Heart of Stone (Parts I & II)

I. Chapter 25 | Part 2 - Stone

He joined Alistair, Gavin, and Gunner in the living room as they waited for Gwen and Aubree's arrival.

Their pack house was small in comparison to Vincent's extravagant palace. Unlike Vincent, Stone and his pack were less flashy and materialistic. The pack house was for sleeping, showering, and doing the necessary paperwork required for every pack. They all lived outdoors. He would have been content to still live in a den deep in the earth like they had hundreds of years ago.

The rise of technology and increase in human interaction was what forced him to build the pack house in the first place. There certainly was more paperwork now than ever before. The rise of technology had made their lives anything but easier.

The pack house consisted of three floors and a basement. The main floor had all the basic necessities of every home. At the back of the house was a large eat-in kitchen (not that they did a lot of eating in there) with oak cabinets, a small round table that could barely seat four with a red and white checkered tablecloth. It had a cozy cottage feeling and the warmth carried to the rest of the main level. An enclosed dining room that could seat a dozen was next to the kitchen for those rare occurrences when they had company over for a meal. On the other side of the dining room was a long, narrow, enclosed sunroom with potted herbs, ferns, orchids, and violets sitting along the floor-to-ceiling windows. A wicker rocking chair and loveseat with fluffy seat cushions, along with a couple of folding chairs tucked away in a corner were the only pieces of furniture in there.

Gwen insisted on having the sunroom, and it continued to be her favorite space in the house. Stone could always find her sitting in there and reading a book—like her mother would have.

The small hallway that led to the sunroom was what separated the conference room from the dining room. The living room was the main space with the staircase leading to the second level along the wall opposite the conference room. The foyer was at the bottom of the stairs with the second set of stairs going into the basement and a door leading to the adjoined garage. Two large, plush, leather sofas faced each other, separated by a glass coffee table in the center of the space, and reclining leather chairs at both ends of the couches. A powder room was located under the staircase to the second floor, next to the kitchen, though it was rarely ever used.

The second level had all the bedrooms and two bathrooms, minus Stone's room.

The third level had Stone's room, a private bathroom, his office, a library, and a small L-shaped balcony overlooking the back of the property. That was his space to go and decompress.

Large windows let natural light into the living room and as he sat in one of the reclining chairs—to keep himself from pacing anxiously back and forth with the setting of the sun—he forced himself to stare at the coffee table to keep from looking out the window, waiting for their car pull in.

He knew he'd hear them come before he saw them anyway, but the reddening sky with darkness quickly encroaching was making him more and more anxious.

Gavin sat on one couch, leaning forward on his knees, his thumbs tapping together in front of his chest as his eyes stared out the window.

Alistair kept getting up from the other chair and going to the window to peer out for a minute before returning to his seat.

Sitting on the other sofa facing Gavin with the window behind him, Gunner had his nose in a book. While it would look odd to anyone seeing a man with hulking muscles like his, Gunner enjoyed reading. Even more curious was Gunner's peaked eyebrow and when Stone glanced at the title, Hausfrau, even he couldn't help peaking an eyebrow.

While Stone wasn't a reader, and had no idea what the book was about, he couldn't help but wonder why Gunner was reading a book entitled the German word for "housewife."