by Chloe Cole
“A bone. It hurts right now but she’ll be fine,” he replied.
“Glad to hear it,” Chandra said, the rest of the tension seeming to leave her in a rush. “That’s everyone. Amalie, Liam and the rest are in the kitchen. Everyone is accounted for and okay.” She paused and called his name softly. “And Billy?”
He turned and met her gaze.
“Your woman has already proven her worth.”
Relief and joy filled Amber’s heart and she swallowed the lump in her throat. They thought she was worthy.
Worthy of them.
Worthy of Billy.
Worthy of all their sacrifices.
If they thought that, just maybe it was true.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
O nce they cleaned up and dressed, they all met back in the great room. They drank coffee and brandy, and shared war stories while the uninjured members of the pack swept up glass and boarded the windows. It had been a harrowing night, and the Pray pack was shaken but intact.
And his mate was all right. It was the best of days.
"The man by the path, he told us to run. I think he even stalled the rest of the wolves...who was that?" Amber asked softly, tugging the blanket more tightly around her shoulders. "I need to thank him."
Maggie frowned, now back in human form, her hip already on the mend. She ran a hand through her dark hair before shooting a glance at Liam. "She said there was a man, but he’d shifted by the time I got there. On the overlook. He told us how many wolves would be waiting by the house and ran interference for the ones coming behind us.” She shook her head slowly, clearly baffled. “The weird part is, he smelled like he was Big Sky Canyon."
Liam's golden eyes flashed and his expression went thoughtful. “Impossible. They hate us as much as the Kotke. Why help the enemy? What color was he?"
"Black. Big. I'd say he was your size, Liam."
Billy cocked his head as he listened to Maggie talk. When she finished giving a more detailed description, he shook his head slowly. It didn’t make any sense, but there was only one wolf he could think of who matched that description in the area. "I could be wrong. Hell, maybe they added a new rogue to the pack over there, but I gotta tell you, it sounds an awful lot like Greyson West." He shrugged. "Doesn't make any sense, but there it is."
The room went eerily quiet until Amber finally broke the silence. "Who's Greyson West?"
Chandra’s face went a little pale and she snuggled closer to Jax. “Before I came to Pray, I was part of the Big Sky Canyon pack. I left because their alpha is more like a dictator and he thinks much like the Kotke do. Grey is his son, and next in line for the job.”
“Exactly,” Liam said, his black brows furrowed in a thunderous frown. “So why the hell would he be doing anything to help us right now? They hate us. We need to get to the bottom of this.”
“Grey wasn’t like his father when I knew him. He’d been a voice of reason in the past, but then he left for a year or so to work on setting up some businesses internationally. Things got really bad when he was gone. I didn’t realize he was back,” Chandra said. “Who knows? Maybe he really was trying to help.”
“Or maybe he’s fallen into line with his father’s way of thinking and there is a bigger plot at play here,” Maggie added from her spot on the couch.
Billy stretched his torso as another broken rib shifted beneath his skin, knitting itself slowly and painfully back together. No question that their healing power was a gift, but sometimes it hurt like a motherfucker.
"A definite mystery,” he agreed, pushing himself heavily to his feet. “But one for another day. For right now, I'm going to thank him tonight in my prayers, lay with Amber, and marvel that she's still alive for me to hold."
He reached a hand out for Amber's, and she laced her fingers with his. He lifted his gaze to meet that of his alpha and dipped his head low.
"I will forever be in your debt, Liam. All of you," he added, scanning the room to make eye contact with each of his packmates. Only Maggie turned her head, but it didn't faze him. She would come around. She might not realize it, but she already had. She saved Amber's life. They had rallied around him and his human and protected them both.
That was the meaning of family.
"I know I don't need to say it, but if ever any of you need anything. Anything. Come to me. You have my undying and everlasting loyalty."
He pulled Amber close and headed for the stairs. They both winced as their injuries collided, but he didn’t pull away and she only nuzzled closer, looping an arm around his waist.
They still had some talking to do, there was no question of that. But for the moment, he was as content as could be. She was alive. She was in his arms. And that was everything.
The second his bedroom door closed behind him, he turned to face her. Tomorrow was promised to no one, and he wasn’t willing to wait another second to say what he’d known the moment he laid eyes on her.
"I love you, Amber. From the moment I saw your face. The second I touched your skin. The instant I breathed in your scent, my wolf knew. You are my one true mate. Forgive me for the secrets I kept, and know, if you have me, there will never be another between us.”
Her eyes went glassy with tears and she rolled up onto her tiptoes, and kissed his jaw lightly. “I don’t have a wolf inside me to guide me yet, but I knew it too. I dreamt of you. I felt you everywhere, Billy. And I can’t imagine a life without you. I’d be honored to be your mate. I never imagined I would ever find something like this. At best, I wanted safe. Average. Content."
With a twinge of regret, he shook his head slowly. "You will never have the latter with me. It will always be wild and chaotic, and exciting. But Amber, you need to understand that it will never be the former either.”
He speared a hand into her hair and forced himself to continue.
“Pack life is dangerous, even during peace times. This is a new era and this battle was just the first of many until we win this war. I will protect you as best I can, but from the day you saw me shift, you've been in danger. Once you become like us, it will be better, but the threat will never be totally gone, and that's not going to change unless you run and hide. Because I love you, I want you to know that I will still help you do that if it's your choice."
In that moment, he knew more fear than he had in any battle. But she didn’t hesitate, and cupped his face in her soft hands.
"You're my choice, Billy. And a life without you isn't one I want to live."
He bent low and kissed her, his heart feeling fuller than it ever had. There would be dark days ahead, but for now, he had it all.
His woman.
His pack.
His land.
And it was enough.
THE END
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OPPOSITION
Times are changing for the Montana wolves. Far too quickly for Maggie Porter’s liking. After a bloody battle with one rival pack and another on the horizon, she wishes things could just go back to the way they used to be. But not until she gets to the bottom of this latest mystery. Who is Greyson West, really, and why did he help her escape the enemy?
Greyson West can’t wait to bring his all-too traditional pack into the future. Stuck under his father’s tyrannical rule that still supports arranged marriages and allows the murder of humans for sport, he knows the time to step in and take over as alpha is now. But his mission is derailed when he meets a stubborn female who he can’t get out of his head.
Sleeping with the enemy could cost him his chance at becoming alpha, but he’s never been much on following the rules…
EXCERPT
THE TENSION WAS like aging blood on Greyson West’s tongue, bitter and metallic. The entire pack was sitting at a round table; all gazes focused on his father, though none would meet the man’s e
yes. Instead, they focused on a spot somewhere around his chin as they listened intently, like they hadn't already heard the very same speech many times before.
But they had. His ranting was the same as it had been almost daily since the Kotke had made a run on the Pray wolves and lost a few days before. The Kotke, his father claimed, weren't as strong as they, the Big Sky Canyon pack, were. Someone needed to teach the Pray wolves a lesson and if the Kotke couldn’t manage, it was up to them to take the mantle. Liam, the Pray alpha, was too headstrong and committed to his new wave thinking.
He would be the ruination of all of them, and he must be stopped.
Grey tuned out, focusing instead on mentally disproving his father's flawed reasoning, which wasn’t hard to do. Not that the nonsense he fed the pack was the heart of the matter at all.
The fact was that the tyrannical alpha Grey called sire had been searching for a motive to crush the Pray pack for years, as soon as he realized that the younger generation of wolves were much more open to Liam’s more liberal way of thinking than to his own. They’d already had one wolf defect, and there were surely more to come if his father didn’t give up his role as alpha soon.
It was just by luck that scandal had so recently fallen upon his father's enemies, leaving them vulnerable and out of favor with several of the more traditional packs that had him digging in his heels. One more coup de grace against the upstarts to make sure future generations would think twice before rebelling.
Grey shifted in his chair, focusing again on his father as the old man finally started winding down.
"Brothers and sisters, we have to fight for our way of life. For our divine right to eat and hunt and live as we wish. These Pray wolves who dare to call themselves a pack are nothing but posers. Abominations who would eat and speak and sleep with humans."
His father paused in his speech, looking around the room and Grey followed suit, irritated by the genuine scowls of the older pack members, and equally so by the feigned repugnance of the younger ones.
They knew better than to defy him by now. The last member to speak out for human rights had been beaten within an inch of her life. The person before that had had his throat torn out. Better to feign disgust than to be burned at the stake for tolerance.
Grey, on the other hand, was willing to roll the dice on that front. God only knew it wouldn’t be the first time he’d done so. His father would take up no action against him, no matter how infuriated the man became. So, rather than joining the exaggerated sneers of his fellows, he sat back in his seat and waited for the speech to end so he could finally step in and try to bring some semblance of reason to his people.
“We tried to bring an end to this pack’s disgusting ways.” Grey’s father sneered at him pointedly, and Grey scowled back. During the fight with the Kotke, Grey had been dispatched to watch and ensure the human housed by the Pray wolves met her end.
At least, that had been his father’s plan.
Grey had no such intention—and when he spotted the woman in a battle for her life, he’d known that it was not his to take, no matter what anyone had to say about it.
Not to mention that her savior—a gorgeous, sable-colored wolf who fought like a lion—had touched something inside him he still hadn’t been able to put a finger on.
God, she’d been amazing. Even at the end, as he’d watched from afar, she was nearly overcome by two wolves. Just when he’d been about to step in—a move that would be looked on by the Kotke as an act of war against them—she and her little human friend had prevailed.
He hadn’t stopped thinking about her since.
The alpha’s droning broke through Grey’s thoughts, and he focused again in hopes of getting a word in edgewise.
"This reckless pup who dares to call himself an alpha has taken a human into his pack yet again, like some sort of pet. I ask you, when will the madness cease? The Kotke may not have been able to kill this human female, but that does not mean it cannot be done.”
Blah, blah, blah. Next he’d mention something about loyalty and—
“I call upon you all, now, to prepare for battle. We will find this female and finish her."
What?
Grey nearly jumped to his feet, then stopped short when his father growled low in his throat and signaled the rest of the pack to howl back in agreement. The response was low at first, tentative, but the power of the alpha was strong, and it grew louder as his will pressed in on them all. Even Grey could feel it, the desire to obey…to please him.
Didn't his father feel the vibrations of the pack? The fear and anxiety? The turmoil?
If he did, he certainly didn't care, but that didn't mean that Grey could idly stand by while his people fell to the knee for a cause they didn't believe in. They had already suffered enough at his father's hand. As next in line to lead the pack, it was his duty to stand in disagreement.
Pushing himself from his seat, he rose and faced his father. Grey already towered over him by a good six inches, and the man glared up at him.
"I have not dismissed you," Joseph growled.
"I am not asking to leave. I'm asking you to listen. I don't—"
"This is a summit, not a discussion. I am telling you that this is what we will do. You will not fail me again. When we march on the Pray wolves, you and Willa will lead the pack in front, I will hold the line in the rear."
Grey glanced at Willa as his father gestured toward her. Her light brown eyes widened slightly, but she stiffened her jaw and gave a firm nod until her sandy hair fell over her cheek. Grey tried to penetrate her thoughts, to will her to stand beside him and take a stand, but she only pursed her lips and pretended not to notice.
Leave it to Willa not to listen at a time like this.
"But you—" Grey started.
"I believe I made it clear this was not a time for questions," his father barked. "Now, all of you should spend these next few days training. These pups may be misguided, but if the Kotke have taught us anything, it's that these Pray dissenters are strong. We must be stronger."
Without another word, his father stepped from the room and slammed the large, oak door behind him. Even after he’d gone, the rest of the pack did not move. They grumbled and sighed, but none of them so much as scooted their chairs back. All except Willa, that was, who was already practically leaping over the table to talk to Grey.
Or, more accurately, to screech at him.
"What the hell was that?" she asked. "Are you trying to get us both killed?"
"I'm not going to let him keep walking around here like he's not losing his damn mind. You know what happened to the Kotke. Six dead and even more maimed. I can't let that happen to our people."
"I’m fine if you want to play hero, but save it for when you're the alpha. A time that will come much sooner if you keep your head down and play nice. Arguing now is only going to get someone slaughtered and make your father feel like he needs to stay in his position longer. We need to wait. Bide our time."
"Waiting is going to get all of us killed." He stalked toward the door, and then walked through the kitchen and the foyer until he was finally in the crisp night air. A clear March evening, perfect for a long run.
Exactly what he needed.
He unfastened his belt, preparing to shift into wolf form, but before he was able to yank off his pants, the door swung open again behind him.
"It’s not up to you,” Willa said, following him out. “You aren't the alpha."
He took a deep breath before turning to face her.
"And you’re not either,” he shot back. Seriously, when would the woman give up trying to boss him around? She should know better.
Willa’s features softened. “I’m not going to ask where you’re going so I don’t have to lie if asked, and I know better than to think I can stop you, but will you at least try to be safe?" She crossed her arms over her chest. "I would hate it if Joseph killed you. It would be such a hassle to find a new partner in crime around here."
&
nbsp; He laughed softly but wasn't about to let her convince him that easily. As much as her friendship meant, the pack still came first. And right now, the only way to save them was to stop the fighting before it started. If his father wouldn’t listen, maybe the Pray wolves would.
"We'll talk about this tomorrow." He edged toward the vast expanse of forest that separated the Big Sky Canyon lands from the Pray territory and began pulling off his clothing.
"If you're still alive," she called after him as he transformed, but he didn't let it stop him. Instead, he began his sprint, letting the wind rush through his fur as he took in the smells of the earth and the early spring breeze with every step. Already the voices of the pack were growing fainter, but as he loped toward enemy lands, he felt Willa’s mind touch his.
Please be careful. If your father doesn't kill you, the Pray wolves just might.
READ the rest of the Opposition now!
ALSO BY CHLOE COLE
Prey, Montana Wolves Book #1 (FREE with Kindle Unlimited)
Awakening, Montana Wolves Book #2 (FREE with Kindle Unlimited)
Opposition, Montana Wolves Book #4 (FREE with Kindle Unlimited)
And COMING Dec. 29th, the Montana Wolves meet dragons in Skyfire, Book One!
COPYRIGHTS
Redemption, Montana Wolves: Book 3
Chloe Cole
First Ebook Edition
Copyright © 2014 – Frog Prints Publishing
All rights reserved.
Cover design: Roderick Bell
