A Silver Wedding: Matt and Lilly: The Macconwood Pack Tales 7

  A Silver Wedding

  A Macconwood Pack Novella

  From The Grazi Kelly Universe

  by C.D. Gorri

  For the second chancers, never stop believing in love!

  Copyright 2019 C.D. Gorri

  *NOTE

  This book picks up where To Claim A Wolf: A Macconwood Pack Novel #5 leaves off! It is better to read it after that one (not necessarily the others, though I recommend getting the whole series!).

  WAIT! Before you read, subscribe here: https://www.subscribepage.com/cdgorri

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, places, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either part of the author’s imagination and/or used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental. This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. All rights are reserved. No part of this book is to be reproduced, scanned, downloaded, printed, or distributed in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of any materials in violation of the author’s rights. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Title Page

  Synopsis

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Connect

  Other Works

  Tagline:

  "She was taken from him once before, now he's never letting go."

  Synopsis:

  Lt. Matt Larentia has waited a lifetime to be reunited with his one true mate, Claire Lilly Maccon.

  Twenty years apart has changed the two Werewolves. As the mother of the Alpha, Lilly has a role to fulfill in the Macconwood Pack. She's missed so much of her children's lives; she doesn't want to isolate them now. Matt has been patient, but he's not a young pup anymore. He simply won't wait another minute. He delivers an ultimatum that Lilly just can't accept.

  Can the two lovers bridge the gap between them and embrace their second chance at love?

  PROLOGUE

  Claire Lilly Maccon crouched behind the neglected line of shrubs that separated the Macconwood Manor from the old barn that was still part of the property.

  She could have cried for the state of her childhood home, but after her father had died and she’d been forced into marriage by Zev Doyle, now Maccon. The beast had actually taken her name. The same way he took me.

  Being brutish and barbaric were his trademarks. Her father, the old Alpha, had been grossly old-fashioned. He’d allowed his crazed Beta to stake a claim to his only daughter, making him sign a betrothal contract when she was barely a teenager, with absolutely no input from her at all.

  Young and idealistic, she’d tried to make a good wife. Lilly, as her friends referred to her, had been sheltered most of her life. Zev had often scared her with his extreme hostility. Her father had told her it was simply his way.

  “It is what makes him a good Beta, Lilly, and he will make a good Alpha and protector for you as well,” the old man had repeated often enough.

  With no other options, she’d married him. The older, gruff Zev had introduced her to sex with little more than a perfunctory speech before he basically took her like a rutting animal. She’s been bruised and raw from the encounter. Luckily, he lost interest soon after.

  At least she had Rafe. The hated activity between her and her husband had brought her a single treasure. A beautiful, strong son to replace the memory of the cold and hard union. Was it really only a few years ago that her baby had been brought into the world?

  She held her stomach as she wandered further off the property. The old barn was an eyesore to be certain, but it had always been her refuge. A place she’d gone to mull over the day and escape reality for a little while.

  Lilly climbed up the ladder to the old hayloft and closed her eyes. Her little angel was asleep now. He was safe. Tucked away for the night with his nurse to guard him. Zev would have none of her coddling.

  Her husband would not tolerate a weakling for a son, so he’d directed an older she-Wolf to keep her out of her own son’s room at night. Tears threatened to spill from her eyes, but she kept them in check.

  Lilly had no recourse. She had to stay, to endure. Oh, but it was hard. She was barely twenty-years old. Zev had married her right out of high school. Impregnated her on their wedding night. And had kept her a prisoner ever since.

  As if that wasn’t bad enough, he’d brought over his Wolf Guard for a meeting a few weeks back. With them, were a few new members of the Pack. Men, of course. Zev largely ignored the women of the Pack except for obvious reasons. The pig.

  She stilled at the thought. Sometimes she swore the man read her mind. And then, of course, the beatings would come. She shivered in the cool darkness. Muffling the sound of her tears as she turned her thoughts back to that night.

  There amongst the recruits was a Wolf whom Lilly had known well in her youth. His brown hair was cut military short, revealing a finely sculpted face that she used to love to stare at in homeroom.

  Deep-set gray eyes sparkled under a jutting brow. He was tall and lean, well-built like most Werewolves she knew. He wore a Sheriff’s uniform now, which she found odd in her home, since Zev hated the law.

  Handsome was a fine word to describe him. Oh, once upon a time, she built such daydreams about him, but now her life was like a nightmare. Seeing him was a bitter reminder of what she could’ve had. What she had lost to her father and Zev.

  Zev had seen her standing in the kitchen, staring at the newcomer. Her husband had flown at her like a wild man. Before he could bring his hand down to her face, the officer moved and stood in front of her.

  Unused to the cruelty of the Macconwood Pack Alpha, he’d reacted as a few had in the early days of his rule. To their own detriment.

  Lilly had learned early not to complain or ask for help. She’d tried to stop him, to place her hand on the man’s sleeve. She’d wanted to beg him not to interfere, but when she touched him, the strangest thing happened. Her Wolf, her White-furred companion since she’d hit puberty surged at the brief contact. As if she too remembered their childhood friend.

  Stunned, Lilly had left her hand on his arm a second too long. Zev ripped her away and scolded the stranger. Shoving her towards the stairs, his eyes had promised retribution. But, oh, the beating had been worth it.

  Lilly had never felt anything like that before. As if by touching him, her Wolf had come alive for the first time in her entire existence.

  His name was Matt Larentia and Claire Lilly Maccon, wife of the Macconwood Pack Alpha, had been secretly meeting him for weeks.

  “Oh Matt,” she whimpered, hand covering her abdomen protectively.

  There was no way she could hide this; no way she could keep the fact she’d been sleeping with another man from her husband now that she carried his child. Our baby.

  One last time, that’s what she promised herself. Then she’d send him away. To protect him, like she’d done when he wanted to challenge Zev when he was all of sixteen-years old.

  Her refusal had sent him pacing. All the way to the army before he’d returned. Bigger, more confident, a man now where he’d been a boy before. But just like that boy, Matt was something she’d always wanted. And now that she was a full Werewolf, she knew why. It sang within h
er whenever he was near. The magic that called to her, made her know which herbs and plants to use to heal her own wounds, also told her he was hers. Her one true mate.

  The tears fell freely now as she came to grips with the ultimate truth. She could never truly have him.

  The sound of her lover scuffling about outside brought her head up. She waited for him to reach the ladder, scooting back and making room.

  “Claire?” He’d always called her by her first name, despite everyone else using Lilly. She liked it that way. It was special somehow. She was his Claire.

  “Yes, I’m here,” she whispered.

  The familiar scents of leather and gun oil preceded his arrival. His Wolf’s musk was strong too, comforting to her in her present state. She breathed them in and smiled, wiping the evidence of her tears.

  “Baby, don’t you cry I have a plan,” he began, but she shushed him and claimed his lips in a searing kiss, unable to restrain herself.

  “I can’t leave Rafe, you know that,” she began.

  “So, we take him. We pick him up from school and we leave. We get as far away from this goddamned son of a bitch as we can get,” he couldn’t keep the growl out of his voice, but Lilly shushed him with another kiss.

  “Oh, Matt, but, I-”

  “What is it?”

  “I’m pregnant,” she confessed. Her ice blue eyes blurred with teardrops as she revealed her secret.

  “A baby? My baby! Dammit woman, we are leaving now. Can you sneak in and get the little guy? We’re gonna raise him and this little one together away from that bastard! I’m gonna marry you, Claire, finally,” he growled and kissed her again.

  After he laid out all his plans, Lilly agreed. His hope and joy were downright contagious. How could she say no when every fiber of her being was screaming at her to go with him?

  They headed down the ladder, him first just in case, he always said. The idea of someone caring about her well-being was downright foreign to Lilly. Her father had been harsh, and Zev had been just cruel.

  Matt was the only one who had ever shown her an ounce of kindness. As teens they’d been wildly in love, then he shipped out with the army and Zev had moved in. There were no words to express her regret and shame in not standing up for herself then. It was too late to go back, but they could go forward. Now. Tonight. She could finally start her life.

  As her feet hit the floor, she turned around to smile up at Matt. Flood lights blinded her momentarily as the sound of thuds and pistols being cocked brought a shrill scream to her lips.

  “Run, Claire!” Matt screamed to her just before he received the butt end of a rifle to his jaw. Blood flew and the real beating began.

  “You thought you could hide from me? Your whoring ways were a secret?” Zev snarled at her from the doorway.

  He had Ernie and Bart with him. Two Werewolves of the old regime. They were just as cruel as he was, and they hated women just as much.

  “Zev, please. Let him go. I’ll do anything-”

  “Shut up, bitch! Your lover here is gonna know pain before I am through with him,”

  “Claire,” Matt whispered, jaw broken, nose bleeding.

  The sound of bones being cracked, his, echoed in Lilly’s ears. She fell to her knees, sobbing loudly. A sharp smack to her cheek brought her eyes up to the cruel dark gaze of her husband.

  “I said quiet! Don’t want them to hear you up in the house, do we? Can’t have that soft boy of yours waking up and running to his mama,” he sneered, and she stilled. The threat to her son was enough to make her do anything he said.

  “First, you’re gonna watch as I break your lover in half. Then, we’ll see if you deserve to live after your treason.”

  He was a madman. An evil, hard madman. Threatening his own son? What kind of person did that? And now he had Matt. Lilly wanted to wail with the injustice of it all.

  Zev grabbed her by the hair as his two goons continued to beat and break Matt. They strung him up, used pipes and wooden planks to break his arms and his legs. By the time they were done, she didn’t think she could cry anymore.

  One night of this would have been tragedy enough, but Zev was unusual in his propensity for violence and misery.

  “I know about your bastard pup, wife, so this is what you will do,” he growled the words as he dragged her to her bedroom and shoved her onto the floor.

  They’d been sleeping separately for years now. The only blessing in the hated marriage as far as Lilly was concerned. Fear made her still, hands covering her slightly swollen stomach as Zev paced across the floor.

  “You will remain here. In this house for the duration-”

  “Just let me leave, Zev, I’ll go far away. Me and Rafe-”

  “You think I’d let you take my son and heir to raise him as what, a fucking pussy cry baby? I don’t think so, wife,” again he called her that word and she cringed.

  “No, you will stay here. Under my rule. As a wife should be. You will have your bastard in the Pack house. If it’s a boy, it can serve under his half-brother. If it’s a girl, well, we can always use another housekeeper,” his wicked grin turned her stomach. She wanted to scream, but she knew better.

  “And Matt? Will you let him go?” She asked, hating herself for the hitch in her voice.

  “Of course. I’m the Alpha. I must tend to my Pack. He will be let go, after you whelp the pup.”

  Lilly stared horrified at his retreating back. She couldn’t imagine what the next several months would entail. The beatings Matt endured. The threats and violence.

  After she gave birth, the baby was taken from her. She was consequently drugged and carted off somewhere across the world. A horrid little Pack ruled by an equally crazed Alpha.

  The Black Sea Pack was small and cut off from most of the world. Lilly cursed her existence. She’d wanted to die and was kept prisoner in a room that too closely resembled a cell for the first few years.

  After that, she’d accepted her fate. No one was coming. Matt was permanently hurt or worse, she’d feared. And her children. She’d dared not think about them.

  Would Zev punish her daughter for her mother’s transgressions? Would her son feel his father’s wrath because of her?

  Years of crying had earned her nothing more than a hollow pit in the middle of her chest where her heart had once been. Only one good thing came of her going to the Black Sea Pack.

  The Alpha, Anri Bagrat, was wrapped up deep with a Dark Witch and using magic to enhance his rule. Preoccupied with his addictions, Lilly was able to start work with an older she-Wolf. Natasja was over a hundred and fifty years old by the time Lilly met her.

  She taught Lilly which herbs and rites worked to aid in the healing of Wolves. Taught her how to commune with her own Wolf, deep down in her soul. To reach there and search out her kin. To find the bond that Zev could not break.

  A decade. That was how long it took her to find them through those faint Pack bonds. The ties to her children were still there, though so very distant.

  Still, it gave her hope. The one thing she never thought to have again.

  CHAPTER 1

  The airplane bumped and rolled to a stop along the private landing strip outside of the Macconwood Manor. Claire Lilly Maccon gasped at the site.

  This was not the home of her childhood, and certainly not the place of her failed marriage to Zev Doyle. Majestic trees towered in neat rows lining the paved driveways.

  Spring was in full bloom in the Garden State and Lilly shivered. Riots of flowers bloomed everywhere she looked. Magnolia trees, dogwoods, daffodils and tulips.

  “Our Alpha mate loves flowers,” Liam, a young Wolf Guard explained.

  He was with the group that had discovered her whereabouts and came to rescue her. Her son, Rafe, was the Alpha now. And he couldn’t be more different from his father. Thank God.

  Lilly nodded as they climbed into a huge, luxury SUV. Her hair was bound at her nape. She wore navy blue pants and a simple blouse. She hadn’t worried about
her appearance in over twenty years, but she swore there were a million butterflies in her stomach.

  “They are very excited to see you Ms. Maccon,” the young she-Wolf, Aleeza was her name, turned to her with a smile on her pretty tanned face.

  The woman had recently mated the towering redheaded male who was seated beside her. Dib Lowell introduced himself as a Wolf Guard and Pack lawyer. It was mainly because of his efforts that Lilly was there today. She couldn’t appreciate the couple more, but still, she was nervous as hell.

  “Oh I, I hope I don’t disappoint them,” Lilly murmured.

  “Of course you won’t, Lilly, they’re your children. They’ve missed you,” she squeezed Lilly’s hand and turned to meet her mate’s eyes.

  The love evident between the two of them made Lilly’s heart ache. Matt, she thought as she often did over the past twenty years.

  Her heart squeezed inside her chest as she recalled stolen moments in the very forest, they were passing on their way to the Pack house. Matt Larentia was long gone now. He had to be. She was sure of it.

  After the abuse he’d received at the hands of Zev because of her, the man would’ve been a fool to stick around. Lord knows he was never a fool. No, never that.

  He was sweet and caring. Gentle and tender. Treated her like no other man ever had. Not that she’d known anyone besides Zev in those days. Still, there had never been another.

  Loneliness had been her companion these past two decades. Sadness a constant too. Wolves in the Black Sea Pack were too afraid of their Alpha to behave the way they should have. So much darkness there. She only hoped Niko and Ana would be able to fix it now.

  She gasped as she took in the newly restored Macconwood Manor from the outside. The entire building had been redone. The landscaping too. It was incredible.

  Powerful and prominent, the Manor certainly made a statement. The way it was supposed to. She turned her head and noted with grateful tears that the old barn had been torn down. Thank God. She didn’t think she could bear it if it was still standing.