Free Absolution by Jambrea Jo Jones Page A

pause on his way up the stairs. Don stood in the hallway looking uncertain.
    I can stay calm and talk to Don or I can blow my shit and beat it out of the fucker. Everett closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He was above petty shit. He could be a grownup about this.
    “I’m sorry.”
    Everett opened his eyes. He had to be dreaming.
    “What?” Everett had to have heard Don wrong.
    “I’m sorry,” Don whispered.
    “Why are you apologising to me?”
    “Because Peter isn’t going to let me and…I just—” Don began pacing.
    “Why should he? You beat the shit out of him.” And that was putting it nicely. From what Peter had told him it took him a month to fully recover and that was a long time for a shifter. He had been left for dead by his own family.
    “Things are different now.” Don stopped and stood in front of Everett.
    He looked so pathetic with his sad eyes and his hair standing on end like he’d been running his hands through it for a long time. Everett didn’t want to feel sorry for the bastard.
    “Because Daddy isn’t around anymore?” Everett shouldn’t have egged him on, but he couldn’t seem to help himself. The man in front of him didn’t have the attitude of the man Everett had seen those many months ago when he saved Kitty from that awful pack.
    “No, I found my mate.”
    “And she knocked some sense into you.”
    “He.” Don said it under his breath.
    “Excuse me?” Everett had to be dreaming. No way had Don just said he had a male mate, not after the grief he and his dad had given Peter when he’d told them he was gay.
    “You heard right. ‘He’. His name is Lincoln. Shit, Ev, I was young and didn’t know any better and so jealous of my little brother for having the balls to come out. You know how Dad was, if he knew both his boys were fags—”
    “Don’t—,” he began.
    Don held up his hands. “Sorry. Just…this is hard, Ev. You were gone and Dad went a bit crazy. I did the only thing I could—self-preservation. Was it the right thing? Hell no. I know that now. I knew it years ago, but by that time it was already too late. I couldn’t leave Mom and I had all of this misplaced anger building inside me, but then he went too far. They were fighting again, Mom and Dad, that is. He took her finger, looked her in the eye and bent it back, breaking it. He started hitting her and it was hard to get him off. I tried. It took five of us to restrain him. I…shit…I had to put him down. Do you know how fucking hard it is to…he was still my dad. Now—”
    A short, dark-haired man came to stand beside Don and took him in his arms. The pair looked good together—like they belonged.
    “Don, baby, you okay?”
    “I’m good, Linc. I—”
    Just like that, Everett had changed his opinion. Don was not the same person. Now he looked like the boy Everett remembered from when they were kids.
    “Look, I can’t guarantee that Peter will come around. There is too much shit there. But I can talk to him. It might be good for him to see the two of you together, but he might blow a gasket when he finds out you’re gay, Don. I would expect a nice punch to the face.”
    Lincoln growled. Everett just smiled. He would’ve done the same thing.
    “Don’t go biting my head off there, Killer.” Everett winked at Lincoln. “There’s a lot of history that you—”
    “Don told me.”
    “Then you know that it won’t be easy for Peter. You need to give him some time. Make sure his mate is with him when you talk. That’d be your best bet. Now that we have that settled I have to get my shit moved out.”
    “What! You can’t leave Pete. You—”
    “Brotherly concern? How touching,” Peter sneered.
    Everett turned. He hadn’t heard Peter come back into the house. Everett stood between the brothers. They weren’t going to have a throwdown in the pack hallway.
    “Peter—,” Don began.
    “No. You don’t get to take that tone with me,” Peter growled. “And what—you need a