“Come on.” I turned her around, led her back to the bed, and tucked her into the covers.
“Aunt Paige, what’s wrong?” The glossiness faded from her eyes as she looked at me.
I forced myself to smile.
“Everything’s going to be okay.” I sounded like a broken record, a jacked-up sound bite stuck on repeat. I didn’t know what else to say.
Deep howls carried through the air, one after another, in every direction.
If anyone tried to get in, I’d shift. I had to protect Evie no matter what.
“Remember how we talked about shifters?” I asked.
She nodded.
“Well, I’m going to show you exactly how it works.”
“Like a game?”
“Exactly. It’ll be fun. And if anything else happens, you climb under your bed, okay? Don’t come out for any reason. Can you do that for me?”
She nodded and pulled the blanket up over half her face. “Aunt Paige?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m scared.”
“I know.” Could I tell her I was, too? Did I lie and tell her again that everything was okay? I didn’t know how I was supposed to handle this. What happened if someone broke the door down? What was I supposed to do if they came in here? I could take one wolf, for sure. Maybe two. But from the howls, it sounded like an entire pack.
The mama bear inside of me was ready for the fight, huffing and teeming at the surface. I wasn’t sure that it was the best move. What if Evie was scared by my shift? What if she ran?
I focused, keeping control, and started the shift, just enough for fur to ripple across my skin. Evie squealed and covered her entire head. I shoved the bear back, maintaining human form.
“It’s okay,” I said. “It’s just me, see?”
I tried to peel the blanket down, but Evie held tight. This wasn’t working. I didn’t want to scare her.
Crash. The window shattered, and I jumped. Evie started crying as the vicious sounds of fighting wolves poured in. I scooped her up in my arms, and she held tight to my neck.
I couldn’t stop to think. I couldn’t focus on the fact that out there, one of those wolves was my mate.
I ran to the bedroom, slipped on my shoes, grabbed my keys, and ran for the door.
Blood rushed to my head, my heart thundering in my chest. I ran for the car.
“Don’t look.” My words were as much for me as they were for Evie.
Jett. I climbed through the driver’s side, and told Evie to climb into the back. As soon as the door was shut, I locked it.
I hit the gas. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I drove away, forcing my burning eyes to stay on the road. I could hardly breathe, hardly think. I couldn’t leave my mate. Turn around. Fight.
There was a terrible pained sound filling the car, and it took me a minute to realize it was me.
Chapter Twenty
Jett
Shards of glass clung to my fur as I rose back up to my paws. It was four against one, but all I could think about was the broken window, and how it belonged to my daughter’s bedroom.
If the Greenville City Pack had any honor, they’d leave my family out of this. But if they had any honor, they wouldn’t have come to my house in the middle of the night, stalking us in the darkness.
The second largest among the wolves was the one I recognized, the one who’d stabbed me in the neck and thrown me in his trunk. The one who’d tried to kill me in that field—Tiny.
The others were strangers, and just as dangerous. The largest hung back, while Tiny and his friends slowly closed in on me, taking turns tearing into my flesh.
“Where is he?” The largest growled in the shifter tongue. He had to be Briggs, the one who’d organized everything, including the betrayal of the roving chapter.
I knew Brick’s mistake would cost us, that it would embolden Greenville. I just hadn’t thought it wouldn’t bring them here. We should have left town, gone to Paige’s apartment. But it was too late for that now.
“There’s no one here for you,” I growled.
“This is him, boss.” Tiny said in the shifter tongue.
Fucker. How had they known where to find me?
The card...I’d handed him my business card back in Greenville. They had my name. That’s how they’d found us.
I’d fucked up so bad.
Without waiting for a reply, Tiny dove at me again. This strike, I dodged in time. I just had to keep them away from the house. I had to keep them outside long enough for—
Engines roared on approach, the distinct sound of motorcycles that meant my brothers had arrived. I hadn’t noticed until they were close. But now, this was over.
“Run while you can,” I growled.
“We won’t leave without Lars.” Briggs held his head high.
Proud bastard should have considered what war meant before starting one.
“He’s been released.” Hawke rounded the building in human form, flanked by a big ass grizzly, Brick, and a wolf, Ray.
“Where?” Briggs growled.
“Edge of town.” Hawke slid his hands into his pockets, completely at ease, completely in control of the situation. I didn’t know how he did it, but when it came down to it, Hawke always looked like he had his shit together. Just like Brick always looked like he was going to rip someone’s throat out. He would, in a heartbeat, and he’d enjoy it.
“Now that we’ve finally got your attention, tell me why.” Hawke narrowed his eyes at Briggs.
“Why what? I don’t even know you people.” Briggs shook his muzzle, hot steam billowing from his nostrils.
“Why your second—”
Tiny bounded toward Hawke. Brick moved in front of the alpha, but not before I dove at the bastard. If anyone was getting a piece of this asshole, it was me.
“No!” Briggs commanded his second, but Tiny wasn’t listening. He was the one who’d started all of this. I’d end it.
I caught his leg in my jaw and threw my weight into his side. Tiny barreled over, falling to the ground.
“Stop,” Briggs barked, but he wasn’t my alpha. I stalked forward, standing over the bastard who had drugged me, thrown me in a trunk, and beaten me nearly to death. Worse, he had come to my home...to my family.
“Don’t fucking move,” I growled to Tiny, who lay still at my paws. This ended tonight, one way or another. But I wasn’t rabid like him; I’d wait for Hawke to give the word.
“Tell me why you betrayed the Silent Butchers,” Hawke said.
“You’re...Silent Butchers…” Briggs shifted back to human form.
Briggs was leaving himself vulnerable by shifting, naked.
Hawke just looked at him. “Why would you be here if you didn’t know that?”
“You took our man.” Briggs crossed his arms.
“Only after you tried to kill ours.”
Briggs blinked hard and shook his head. “I did no such thing.”
I couldn’t sense a lie in his words. Why couldn’t I hear it?
“Tell me you’re not Briggs.” Hawke stared the other alpha down.
“I am.” Briggs took a step closer, holding a hand out to tell his backup to stay put.
Naked and alone, Briggs handed Hawke a clear advantage…but why? That advantage doubled as he walked away from his men.
“I’m Hunter Briggs, alpha of the Greenville City Pack. The only interaction I’ve had with your MC is when my uncle hired some of your guys to slaughter my family.”
What the fuck?
“He turned on them, as he turned on his own kin, but none of that was my doing.” Briggs stopped two feet from Brick. One false move and the grizzly would tear him apart.
But Briggs’s words rang true, and I thought back to what Draper had told me. He’d said Briggs, but not which Briggs. Why the hell would we assume there were a bunch of them?
“I believe you.” Hawke crossed his arms. “But that doesn’t absolve you of the assault of my second.”
Briggs cocked his head to the side. “What are you talking about?”
“Your man, Tiny, tried to kill my guy when he came to you for a peaceful meeting.”
“I never heard a word of this, not the meeting or any attack.”
Briggs again spoke the truth.
All eyes turned to Tiny on the ground.
“It’s my job. I was protecting you,” Tiny said in the shifter tongue. There was no lie in his words either. He believed he was doing the right thing.
Fucking idiot.
Briggs’s jaw tightened before he turned back to Hawke. “You took one of mine after one of mine assaulted one of yours. Upon the safe return of Lars, I wish no further quarrel with you. Peace?” Briggs offered his hand.
Hawke looked to me. He didn’t need my approval, but I appreciated the gesture, and nodded.
“Deal with your wild dog,” Hawke said.
Briggs spared a glance at Brick, who was seething a bit, but otherwise still.
“I will.”
“And your uncle, the one responsible for the deaths and capture of the roving chapter?” Hawke asked.
“Phillip Briggs—exiled,” Briggs replied.
“And if the Butchers find him?”
Briggs sucked in a deep breath. “He’s dug his own grave. When the consequences of his actions catch up with him, he deserves his fate. I’m actually surprised you haven’t found him yet. My father informed the Butchers of his location.”
Again, I recalled what Draper had said. He’d told me that when they hunted down Briggs, that was when the Tribunal had apprehended the roving pack. It seemed this Phillip Briggs might still be on the run. If so, maybe one of the other chapters would want to hunt him down. Maybe Brick would. Either way, I was out.
Hawke considered Briggs, nodded, and accepted his hand.
The two shook, and just like that, there was peace. I looked down at Tiny and took a step back. He rose to his paws and shifted back to human form.
The other Greenville wolf did the same.
Content that it was over, I shifted back, too, leaving Brick as the only beast among us.
The look Briggs shot Tiny told me he’d keep his word.
It was really over.
I had to tell Paige the good news.
But Hawke grabbed my arm as I went to pass. “I’m taking your advice.”
“What advice?”
“I’m dissolving the MC in Ashwood.”
Brick growled, a deep roar coming from such a big ass bear.
Hawke looked to Brick. “Anyone who wants to join another chapter would be welcome to do so.”
Brick wouldn’t leave. Ray would, given his dream was to join the Butchers. But I had a hard time imagining Brick going anywhere Shaundra wasn’t. I’d seen the way he looked at her. It was the same way I looked at Paige.
I nodded to Hawke. “I need to check on my family.”
“Sure.”
I ran past the others to the front of the house, and found the door already open. Bile rose in my throat as I raced inside to my daughter’s room, and found it empty. “Paige? Evelyn?”
I ran back to the doorway and watched the line of bikes leaving the driveway. But Paige’s car...my family was already gone.
Chapter Twenty-One
Paige
“I want to go home.” Evie curled her little body around the stuffed rhino Jett had given her, a ball on the couch hiding beneath a throw blanket. I’d tried to get her to settle into my bed, but she’d refused.
“I want to go home, too.” Except I was home, back in my apartment. I sat down beside Evie and rubbed her back. Neither of us had slept, and now the sun was already up. I wanted to pace. I wanted to scream. I wanted to cry. None of that would change what had happened.
I checked my phone for the thousandth time, praying that he’d called or sent a text and I’d just missed it. I had to know that Jett was okay. I’d left him three messages already, and he’d call when he could, wouldn’t he?
He would. He could. He was fine. Everything was going to be fine.
I closed my eyes and fought for composure when all I wanted to do was break down.
“I want my daddy.”
“I know.” I lay beside Evie and held her. I checked my phone again. Nothing.
“Can we go back?”
I pet her hair softly and her eyes slid shut.
“...I want...I want...to go home.” Her chest rose and fell as she drifted off to sleep.
Tears streamed down my cheeks. I couldn’t stop it once it started, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to. There was something cathartic about letting go, just a little, when I knew she couldn’t see me. I held my mouth shut hard, so as not to make a sound, and I let myself cry.
We’d come here because I didn’t know where else to go. But this apartment, it wasn’t my home anymore. Jett was my home. We couldn’t live a life where wolves showed up in the night to harm us. But I couldn’t live without him, either. We were mates. That was supposed to be it, the key to our happily ever after. We were supposed to have a bunch of kids, and steal kisses in the quiet moments when the chaos finally stilled. We were supposed to share picnics in the woods and learn every story the other person had to tell. Being mates meant love and contentment and finishing each other’s sentences. Not tears and fear...not this.
I closed my eyes and tried to rest. My body hurt, my heart was shattered. I was a broken mess, and I needed to sleep. Unwanted images flashed through my head—of our home burning, of my mate bloodied. His bright blue eyes faded as he lay on the ground, unmoving.
I shook the thought, and the idea of sleep, and headed to the kitchen for some coffee. There wasn’t a whole lot in the fridge. My veggies would need to be tossed, but the coffee—that was still good.
A gentle knocking came from the door. It was probably just Mrs. Foster from next door checking in since my car was parked out front and she’d know I was back. She was sweet, and I could use any distraction right about now. Maybe the stray cat, Graybeard, had snuck inside the building again. I bet Evie would love him.
I opened the door and he was there—blue eyes tired, brown hair a wild mess. Not my favorite cat, but even better, my mate. He leaned on the doorframe like he couldn’t quite stand on his own, and the scent of blood overwhelmed everything else. It overwhelmed everything but my need to touch him.
I threw my arms around him, only realizing after he cringed that I was hurting him.
“Are you...I can’t believe...what the hell happened?” My words came out a tumbled rush, my heart full and my head swimming.
“It’s over. Are you two okay? Where’s Evelyn?”
“We’re fine. She’s on the couch.” Everything's fine.
Jett crept over and peeked at her. The admiration in his eyes when he watched her sleep filled me with joy. Jett was here. There wasn’t just sadness or a touch of happiness—I was exhausted with relief.
We went back to the kitchen, far enough away not to disturb Evie.
“Nice apartment,” he said.
I snorted. The apartment was fine, but that’s not what we needed to talk about.
“How do you know this won’t happen again?” I stared into his deep blue eyes, searching for answers.
“There’s peace between the packs,” he said.
“What about the MC?”
“The Ashwood chapter’s disbanded. Butcher trouble isn’t our problem anymore.”
I couldn’t believe it. It was too good to be true. “Disbanded? And everyone’s okay with that?”
Jett shrugged. “They will be, or they’ll join a different chapter. But they’re not what matters. All that matters to me are you and—”
“Daddy!” Evie hopped off the couch and threw herself around Jett’s legs.
“All that matters is that I have you two. My girls. My family.”
Epilogue
Paige
I used to believe in love at first sight.
I used to believe in soulmates, that there wa
s one perfect person out in the world that complemented you in every way. Love takes work.
There is no one magic moment where everything wondrously becomes easy for the rest of eternity. Love is a commitment, a promise to ride out the bad times, knowing that with work and time, the good is worth fighting for.
Forever doesn’t just happen. It’s a choice, one worth compromising for. It’s finding that person who will compromise for you, too.
It’s the little moments holding hands or watching movies snuggled up on the sofa. It’s deciding to share the last cookie instead of eating it yourself. It’s stepping up when it’s easier to walk away, because love endures.
It’s not waiting for an unrealistically flawless person to fall into your life, but fighting for someone who’s worth fighting for. It’s always being there and never giving up.
Love isn’t always easy, but the best things in life never are.
That was it. I finally finished my article. I titled it Forget Mr. Right. Snag Mr. Worthwhile. A quick tap on send, and I shut my laptop.
A weight lifted and I bounced with every step. With everything else we’d been through, articulating my thoughts on relationships was easy-peasy. Plenty of time left to prep for the picnic.
Graybeard weaved between my legs, purring. I’d been sad leaving him behind in the city, thinking he was a wild man and needed his space, but somehow, he’d followed us here. I still hadn’t figured out if he’d found his own way, or if Jett had gone back for him. My guess was the second.
The doorbell rang, and I popped a cherry tomato from one of the platters in my mouth as I walked past the brand spanking new stainless appliances and butcher block countertops. The remodel had gone more quickly than I’d expected, and I was in love with the results.
A splash of tart acidity met my tongue as I crushed the orb between my teeth. At the door, I’d expected it to be Shaundra, or even Hawke. But it wasn’t.
It was Linda.
“Hey.” I squeezed her in a quick hug before realizing it might not be the best thing. “Sorry. Was that too rough? How’s your hip?”
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