by J. L. Wilder
“Tell me where you’re taking me,” she said, trying her best to sound brave.
“You’ll see when we get there,” he said.
“My alphas will find you,” she said. “They’re probably tracking you already.”
Brett shook his head, smiling. “Even you don’t believe that,” he said. “Why do you think we’re traveling by car? Your scent is going to disappear. They won’t know what happened to you, or which way to go. And I’ve added a few special touches of my own, just to cover all my bases.” He winked, and it made Sophie’s skin crawl. “I’m willing to bet they’re not even going to look for you,” he said.
“Of course they’ll look for me,” Sophie said, but her voice was barely a whisper. Won’t they?
What could Brett have done to prevent her alphas from searching for her? What could anyone possibly do that would keep them from her side?
Unless...
No.
She wouldn’t allow herself to think it. Of course her alphas were still alive. They had to be alive. They just had to be.
Brett spun the gun around and around in his hands as if it were a toy. Sophie knew he was doing it to intimidate her, to prevent her from forgetting, even for a moment, that he was armed and she was not. That he had all the power here, and that there was nothing she could do about it.
If he hadn’t been armed, she might have considered shifting. A fight between wolves in a confined space like this was a terrible idea, but if she could take him by surprise, she might be able to draw first blood and wound him badly enough to prevent retaliation.
But there was the gun. If she shifted, he would shoot her. He had said himself that he didn’t need to keep her alive.
And if he was right about her being pregnant...
She closed her eyes, doing her best to take stock of her body. Trying to identify the familiar signs of pregnancy.
But the pain from the blow to her head was too intense. She couldn’t focus on anything else.
God, she thought. Please just let the others be all right. There were nine babies to raise. Now their mother was gone. They needed the rest of their family. Please don’t let anyone else be hurt.
There was no chance of getting away. She curled up on the floor of the van, closed her eyes, and let the tears of pain and fear overwhelm her.
It felt like hours went by before the van finally stopped. Maybe it was even days. She couldn’t be sure. All she knew was that the speeding sensation came to a crawl, and then to a halt.
Brett scooted forward along the floor of the van. “We’re here,” he said, shaking her shoulder roughly as if to wake her up.
Sophie sat up. “Where?” she said. “You said you would tell me when we got here.”
“Vancouver,” Brett said. “All right?”
Vancouver. A chill ran down Sophie’s spine. No. Anywhere but here.
Maybe when the doors opened, she would have a chance to run. She readied herself to spring out, hoping that there would be a convenient forest or something to lose herself in.
“Hey, now,” Brett said, raising the gun slightly. “Remember, bullets travel faster than you can run. And I’m a good shot. Now that we’re here, I’ve got no problem shooting you in the leg and bringing you in alive, just like the boss wanted.”
Sophie’s stomach lurched. She forced her muscles to relax.
Just wait. Maybe there will be a chance to escape later.
And there was one good thing about being in Vancouver. She knew roughly where she was relative to the cave and her pack. If she could get free of Brett, there was a chance she could find her way back to them.
It felt like an extremely slim chance. But it was there. It was better than nothing.
The van’s rear doors swung open, and for a moment, Sophie was blinded by the daylight. Then her vision cleared.
Two more men were standing outside the vehicle. One of them must have been the driver, and Sophie supposed the other had been riding in the passenger seat. Three of them. She didn’t stand a chance.
“Bring her out,” one of the men said.
Brett grabbed her by the collar of her shirt and propelled her forward. Sophie barely managed to get her feet underneath her as she was pushed over the edge of the van onto the grass below.
“Let’s get her in the barn,” the man said. “Everyone’s waiting back at the house.”
Brett grabbed Sophie roughly by the arm and marched her across the grass toward a small barn that looked as if it had been erected very recently. The roof wasn’t quite finished—there was a hole in the top. Sophie shuddered, staring up at it. Was she really going to be expected to stay there?
There has to be some way out of this. The alphas will find me, or I’ll find a way to escape. Something. Somehow, I’ll make it back to my family.
Then she heard a familiar voice, and her blood ran cold. “Sophie. Never thought I’d see you again.”
She turned.
Josh, her old alpha, the man who had sent her into exile, was waiting for her by the barn door.
Chapter Eight
RYKER
He raced through the pouring rain, adrenaline spiking through his body, sniffing frantically for any sign of her.
He had lost track of how long he had been running, but the sun was beginning to come up, so it had definitely been all night. He felt as if he could keep going for days. Whatever combination of rage and pain was fueling him made him stronger than he had ever been in his life.
I knew it. It was easier to focus on feelings of self-righteousness than on feelings of fear. I knew something was wrong when the sun started to go down and she wasn’t home yet.
When the bears had left the north, Ryker and his brothers had become more comfortable with the idea of allowing Sophie out on her own. It had seemed wrong to keep her trapped in the cave all the time, so they had purposefully given her a little more freedom. But she knew they liked to see her back by sunset.
Why would she have kept us waiting, unless something was wrong?
Burton had tried to reassure him, had told him that he was worrying too much and that Sophie would no doubt be home any minute. But Burton had been wrong. Ryker had been right.
He ran harder. Surely she must have left some sign somewhere in these woods. She couldn’t have just disappeared.
He came to a halt by the riverbank. Her scent was there. It lingered powerfully, even in the rain, and he could tell that she had been there recently. Possibly just a few hours ago. He closed his eyes and inhaled, filling his mind with that scent, allowing himself to descend further into the mind of a wolf. He had to be a hunter now, a tracker. He had to trace that scent and figure out where she had gone.
He lowered his head and began to sniff the mud.
She had walked down the bank. He felt sure of that. And then—
Then the scent disappeared.
She had gone into the river.
For a moment, a stab of panic hit him. Could she have drowned?
But that didn’t feel right. Sophie was one of the strongest swimmers he knew, stronger than most of the rest of the pack, and she had a natural buoyancy that would have aided her in the water. Besides, it might have been a river, but the current was mild. Ryker would have been comfortable letting a five-year-old swim in this water.
Why would she go into the river at all? Was she fishing?
How did these pieces fit together?
“Ryker.”
He turned. Marco stood, in human form, up on the bank. His face was pale, and though he looked emotionless, Ryker recognized by the set of his jaw that he was distraught.
Ryker shifted. It went against his instincts to do so. He couldn’t track Sophie’s scent nearly as effectively in his human form. But it was clear that Marco wanted to talk, and sharing information could only be good right now.
“She went into the river,” he said.
Marco nodded. “I know,” he said.
“What? How do you know?”
“Because she left a note,” he said.
Ryker couldn’t have been more stunned if Marco had announced a desire to go hang gliding. “What?”
“Come out of the rain,” Marco said. “You need to read this, and you won’t be able to if it gets wet.”
Frowning, Ryker walked up the bank, following Marco to stand under the sheltering canopy of a large oak. The leaves above them grew so thick that they were protected from the falling rain.
Marco fished a piece of paper out of his pocket and handed it to Ryker.
“Where did she get paper?” Ryker asked, turning it over.
“That’s what you’re worried about?” Marco asked.
Ryker looked up at his fellow alpha. Marco was shaking. He was worse off than Ryker had originally thought him to be. “Sit down,” he said.
“I don’t want to sit down.”
“Fucking hell, Marco, you’re about to collapse. Just sit down.” He grabbed his fellow alpha’s hand and sank to the earth, pulling Marco down with him.
“Read the note,” Marco said.
Ryker unfolded the paper and read—
To my alphas,
I’m sorry. I can’t face the thought of your being disappointed in me. I realize that I’m disappointing you by leaving, but this way, at least I don’t have to face it. I hope you can find happiness with someone else.
-Sophie
Ryker read the message three times, waiting for it to sink in. He felt, at first, as though he couldn’t understand what he was seeing. The words simply didn’t make any sense.
Then, slowly, gradually, a hard weight began to settle in the pit of his stomach.
“No,” he said, feeling as though his own voice was coming from miles away. “No, she wouldn’t.”
“The note was in the cave,” Marco said. He didn’t sound like himself at all. “Robby found it. She left it for us so we would know what happened. Why she left.”
“You don’t believe this, do you?” Ryker asked.
“You think she’s lying?” Marco asked.
“I don’t know what I think,” Ryker said. “But she didn’t run away because she didn’t get pregnant. She wouldn’t do that to us. She wouldn’t do that to her own children.”
“I don’t know,” Marco said. “I wouldn’t have thought so either, but...”
“But what?” Ryker demanded. “You’re saying you do believe she’d do something like that now? Do you really think so little of Sophie?”
“Stop,” Marco said. “Stop yelling at me. I didn’t do this.”
“You’re ready to call off the search,” Ryker said. “Look at you. You don’t want to look for her anymore. You don’t want to bring her back.”
“Of course I want her back!” Marco cried. “Do you think I could ever willingly let her go? Do you think it’s not fucking killing me?”
“You look like you’re going to survive.” Ryker didn’t know when he’d been so angry. “This was all it took to break your bond. A note.”
“I love her enough to respect what she wants.” Marco said. “I suppose you want to go find her and drag her back kicking and screaming.”
“She doesn’t know what she wants,” Ryker said. “If she thinks this is what she wants, she’s out of her mind.”
“And you know better?”
“Of course I know better.”
Marco shook his head. “You’re no different than the southern alphas,” he said. “Our pack was supposed to be different—better—because we organized ourselves around the needs and desires of our omega instead of our alpha. If you want to be the kind of alpha who forces people to comply with what you think is best for them, how are you any different from the pack you ran away from?”
That was more than Ryker could take. His fist connected solidly with Marco’s jaw, sending the other man sprawling in the dirt.
Marco spat and sat up. “Hit me again,” he said. “Does that make you feel like a man?”
Ryker was on his feet. “I would walk away from me right now if I were you,” he said through gritted teeth.
Marco rose to his feet as well. “You think you’re the best of us, don’t you?” he asked. “And why? Because you met her first? You think you’re the real alpha, and that Burton and I are some kind of sub-alphas. You think you’re the one who’s really in charge here.”
Ryker saw red. He had always accepted Marco, and over the time they had spent together, he had truly grown to love the other man like a brother. But right now, all he wanted was to cause him pain. “Do you think you’re the only one this is happening to?” he demanded.
“I told her I didn’t care if she got pregnant or not,” Marco said. “I told her it didn’t matter, that we could always just try again.”
“And?"
“Well, did you tell her that?”
Something horrible and painful was happening inside of Ryker. “What the fuck are you asking me?”
“You know what I’m asking you,” Marco said. He spat again, and this time, Ryker saw blood. “Did she leave because she thought you wouldn’t accept her? Are you the one she’s really apologizing to in that note?”
“How—how fucking dare you?”
“Why don’t you believe her note?” Marco asked. “Why do you think she’s lying?” His voice was rising in pitch and volume now, and Ryker realized that he had never seen his fellow alpha get angry like this. He had never seen Marco yell. “Is it because you don’t want to believe it?”
“Of course I don’t want to believe it! Why the hell do you want to believe it?”
“Because what the hell is the alternative?” Marco cried. “If she didn’t leave because she couldn’t get pregnant, then she left for some other reason. And what could that be? Because she didn’t love us? Because she didn’t care for the kids? Because the omega bond we thought we all had was actually nothing?”
“Don’t talk like that,” Ryker said.
“Why not?” Marco snapped. “You are.”
The wolf was closer to the surface than it had ever been before in Ryker’s life. Not even when he had been fighting the bears had he been this angry. Bears were his natural enemy. They were supposed to want to hurt him, to destroy him.
Marco was supposed to be his family.
Nothing had prepared him for this kind of pain.
Marco’s teeth were bared. He sank back into a crouch, and Ryker knew he could see what was about to happen. “That’s right,” he said. “Fight me. Do it. You’re the big alpha around here, aren’t you? Put me in my place. I fucking dare you.”
If it’s a fight he wants, it’s a fight he’s going to get.
“Stop it!” a voice shrieked.
Ryker’s focus didn’t waver. He circled slowly, and Marco moved with him.
He heard the sound of pounding footsteps, and then Petra was there, skidding to a stop between the two of them, her hands held out to either side. “Stop it,” she said. “Don’t do this. You’ll kill each other.”
“Move, Petra,” Ryker growled.
She stood firm. “No,” she said. “Stand down. You two are my alphas, and I’m not going to let you do this.”
Another set of footsteps approached, and Chrissy appeared. She froze, taking in the scene before her, saying nothing.
“Get out of the way,” Marco said to Petra. His voice was practically a snarl.
Ryker sank deeper into his crouch, preparing to spring. Marco wasn’t going to win this fight. He was good, but Ryker was better.
I can take him.
Cam broke free of the trees and came sprinting toward them. “Petra!”
“Cam, no!” Chrissy sprang forward and caught her brother by the waist, heaving him backward. He struggled against her grasp, but Chrissy was stronger, and she dug in. “Robby, help me!”
Robby appeared, placed himself between Cam and the alphas, and began driving him back with a shoulder. “Petra, get out of there,” he growled back at her. “You’re going to get yourself killed.”
&nbs
p; “Don’t hurt her!” Cam yelled wildly.
Something seemed to come over Marco. He blinked, then rose up out of his crouch. A moment later, he was on his knees, his face buried in his hands.
Chrissy and Robby released Cam. He raced forward and grabbed Petra, pulling her back, out of harm’s way.
Robby strode forward and got right in Ryker’s face. “Is this really how it is?” he asked quietly. “You’re going to tear up the family?”
“It’s already been torn up,” Ryker said, his voice low.
“We lost one person,” Robby said. “One. I know she was important. I get it. But the rest of us are still here. Your brothers and sisters. Your children. We’re all still here. You can’t tell me that doesn’t mean anything to you. That this family doesn’t mean anything to you.”
Ryker felt as if the world had turned upside down.
We’re not a family. The words came into his mind unbidden. We’re nothing.
He didn’t want to think it. They had been so close. He had truly believed that this was something real.
But if Sophie could walk away, what was there to hold anyone else there?
The only thing he knew for sure was that, if he stayed, he was going to explode. His rage was going to come bursting out of him, and someone was going to get hurt.
That was one thing he wouldn’t let happen. He had come too close to hurting Marco just now. Petra had almost been collateral damage. He would take himself away from them before he could do them any harm.
He began to back away.
“Ryker,” Robby said. “Just calm down. Just come back to the cave, man. We’ll figure this out.”
But he couldn’t. He couldn’t face the cave with Sophie no longer in it. He couldn’t bring himself to confine his anger to such a small place, where someone would surely get hurt if he were to lash out.
He turned and ran into the woods.
For what seemed like a long time, he could hear the others behind him, calling his name, imploring him to come back. He understood. It was awful, what he was doing to them—forcing them to lose another member of the pack so soon after having lost Sophie. It wasn’t right or fair.
