<b>Chapter </b><b>69 </b>
I <b>walk </b>out <b>of </b>the bedroom with Lilly, throwing her paper te in the garbage as we pass it on our way to the door. Jamison has finished his <b>lunch</b><b>, </b>cleaned up his te and is calmly ying a game on his smartphone.
“I’ll see you at dinner.” Lilly whispers as she kisses my lips.
“I love you.”
She smiles as she leaves out the door. I watch her walk down the hall until she disappears around the corner into the central area of <b>the </b>pack house. <b>I </b>close the door and turn back to my desk.
“Are you still willing to talk?”
<b>“</b>Yes sir. What would you like to know?”
“Let’s finish the story of when Cole took care of you and your siblings. Last thing you mentioned was him wanting to keep your siblings routine in your parents absence but had a difficult time psychologically with bathing a five, three, and one year old pups. You said your parents had a hard <b>time </b>with getting past the pedophile rumors that were going around about him.”
“Yes sir. Dad was less concerned than mom. He had more of an open mind towards him when he realized how rough he had it. While <b>he </b>was fighting with Alpha Redmen to allow Cole to have a real carpentry apprenticeship, which included living with us, he was also fighting with mom over the same thing. I remember there being a lot ofte nights where they argued over it. How dad repeatedly reassured her that he would never have that kind of ess to the younger kids. He pointed out consistently how he felt Cole was being abused and wanted to give him a break from such treatment. Mom still <b>wasn’t </bpletely on board when Alpha Redmen caved and allowed Cole to move in with the condition that he report for “special training<b>” </b>on the fifteenth of every month.”
“But she obviously let him move in.”
“Yes sir. She wasn’t very happy and acted very distant and cold towards him. It affected him in a really bad way. He was always ufortably silent <b>when </b>he was around everyone. It was as if he was afraid to make a mistake. You never heard him when he was in the house and it took him <b>six </b>months before he really came out of his room.”
“So for six months you never saw him?”
“Once he started living with us dad never had another issue with him showing upte. He learned the skills of a carpenter quickly and easily. I would often hear dad talk to mom about how impressed he was with Cole and his ability to pick up new skills <b>so </b>easily. He oftenmented on how it seemed like Cole was two different people. As he gained confidence in the skills dad was teaching him he became more personable. The more he learned the more he wanted to know. Even started talking to him while on the job but he always shut down when he came home. <b>For </b>the first <b>six </b>months, he woulde in, take a shower, sit at the table and eat dinner with us. While dad talked about his day Cole stayed silent. He never took a lot of food and barely ate what he took. Rarely did he ever look at anyone while at the table. If you asked him a question he would answer but his answers were either straightforward and to the point or vague, as if he really didn’t want to talk about the subject.
Unlike his siblings, he was always polite and thoughtful with his answers. He had been with us for seven months when the ident happened with mom and dad. He had just started the month before ying with my sisters in the evening. They loved him within the first month of him being there but it took him six months to start sitting on the floor with them. You could tell how difficult it was for him to stay away and they didn’t make it easy on him to maintain <b>a </b>distance. I too always held a cautious eye on him but I never once saw him lose his cool. For a teenager without kids he has incredible patience towards the Hittle ones. The ident happened the day he had training with his father. I could tell by the way he spoke and moved around that he wasn’t feeling well but he always put on the facade of being okay.
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