The Fallen Cross Pack Series: Boxset 1-4

by Aliya DalRae

  Nadia was right, though. He did have some business to take care of, and he headed straight to Butch’s cabin.

  The sun was up, the sky full of big, puffy clouds that held the promise of a coming storm. The ground was littered with colorful leaves, a sacrifice of red and gold offered up by the trees to the gods of fall. Patrick stifled a shiver that had nothing to do with the cool breeze that stirred through the leaves, inciting their autumnal dance.

  It was time to find out how things had gone with his daughter.

  Butch answered the door in his boxer shorts, his hair mussed from sleep and his mouth full of curses for the person who had dared to wake him.

  “That would be me,” Patrick said with a little wave, and Butch let out a low growl before gesturing for his Alpha to enter.

  “Stopped by your place last night, but you were both asleep, and I didn’t want to wake you. Everything went as well as could be expected, and the news would have just kept you both up all night.”

  Patrick nodded, but that rock was back in his throat, and he couldn’t stop the burn of tears that pricked at his eyes. Anyone besides Butch and he would have had to leave, but this was one wolf who knew him inside and out. He wouldn’t consider this show of emotion a weakness, or use it as a way to unseat the new Alpha. So when the first tear slid down his cheek, Patrick did nothing to hide it.

  Butch was stepping into a pair of Levi’s, but he didn’t miss a trick. He buttoned the fly and strode over to Patrick, laying a beefy hand on his shoulder.

  “You had no choice,” Butch said, forcing Patrick to look him in the eye, which made it necessary for the Alpha to crane his neck up just a bit. Butch was the largest wolf in the Pack, in any form, and Patrick took comfort in knowing he had this man at his back.

  And of course he was right about Jessica. The Pack was entirely too young and unstable for him to even think about bringing a human child into the mix. Maggie was here out of necessity. He would get her clean and she would learn to adapt to Pack life, he was sure of it. Her status as the Alpha’s mate would protect her from most, and he would die protecting her from the rest, but a child? There were too many variables.

  “So the call went okay?”

  Butch gave his skull a vigorous two-handed scratch that left his hair standing on end, then pulled on a red and black flannel shirt, his usual uniform. “The police were there within ten minutes, busting the door down. I thought that was a little over the top, but you know cops.”

  Patrick shook his head and motioned for Butch to continue.

  “Course I couldn’t see what was going on in the apartment. They were there for quite a while before an official-looking lady pulled up in a little Chevy and went inside. I got her license plate number and asked Anthony to check her out, make sure she’s okay.”

  “Thank you,” Patrick said.

  “No problem. Anyway, the lady was in for about half an hour before she came out with Jessica, loaded the kid into her car and took off. I followed them to the police station, and Anthony promised to keep an eye on things. He really likes his job there, is talking about going to the academy.”

  “That’s great,” Patrick said, but his heart wasn’t in it. Butch cleared his throat.

  “So, Anthony called me a couple of hours ago to let me know they got Jessica processed into Child Protective Services, and into a temporary home. Took her there in the middle of the night, so they really were looking out for her. You know this won’t look good for your wife, though. I’d keep her away from the television for a while.

  “Maggie has bigger problems right now than her reputation. It’s unlikely she’ll go back to that life anyway. The important thing is that Jessica is being cared for.”

  “She is,” Butch assured him.

  Patrick looked around Butch’s cabin, at a loss as to what he should do now. This was one of the larger units in the camp, but with both of them inside, it felt small and cramped. Butch must have been feeling it, too, because he walked to the door and stepped outside into the fresh, clean air.

  Patrick followed, his eyes instantly straying to his own lodge, where Nadia was laying it all out for his wife, at least as far as her detox was concerned. Patrick shaded his eyes and looked toward the sun, its warmth still not managing to penetrate his skin.

  Aside from Maggie, Jessica had been his sun, the star around which his entire world orbited, and he had just abandoned her to the system.

  All he had to do now was figure out how he would tell his wife.

  Chapter Five

  P atrick returned about an hour later, saving Maggie from any more of Nadia’s well-meaning advice. “They had a plan,” she’d said. “They were going to get her clean,” she’d insisted. All Maggie cared about was how they intended to make this damned shaking stop if they weren’t going to give her any more drugs. Nadia may have said, but if so, Maggie was pretty sure it didn’t involve a needle or a quick fix.

  “How’s it going?” Patrick asked, brushing his hands on his jeans and closing the door.

  “Great,” Nadia answered for the both of them, but Maggie didn’t necessarily agree. “Maggie’s on board with the program and we’ll start immediately. It’s going to be rough, on both of you,” she said to Patrick, “but in the end it’ll be worth it, right Maggie?”

  Maggie put on a cheery smile that felt more like a grimace and said, “Absolutely.”

  “Well, then,” Patrick said, “if you’re about done, I’d like to spend some time with my wife.”

  “Of course,” Nadia said, collecting her jacket as she headed for the door. “I’ll be back in a bit to get things started. If you need me, just holler,” she added, and left them alone.

  “Are you ready for this?” Patrick asked as he pulled up the chair Nadia had just vacated and grabbed Maggie’s hand.

  “No,” she said, the truth of it bearing down on her like the world on Atlas’ shoulders. “Not even a little. Couldn’t I just have one more hit, to get me through the day?”

  But Patrick shook his head. “I need you, Maggie. I can’t do this without you, and I need you at full strength.”

  He was so serious, and Maggie got the feeling that this was about a lot more than her drug habit. She wanted him to answer all of her questions, to tell her why it was that their lives had been torn apart. She wanted to know how he’d come to be living at a kids camp in the middle of nowhere—Nadia’s definition.

  She wanted to ask so many questions, but her body was betraying her, begging her for just a little more time, just one more trip down the memory lane of forgetfulness. She knew by that set in Patrick’s jaw that she was dreaming if she thought he would give in, but she could hope. Her addiction demanded it.

  “Oh, Maggie, how did it come to this?” Patrick squeezed her hand to steady the tremors.

  “You left us,” Maggie spat, the DTs making her edgy.

  “I did, didn’t I?” he sighed. “But never again, Mags. Never again.”

  “I want to see Jessica,” Maggie said. Patrick must have had their daughter picked up on the way to this place, wherever it was, and stashed her with a babysitter. It would be just like him to make a big production of bringing them all together again. He would have wanted Maggie to get some sleep, of course, to rest up before the big celebration, but she was ready now.

  Patrick shifted his eyes to the floor, unable or unwilling to meet her gaze. “Paddy?”

  “I had to make a decision,” Patrick said, still staring at the floor. “Look at us. It’ll be weeks before you’re yourself again, and even then my situation…I’m so sorry, Maggie.”

  “I don’t understand.” Maggie’s whole body was shaking now, most of it having nothing to do with the terrible cravings building inside it. “Patrick, where is my daughter.”

  “She’s my daughter, too…”

  “No, you left us, you abandoned us and left me to take care of her, to provide for her…”

  “It wasn’t my fault. I’d have come back to you sooner if I could�
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  “You seem to be doing just fine here, Patrick. Jessica said you were hurt, but you weren’t, were you? You were just hanging out here with a bunch of weirdos doing whatever it is weirdos do at abandoned camps in the woods. You left us, and you’re just fine, but we aren’t. We weren’t, but we can be now. You’re back, you’re good, and I will be soon.” But Patrick just kept on staring at the floor, shaking his head.

  “Look at me, goddammit,” Maggie cried. “I want my baby! What the hell have you done with my baby?”

  Finally, Patrick raised his eyes to hers, and Maggie really wished he hadn’t. What she saw there filled her with a cold terror that chilled her very bones.

  “Patrick,” she said, her voice unnaturally calm. “What have you done with Jessica?”

  Patrick searched her face, as though trying to predict her response to what he was about to say. When he did speak, she prayed to a God she didn’t believe in that He would take those words and bury them, someplace deep where she could pretend she’d never heard them.

  “I’m sorry, Mags. We have to let her go.”

  Chapter Six

  B y the second day of Maggie’s recovery, she realized that Patrick’s decision to turn Jessica over to CPS was probably for the best. After all, the most important thing was that their daughter was cared for, and the way Maggie was feeling, there was no way she could be the mother that her sweet girl deserved. The fact that she at least had Patrick back in her life helped to ease the pain of the loss.

  That’s what she told herself, but who the hell was she kidding? Patrick was her world. In spite of everything, knowing that Patrick was there to hold her hair back when she puked or to pile blankets on her when she shivered from the ice running through her veins? That meant more to her than a million children. It was a cold, bitter truth, but it was hers. One she faced boldly when the DTs hit her the hardest.

  Maybe someday she would regret the decision that Patrick had made for the both of them. Until that day, she was going to focus on her current hell and counter it with the joy of having Patrick back again.

  Even with the help of something called Methadone, it was a full ten days before Nadia deemed Maggie “drug-free.” Still, Maggie knew there was more to her recovery than just getting the heroin out of her system. That was made clear to her on the eleventh night, when Patrick decided she was well enough to hear the story of his disappearance.

  Maggie listened quietly as Patrick told her a fairy tale of being attacked by a wolf in the alley by the carryout where he’d gone to buy those blasted cigarettes. A wolf, in downtown Dayton.

  She didn’t say a word when he informed her that he had awakened in a horse’s stall, without a stitch of clothing, or when he claimed to have healed within days of the incredible wounds the wolf had inflicted. Thanks, of course, to their fabulous medic, Nadia.

  When he got to the part about changing into a wolf, himself— once a month, no less—she sat up straight and folded her arms across her chest. If it weren’t for the fact that he seemed so sincere, she would have laughed in his face.

  Still, this was Patrick, and Patrick didn’t lie. At least he hadn’t when he had been her husband, but that was nearly two years ago. Who knew what kind of fabricator he had become in that time?

  And yet, when he told her how he had challenged the horrible leader of this ragtag bunch of Werewolves, there were tears in his eyes. He was short on details when it came to what this “Challenge” actually entailed, but it was clear that whatever it was had left a lasting impression.

  When he’d finished, claiming to have freed his pack mates from this awful prison, he looked at her, eyes wide with expectation.

  “Say something,” he said.

  Maggie threw her hands up in the air. “Exactly what do you want me to say?”

  “I don’t know.” Patrick dragged a hand through his shaggy hair, then scratched at the stubble on his jaw. “That you believe me?”

  Maggie opened her mouth, closed it again, then tried once more. “If I’m being honest, I would say that I wasn’t the only one sampling the pharmaceuticals over the last couple of years.”

  Patrick nodded. “I probably would feel the same way if someone were to have told me that story, before…”

  “Before you were abducted by Werewolves and changed into one of them, forced to sell drugs and break legs for the Alpha dog from hell?”

  “Right.”

  “I don’t know what you want me to say.” Maggie stood and paced across the room, trying to find a grain of truth in anything Patrick had just laid out for her. Trying, and failing.

  “I’d almost rather you told me you’d met a woman and run away with her. But then you realized you couldn’t live without me and came home when that ho-bag proved to be a piece of shit.”

  Patrick chuckled, but shook his head. “I would never have done that to you, or to Jessica.”

  Mention of their daughter should have triggered some kind of emotion in Maggie, but even with the drugs out of her system, she couldn’t bring herself to care. Everything was dull and bland in her world now, except for Patrick. He was the only bright spot, the only thing that kept her putting one foot in front of the other, that kept her from stealing a car and driving back to Dayton to score a dime.

  And now he was lying to her. No, not just lying. He had invented a story so unbelievable that he had her questioning his sanity. She had a serious drug problem, no doubt about it, but it looked like Patrick’s cheese had slid all the way off his cracker.

  “Maggie, please, come sit down.”

  But she couldn’t. He seemed so normal, so typically Paddy, that it never occurred to her that he might have lost his marbles. It was obvious, though, that he needed even more help than she did.

  “Maggie.”

  He said it with such force, that she felt compelled to comply. She returned to the chair and sat her tail down, waiting for him to continue with this line of malarkey.

  “I need you to stay calm,” he said as he knelt on the floor in front of her and placed his hands on the arms of the chair, effectively blocking her from any kind of escape.

  “You’re scaring me, Paddy,” Maggie said, but he didn’t move.

  “Please, Maggie, you need to stay calm, and whatever you do, don’t try to run. It would only make my wolf want to give chase, and that could force a complete change. I just need to show you…”

  “Paddy, you need help.” Maggie said it as calmly and with as much compassion as she could manage, her heart pounding out of her chest the way it was.

  “What I need is for you to believe me!” A bright yellow light flashed in Patrick’s eyes, and the words he bellowed were garbled when his eye teeth grew into fierce fangs.

  If she’d still been using, she would have blamed it all on some sort of drug-induced hallucination. As it stood, she was now questioning her own sanity.

  “P-patrick?” she asked, retreating back into the chair as far as it would allow as his golden eyes bored into hers. She squeezed her lids shut, unwilling to believe the truth that was staring her right in the face.

  “Look at me, Maggie,” Patrick snarled, shaking the arms of the chair until she opened her eyes. “Everything I’ve told you is the God’s honest truth. We are in the middle of a transition that could be dangerous, not just for the wolves, but for anyone who is connected to us. I need you to understand what you’re getting yourself into by staying with me.”

  “Jesus, Paddy, it’s a bit much, don’t you think?”

  Patrick closed his eyes and scrubbed his face. When he looked at her again, his eyes had returned to the icy blue she had always loved.

  “Yes,” he said. “It’s more than a bit much, but it is the reality I live with now. I know you still have some healing to do, but you need to decide if this is a life you want to live. It’s dangerous and often terrifying, but I don’t have a choice. Not anymore. You do.”

  “I can’t process this, Patrick. It’s too much. I need to think…”
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  Nadia chose that moment to barrel into Patrick’s lodge. Her eyes were glowing that same freaky yellow as Patrick’s had been a moment before, her breathing heavy as though she’d run all the way there.

  “Dumbasses,” was all she said, but it had Patrick on his feet and running for the door.

  “Watch her,” he ordered the medic as he jabbed a finger at Maggie. “If anything happens to her, I’ll kill you.”

  “They’re in the full moon clearing,” Nadia shouted after him, but he said nothing more before disappearing out the door.

  Chapter Seven

  O f all the times for the Dumbasses to pull another of their stunts.

  The last thing Patrick wanted to do was leave Maggie like that after revealing the monster inside of him. Even though it was just a taste, he had seen the look on her face at the sight of the yellow-eyed beast he was now. However, he had sworn to protect these people, and right now the Dumbasses needed to be dealt with.

  There had been a handful of wolves that Patrick had been forced to turn out of the Pack. They had been loyal to Devaris, and try as he might, Patrick couldn’t get them to see their way to enjoying the new Pack dynamic. They liked the old days when money was made easily and they held sway with the Alpha. They were Devaris’ enforcers, and they were mean.

  Patrick had tried, he really had, but they simply couldn’t stop being evil. Soon after he forced them to leave the camp, the attacks began. Little things at first, like hunting on Pack property and leaving large portions of their kills to rot in the sun. It was irritating, but unless Patrick caught them at it, there was nothing he could do.

  However, over the last few weeks, things had escalated. The leader of the group, Bobby Ashwood, was the highest ranking Dumbass to have survived the night of the Challenge, his leaders having been taken out by Butch and Poppy when they had tried to interfere.