Table of Contents
Author Highlights
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Wolf Betrayed
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
PARKER
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
COLLECTION
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
BRANDON
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
ELEVENTH HOUR
Chapter Fifteen
AVERY
Epilogue
A Note from Carrie Ann
About Carrie Ann and her Books
Excerpt: Wicked Wolf
Tattered Loyalties
Delicate Ink
Dust of My Wings
Wolf Betrayed
A Talon Pack Novel
By
Carrie Ann Ryan
Wolf Betrayed
A Talon Pack Novel
By: Carrie Ann Ryan
© 2016 Carrie Ann Ryan
ISBN: 978-1-943123-39-1
Cover Art by Charity Hendry
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All characters in this book are fiction and figments of the author’s imagination.
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Author Highlights
Praise for Carrie Ann Ryan….
“Carrie Ann Ryan knows how to pull your heartstrings and make your pulse pound! Her wonderful Redwood Pack series will draw you in and keep you reading long into the night. I can’t wait to see what comes next with the new generation, the Talons. Keep them coming, Carrie Ann!” –Lara Adrian, New York Times bestselling author of CRAVE THE NIGHT
“Carrie Ann Ryan never fails to draw readers in with passion, raw sensuality, and characters that pop off the page. Any book by Carrie Ann is an absolute treat.” – New York Times Bestselling Author J. Kenner
"With snarky humor, sizzling love scenes, and brilliant, imaginative worldbuilding, The Dante's Circle series reads as if Carrie Ann Ryan peeked at my personal wish list!" – NYT Bestselling Author, Larissa Ione
"Carrie Ann Ryan writes sexy shifters in a world full of passionate happily-ever-afters." – New York Times Bestselling Author Vivian Arend
“Carrie Ann’s books are sexy with characters you can’t help but love from page one. They are heat and heart blended to perfection.” New York Times Bestselling Author Jayne Rylon
Carrie Ann Ryan's books are wickedly funny and deliciously hot, with plenty of twists to keep you guessing. They'll keep you up all night!” USA Today Bestselling Author Cari Quinn
"Once again, Carrie Ann Ryan knocks the Dante's Circle series out of the park. The queen of hot, sexy, enthralling paranormal romance, Carrie Ann is an author not to miss!" New York Times bestselling Author Marie Harte
Dedication
To Chelle.
Acknowledgements
I feel like I write the same things here each time and I can’t help it. I have such an amazing team and I know I wouldn’t be able to do what I do without them. So thank you Charity for not only my cover, but my sanity. Thank you Chelle for your counsel and edits on this one! I know you didn’t get to sleep much, so I thank you. Thank you Tara and KP for keeping me going as well as organized. And thank you Avery, Skye, Christi, and Kimberly for helping me flesh out the plot…and not for freaking out when I mentioned I wanted to write about a tank.
Thank you Dr. Hubby for understanding when I need to work weekends and when I started to cry randomly thinking about this book.
And as always, thank you dear readers for sticking through everything with me. I’m so freaking blessed with y’all!
Happy reading!
Wolf Betrayed
The Talon Pack continues with the daughter of a traitor, the man who can never be her lover, and another man she should never want…her enemy.
Charlotte Jamenson was born to the Pack that threatened the world, but grew up in the one that saved it. She’s spent her entire life repenting for lies and faults that were never hers to bear. When she falls for her best friend, Bram Devlin, she thinks she’s finally found forgiveness for the blood in her veins; only a mating bond never came.
Bram knows there’s something missing within his mating with Charlotte, but there’s nothing he can do about it. Their Pack is in danger, and it’s his duty to protect their Alpha—even if it means sacrificing his life. When he’s put in charge of protecting a new member of the Talon Pack, he realizes he and Charlotte may just have a chance at something more than heartache.
Shane Bruins sacrificed his life and his future to protect the Packs from the men he worked for. Now, thanks to circumstances beyond his control, he’s not quite who he was before, and his life is on the line yet again. Only this time, he isn’t alone, and the two wolves in his path might be the only things that can calm the beast inside.
The war isn’t coming, it’s here, and the Talon Pack will have to rely on three souls who know they aren’t what each other wants—but exactly what they need—to win.
Chapter One
Charlotte Jamenson ducked beneath a fallen tree branch and inwardly cursed when she tripped over an aboveground root. If she’d been in her human form, she’d probably have said the word aloud and added a few others, as well. Instead, she huffed a breath, lowered her head, and moved faster through the woods.
Her wolf pushed at her, ready to take control and let the run do what it needed to: relieve the tension and stress that came with being who she was in a Pack on the brink of war. Yet she couldn’t quite let her wolf come to the surface even though she was in that form. Her human half needed to think, to feel the dirt beneath her paws, and hold on to what little control she had over her life. The war was coming, perhaps it was even here, and she didn’t have a clue how she could help.
She was the adoptive daughter of the former Omega of the Redwood Pack. The true daughter of the traitor to the Central Pack.
Yet she had nothing to show for her blood other than the guilt that came with continuing to breathe when so many others did not.
The other wolf with her nipped at her flank, and she sped up, thankful that he’d pulled her out of her thoughts of self-pity. She had enough trouble figuring out how to help her people without falling into a depression over where she’d come from yet again.
Charlotte didn’t bother to turn and bite at the other wolf for daring to touch her. This was Bram, her best friend and everything else that she could possibly ever need, he could nip at her if he wanted. She’d just nip back.
When he tried to snap at her again, she slammed her body into his. He was so much bigger than she was, though—in either form—that he didn’t budge, and she almost stumbled. He let out a soft growl, even as they continued their pace, as if admonishing her for being so careless. Either that or he worried about her too much. As this was Bram, it was probably a mixture of both.
They continued their run, their pace increasing until she was panting and losing steam. She hadn’t been sleeping well, not with the steady unrest around them and the wolf at her
side, and now it was starting to show. She wouldn’t be much help to her Pack and family if she didn’t start taking care of herself. And while this run had initially been part of that, as all wolves needed the exercise, she was going to hurt herself if she didn’t slow down and head back home.
Bram seemed to sense her needs—as always—and slowed down first. She held back another sigh and matched his pace until they were both walking back toward the set of trees where they’d left their clothing.
When they reached the area, she let out a low moan, knowing the pain from the change was coming. Even though she’d done this countless times before, the transition between wolf and human, human and wolf, never got any easier. For people like Bram, who seemed to excel at everything he did, it looked as if he gently flowed from one form to another. He never showed any signs of weakness, never looked like he wanted to pass out from the pain. That was probably why he was an enforcer and protector for her Uncle Kade, the Alpha of the Redwood Pack.
And why she was still caught in the in-between without a clear duty or purpose.
Her bones popped, her muscles tearing as her body completed the unnatural change between her two forms. It wasn’t like in the movies the humans had made before the Unveiling. This wasn’t full of sparkly magic and wishes. It was an intense agony infused with faith in the moon goddess that Charlotte wouldn’t get stuck halfway between her two halves.
She’d had nightmares about that when she was little.
Of course, the fact that she’d seen it happen to her brother’s…experiments before she’d come to the Redwood Pack probably had something to do with it.
When she was finally back in her human form, she stood on shaky legs and let out another breath. Her body was sweat-slick and achy, but the run had done her good. Her wolf had needed the escape, and Charlotte had needed to be alone with Bram. Even if just the idea of it was a sweet agony.
He was her best friend. Her everything.
The one man who the goddess had chosen to be her mate.
But when the mating bond didn’t come, her heart had shattered into a thousand pieces. She’d always known she’d never be good enough for a wolf such as Bram, yet some small part of her had hoped the moon goddess would allow her that one piece of happiness. But the blood in her veins spoke loudly to those who dared to listen, and because of that, Bram would never be hers.
There would be another chance for him to mate, she knew. There were potential mates around the world for every shifter in existence. One only needed to find them. They could choose whom the moon goddess put in front of them, or wait to find someone their human half could love.
Charlotte had thought Bram was hers. Her wolf knew it to be true.
But no bond had come.
So she would remain his best friend, and when he found another wolf to complete the bond, she would step aside and shatter, breaking every day until she took her last breath.
Strong fingers gripped her chin, and she pulled herself out from beneath her blanket of self-doubt.
“Charlotte.” Bram’s voice soothed her, even as it brought her to the edge and made her ache.
“What?” she breathed.
“You need to stop thinking so hard,” he said softly. His eyes were dark, yet the yellow ring around the irises told her that his wolf was close to the surface. “You’re hurting yourself; pushing yourself until you’re bound to break.”
She’d already broken.
But she didn’t tell him that. He knew it already since he’d crumbled right next to her when the bond hadn’t come.
“I’m fine.” A breathy answer. She cleared her throat. “I’m fine,” she repeated, her voice far stronger. She was good at pretending she held a strength within herself she would never actually possess. Her sister, the only mother she’d ever known since Ellie had raised her from a small child, had taught her how to pretend, how to face her fears even if she may never fully overcome them.
Bram frowned, and she wanted to rub away the little line that formed between his dark brows. She loved that line, just like she loved every inch of his face, though she’d never told him that. She never would.
His skin was smooth, dark brown, and encased muscles that held the strength of a Pack leader. The squareness of his jaw, and the broadness of his shoulders had only intensified as he’d grown into himself and his position in the Pack, and she’d fallen for him early on in their friendship. Their one night of passion, however, would have to be the last time, as the bond hadn’t come when it should have.
Bram was not hers, and he never would be.
But she couldn’t fight for her Pack in this time of war if she spent her days mooning over a wolf she could never have.
Resolute, she rolled her shoulders and took a step back from him. The hurt that crossed his features mirrored her own, but both she and Bram were good at pretending.
Oh so good.
“Do you want to head back?” Bram asked as he fisted his hands by his sides. She did her best not to look down past his waist since neither of them had put clothes on yet. Nudity shouldn’t matter to wolves, and yet it did right then. She’d once felt his body up close, caressed every hard inch of him, but now she had to push that from her mind.
“We need to,” she answered as she bent to pick up her clothing. She hadn’t missed Bram’s gaze wander over her body, and she couldn’t allow it any longer. They needed to move on, and they couldn’t do that if they were constantly panting with need. “I promised Mom that I’d be back for dinner. Lana and Belle miss me.”
Charlotte had chosen to call Ellie her mother when she’d come to the Redwood Pack. Though technically, Ellie was Charlotte’s half-sister, it had been easier to call Ellie “Mom” and refer to Maddox as her father. They had been the ones to raise her and teach her what it meant to be a shifter in the world of secrecy and hope. Belle and Lana were technically Charlotte’s nieces, but they were the sisters of her heart. As long as she didn’t think too hard about the bonds and connections that wove through their heritage, she was fine. The fact that one of her best friends, Parker, was also her nephew—and cousin—because of the ways everyone had mated only made her head hurt. So she chose to ignore all of that and focus on what mattered.
Usually.
Bram grinned then, and she held back a moan at how gorgeous the man looked when he smiled. It simply wasn’t fair that he was so good-looking. “Let’s get dressed, then. Your sisters shouldn’t be kept waiting.”
Charlotte rolled her eyes and quickly pulled on her jeans. “You spoil them.”
“Well, duh. You tend to spoil them, too. They’re almost adults now so we need to make sure they’re pampered before we push them out into the ranking of the Pack.”
“Like Dad would ever let them be pushed out like baby birds in the nest.”
“True,” Bram said as they started back to the center of the den where most of the homes were located. The wards the witches of the Pack had put up might protect the den from the humans’ prying eyes and even more dangerous intentions, but the natural landscape of the area also provided some protection. “Maddox might not be the Omega now that Drake is coming into his powers, but the guy is more intuitive than any other wolf I know.”
Bram reached out as if to take her hand as he had countless times before but seemed to think better of it and quickly dropped his arm. She refused to be hurt because of the action. It was just the way things were now.
She gave him a falsely bright smile. “Yeah, you try growing up with a Dad who can literally feel every emotion you’re feeling. There’s no hiding from him.”
Bram gave her a look. “Considering I was at your house more than I was at any of my foster homes, I know exactly what you mean. Getting you out of there after hours so we could sneak around like any self-respecting teenagers wasn’t the easiest thing.”
Charlotte laughed, the tension of the run and what would never be slipping from her shoulders. “I still think we got off easier than Finn and the rest of Unc
le Kade’s kids. I mean, Kade’s the freaking Alpha and always knew what I was up to. Just imagine his own kids.”
Bram shrugged. “Your family is so close, I’m pretty sure all the older generation knew what was going on with their entire passel of kids but let us get into some trouble anyway. I mean, it’s how we learn, right?”
Charlotte smiled and continued walking toward her parents’ home. The only reason she and her cousins had been able to run as wild as they had was because the Redwoods were healthy. Though she’d lost her grandparents in the final battles with the Central Pack, the rest of the den had risen up to protect their own. The battle that had taken Edward’s and Pat’s lives had fundamentally changed the Pack’s structure and bonds. Charlotte’s generation of wolves had been forced to come into their powers far earlier than they should have, and children like Bram had lost their parents in the seemingly unending battles.
From the ashes, the Redwoods had grown into a power to be reckoned with.
The Talon Pack, their allies and friends, were still learning how to become a Pack like hers. They didn’t have the same history as the Redwoods, and because of that, they were technically weaker. But because they were allies, and so many within each of the Packs had mated with each other, they were almost one large Pack now—with two Alphas. She wasn’t sure how things would work in the future, but for now, they had a solid alliance and shared a threat.
The humans.
When the world had found out about the existence of shifters, some humans had chosen to take them in with open arms. Others had created a war. Politics and grandstanding were now commonplace, and Charlotte’s people were on the edge of a blade that would either protect them or cut them down to nothing.
She wasn’t sure what all was coming for them, but she knew she would fight for her family no matter what…they just needed to give her a chance.
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