little more distant. She was never built for normalcy, and certainly not built for motherhood.

My dad once said she had a storm in her soul—that she never stayed in one place because she wasn’t meant to.

He said it gently, like it was a kindness.

But it didn’t feel kind.

It felt like abandonment.

My stomach growled loudly as I tossed over to my side. I hadn’t eaten since that morning—before the call.

Before the world tilted.

I sat up and rubbed my eyes, hoping the ache would dull. It didn’t.

There was a soft knock on the door. I jumped in response. The door creaked open an inch, and I caught the glint of a tray. Then a voice—low, velvet-edged—broke the silence. It was him.

“May I come in?”

Then the same scent from earlier drifted into the room, sharp and intoxicating, making my pulse spike.

Pinewood, ash, fur. Old smoke. Wet earth.

My face warped in confusion as I lifted my nose to the air, and was met with Luca’s steady gaze.

The scent belonged to him.

My mother’s husband. My stepfather.

Lucas.