by Jessie Lane
Running his hands through his hair, Stone growled, “Why didn’t you follow them?”
His beta stilled unnaturally, and then slowly leaned closer to Stone to whisper, “There was nothing to follow. No visible tracks and no scent. The best I can figure is they were standing in the small stream that runs beside the barn to cover their tracks. What I can’t explain is how they left no scent at all.”
“That’s impossible.”
Caleb nodded. “I know. Even though they could have been standing in the water, it still wouldn’t have taken much for the water to bring their scent to the area. Nobody ever escapes without leaving some sort of scent trail. What I want to know, man, is how the hell they did it. Because I’m telling you, Stone, I know what I heard. Those voices were there. So, why weren’t they? Or, at least the faintest trace of them?”
Taking numb steps backward, Stone had frantic thoughts whirling through his mind. Disbelief was one of them. How could someone disappear and not leave a scent track? Hunters used other smells to cover their scents, but that wasn’t what Caleb had found—or not found, for that matter. His beta hadn’t been able to find anything at all. Which seemed impossible.
Unless they have a witch.
“Holy fuck, we have a witch on our hands,” Stone whispered in shock.
Caleb’s face morphed into one of enraged fury. He hated magic, to the point he was prejudice against it. He had his reasons for it, though. A witch had killed his parents in a spell gone wrong.
Balling his fists up by his sides, Caleb let out an angry growl, his lip curling in distaste. “I’ll kill any witch I come across. I swear this to you, Alpha.”
Some distant part of Stone’s mind heard what his beta was saying, but he was still too much in shock to say anything back. Who would bring a witch onto their lands and why?
His wolf snarled in his head, To kill our mate.
All this time, Stone had been trying to figure out why some human would blow up his mate’s parents’ house. Now he knew humans weren’t the ones to blame. There was at least one witch involved, and a conversation held on his pack lands told him the only other thing he needed to know just then. Someone in his pack wanted his mate dead. Now he just had to figure out who and why. Until then …
Stone pulled out his cell phone and dialed one of the wolves who was watching over his mate’s hospital.
“Alpha,” the other wolf answered with no preamble.
His pack treated him with the utmost respect at all times and seemed to be happy under his reign. Well, at least he thought they had. Now he had to wonder if he really had some unhappy anarchists in his pack who were trying to bring him down through his mate.
He was at least sure that the three wolves he had sent to watch over Dia—Brandt, James, and Scotty—were loyal to a fault. There was no other wolf he trusted more than those three, besides Caleb.
“Someone is trying to kill my mate. Be aware of everything around you and be careful. I’ll also need you three to try harder in finding her inside the hospital and keeping an eye on her there. Nothing is to happen to her, you understand?”
“Yes, Alpha,” Brandt replied.
“Good. Call me once you have an update about her. I want to know how she’s doing.” Stone hung the phone up and collapsed back into his chair. Gripping the arms, he felt the entire world fall away as both his human and wolf side focused on one single task.
Find and kill whoever it was who had harmed his mate.
Chapter Seven
Dia gradually came to and opened eyelids that felt like they had hundred-pound weights holding them closed. Dim lighting let her slowly focus on a window with nothing but clear blue sky on the other side of it. Haltingly, she took in the room around her and remembered where she was: the hospital. Flashes of a memory of waking up here before started to play in her mind.
A doctor telling her she had been in an accident.
Besides having a splitting headache, she didn’t feel sore, so what kind of accident had she been in?
Overhearing the nurse say something to the doctor about her parents being killed in an explosion.
Pain and confusion swamped her emotions. Her parents were dead? She didn’t even remember having parents, but that didn’t stop her chest from hurting at the knowledge that they were dead and she would never meet them or get to know them. It was bad enough that she didn’t know who she was, but now that she knew her parents were dead, there was a chance there would be nobody alive to tell her these things. What if she had no other family?
A fast beeping from one of the monitors she was hooked up to started to speed up, so Dia looked over at the machines. It wasn’t her heart monitor, she could easily see that number. It was a high number, but there seemed to be no sound to it at the moment. She kept looking until she found another monitor with a second heartbeat, and that was when the last of her flashbacks hit her like a ton of bricks.
You’re safe here, Miss Connor. I need you to try to calm down. It’s not good for the baby for you to be this upset.
Holy Moses on the mountain, was she freaking pregnant?
The shock of that possibility immobilized her. Dia didn’t know what to think or what to say. Wait, who was she going to say something to, anyway? Her baby? It wasn’t like she knew anyone else right now. Hell, the only reason she knew her name was because the doctor had told her what it was. That made the shock of a pregnancy all the more unsettling because she had no idea who the father was.
Looking down at her waist, she was really concerned not to see an obvious baby belly bulge there. She had a slightly rounded tummy, but that was more of her body shape than a baby bump, she thought. It was obvious from looking down at her ample chest and hips that she had a curvy figure. So if she was pregnant, she must not be very far along, right?
Just then, a woman in a blue uniform came through her door. She was pushing a cart with a food tray on it. “Oh, good, you’re awake in time for lunch.”
Dia stared at the cheerful woman, not knowing what to say. Not that the nurse seemed to mind. The woman just pushed her cart up next to Dia’s bed, then used the remote control for the bed to prop Dia up into a sitting position. Once she had that done, she slid a table over Dia’s lap then put a tray of food right in front of her. It was at that moment that her stomach decided to let out a loud groan of hunger, causing the nurse to laugh and her cheeks to warm in embarrassment.
The nurse was chattering away as she got Dia set up with food, utensils, and a drink. Talking about the beautiful weather, she said something that Dia’s brain latched on to, as if it should be important.
“It’s a shame they had to cut your hair off, honey. I got to see it as they were wheeling you back to the ER, and it was gorgeous.”
Dia reached up with both hands and found short, prickly strands covering her head.
Buzz cut, her mind whispered to her.
Why in the world would she know what sort of haircut this was? Why would that be so important to her for Dia to actually remember it?
Looking at the nurse, she asked, “How long was my hair?”
The nurse gave her a sad look. “Oh, honey, your hair was glorious. Nice and long, past your shoulders. Good natural wave to it. I was downright jealous over that head of hair. But it couldn’t be helped. You hit your head, and there was swelling on the brain. They had to shave it all off to run their tests and see if you needed surgery. You had electrodes attached to your poor little head for over two weeks. At least your hair is starting to grow back now. Well, you eat up now, sugar. Need you to feed that baby growing inside of you.”
A strangled noise came from the doorway, making Dia and the nurse both look in that direction, but they didn’t see anyone there.
Shrugging her shoulders, the nurse wished Dia good-bye and pushed her cart out of the room, leaving Dia alone again with nothing but her lunch, her scrambled thoughts, and her pitifully short hair.
She picked at the food on her tray, not feeling very hungry. A sma
ll grumble in her stomach called her a liar and reminded Dia that she was eating for more than herself now, so she forced herself to take a bite of the meatloaf on her plate. She had just finished that portion of her lunch when there was a knock on her hospital room door.
Dr. Bennett was back.
“Hello, Dia, how are you feeling today?”
Dia shrugged. “Okay, I guess. Still very confused about what’s going on more than anything.”
The doctor gave her a sad smile. “I would say that’s perfectly normal in your circumstance, but that’s also why I’m here today—to answer any questions you might have.”
Dia chewed on her bottom lip nervously, wondering what she should ask first. There were some things she didn’t want to talk about too much, like the loss of the parents she couldn’t even remember.
“I remember overhearing that my parents are dead. Is that true?”
Dr. Bennett gave her a small nod. “Yes, unfortunately there was a gas leak at their house and it ignited. You were outside the house, and that’s why you’re still alive today.”
Fresh grief tore through her soul, but it was a necessary pain. Dia had to know what was going on if she was going to somehow take control back of her life.
With a choked voice, Dia asked, “What exactly happened to me?”
The doctor flipped a chart open in front of her and started to read. “The blast from the explosion sent you flying for several feet, and when you landed, you hit your head on the curb of the road. The hit to the head was significant enough to cause a small brain bleed that luckily stopped on its own, but also caused a substantial amount of swelling. We put you in a medically-induced coma while treating the swelling, and it took us two months to get it under control because of the pregnancy.”
“So, I am pregnant?” Dia asked with a breathless hitch in her voice.
The doctor nodded again. “Indeed, you are. From the ultrasound we gave you, we have you at approximately two and a half months along. Now it’s my turn for a question: do you happen to remember anything?”
Dia shook her head. If she tried hard to look into the recesses of her brain, all she saw was a black blank slate of nothingness.
“Nothing. Will my memories ever come back?”
The doctor gave her an encouraging grin. “I think they will. You see, when your swelling brain tissue pressed against your skull, it caused some impairment, such as memory loss. It can also cause mood swings or erratic behavior. Even though you’re awake now, the memory loss and confusion is still there. However, I think you will get at least some of your memory back with time. It’s going to come down to having a whole lot of faith and patience.”
It wasn’t the best news, but it was at least something to look forward to. Dia wished with every fiber of her being that she would get her memory back.
Dr. Bennett seemed ready to leave, though Dia still had one last question for her.
“Doctor, before you go, has no one come to see me? I understand my parents are dead, but do I have no other family? Or perhaps the father of the baby? Maybe I came into the ER with a wedding ring on?”
Dr. Bennett’s face lost all of her sparkle and a sad look crossed her face. “I’m sorry, my dear. You had no jewelry on you when you were brought in. We’re searching to see if you have any extended family, but so far, we’ve found none. And no one has been by to see you.”
The aura in the room became sad and awkward. More than anything, Dia just wanted to be left alone now.
As if the doctor could read her mind, she told Dia good-bye and said she would be back to check on her again before her rounds were done that day.
There she was, left alone again, with nothing but mashed potatoes and a strawberry jello that she no longer had any desire to eat. Looking at the blue sky out of her hospital room window, Dia wondered sadly if there was anyone left in the world who cared for her at all.
Chapter Eight
“We need a trap.”
Caleb’s words rang through the silence of Stone’s house.
It was hard to think about what needed to be done when he was waiting to hear back from the men he had stationed in Nashville to guard Dia. Instead of hearing about his mate, though, Stone was sitting here with his beta, trying to come up with a plan to catch the people responsible for almost killing Dia.
“What are you thinking?” he asked Caleb.
His beta clenched his hands together where they rested on the tops of his legs. “You’re not going to like this, but I think the fastest way to lure them out is to use Dia as bait.”
“Not happening,” Stone shut his beta down right away.
Holding his hands up in a surrender gesture, Caleb kept trying. “Just hear me out. We announce to the pack that Dia is okay and coming home. Then we keep her surrounded at all times on the way home. We put wolves we trust hidden out of sight around your house, and when we get her here to your place, we make a big pretense of leaving her alone for a little while so you can get some pack business done. I bet whoever it is will try to get to her then. We can take them out here.”
“What if they don’t come right away? We put her in danger until they do make an attempt? And how do we keep her protected for that long? I think your plan has more holes than swiss cheese. It’s been two months since I’ve seen my mate, and I sure as fuck don’t want to put her in danger the moment I finally get her back.”
Saying out loud how long he had been away from his mate was hard. Thinking of how frightened she must be was even harder. What worried him the most was that she had not tried to call him in the past two months. Was it because she was unconscious and couldn’t? This was why his men needed to hurry up and give him a fucking update.
As if his men knew he was thinking about them and Dia, Stone’s cell phone rang.
Putting his hand up to halt Caleb from anymore discussion, he looked at the number on the screen then picked up the phone.
“Update?”
Brandt was the one to answer him. “I made it into the hospital, found her floor and room in the hospital’s system when a nurse’s back was turned at the main desk. Went up to scope out her room and could hear her talking with the nurse. She’s awake and lucid, but I overheard a nurse on her floor say she’s lost all her memory.”
It felt like the floor dropped out from beneath Stone. “How bad is her memory loss?”
“From what I overheard, she remembers nothing and no one. Didn’t even remember her own name when she woke up.”
“Fuck!” Stone roared, lifting his arm, ready to throw his phone against the wall. What Brandt said next stopped him from doing it, though.
“There’s more.”
Taking a deep breath, Stone put the phone back to his ear and prayed the “more” was good news. “Yes?”
“She’s pregnant.”
Stone would have never thought it possible, but at hearing that news, his wolf went ballistic. Their mate was pregnant with their cub, and he was nowhere near her to protect her. The logical side of his brain reminded him that was a good thing. Someone was out to kill Dia because of him. However, the primal, animalistic part of him was raging to run to his mate and protect her.
Waring emotions ran through him until he just wanted to kick Caleb out of his place so he could be left alone to process everything. What happiness and joy he felt at the knowledge that he was going to have a baby with the woman he loved was quickly overshadowed by the reality of their situation. Now he had two people to protect instead of one. Dia was carrying his son or daughter, and there wasn’t a damn thing in this world that he would ever let touch his child.
Turning his attention back to Brandt, he ordered, “Stay as close to her as you can without being noticed. In fact, is there a waiting room near her room?”
“There’s a waiting room just down the hall from her. What do you want us to do?”
“The three of you rotate in shifts, staying in the waiting room. Close enough that you can hear what’s going on without tipping anyo
ne off that you’re not supposed to be there. Call me anytime you learn something new. Caleb and I will continue to work on things from our end. If anyone from the pack calls you, tell them I sent you on a business trip.”
Brandt sounded a little confused when he asked, “Are we not telling the pack that Dia is hurt?”
Looking straight into Caleb’s eyes, he made sure the man was paying attention to his conversation so he only had to say this once. “No, we’re going to tell the pack that Dia died from complications. As far as the pack is concerned, she’s dead to them. Understood?”
“Yes sir,” Brandt answered, and then Stone hung up the phone.
Caleb, however, looked less understanding and more confused than anything. “Why are we going to tell the pack that Dia died?”
Stone pursed his lips together and narrowed his eyes. “You heard what Brandt said. Dia is pregnant with my cub. There’s no way in hell I’m letting you talk me into using her as bait now. No, we’ll figure something else out and leave my mate and child safe in Nashville.”
“Have any ideas how you want to lure out her would-be killers, then?” Caleb asked.
Shaking his head, Stone told him the truth. “Not a fucking clue. Put your thinking cap on because I want this mystery solved as soon as possible. Until we figure out a way to draw them out, we have a pack to go tell that their alpha’s mate is dead. Let’s go get this shit over with.”
Chapter Nine
One week later…
“It’s almost time for you to leave.”
Dia clenched her hands together over her stomach, thinking about the baby that lay just beneath them. Giving voice to her worries, she asked the nurse, who had been so kind to her this past week, “Where will I go? I don’t know anyone or anything. I don’t know if I have any extended family or friends. I don’t even know if I have a place of my own, or if I was staying with my parents in the house that exploded! And, if all of that isn’t bad enough, I’m pregnant and don’t even know how I got that way or who the baby’s father is!” She was almost sobbing by the time she finished her sentence.
