The screen door creaked open and Abraham handed me a mug full of steaming hot liquid. I shot him a grateful smile and took a tentative sip.
“Ready to get back to pack lands tomorrow?”
I made a face, and he laughed. “That’s what I was just thinking about,” I said.
He leaned back in his chair, his long legs extending in front of him and crossing at the ankles. “It was nice to get away, but you know we have jobs to do.”
“I know, and I accept that. To be honest, as nice as the alone time has been, being away this long has kind of made me anxious. I’ll be happy to get back to the lodge.”
He nodded slowly. “I know what you mean. I’ve checked in with Bea every day, but she has nothing new to report. Everything is running smoothly and there hasn’t been any sign of the Charlotte pack.”
I set my mug aside and pulled my knees up to my chest. “Does that worry you?”
He turned his head to look at me. “That we haven’t heard from them yet?”
I nodded, and he sighed.
“A little,” he admitted. “I’d rather face an enemy head-on. This waiting game is brutal.”
I pursed my lips and looked out into the woods as I let my thoughts settle. “I bet that’s part of his strategy. To make us anxious while he waits to strike.”
Abraham sighed again. “I’m sure you’re right.”
It was quiet between us for a few moments while I gathered the courage to ask my next question. Finally, I took a deep breath and spoke up.
“How do you think this is all gonna end?” I hadn’t intended for my voice to be that quiet or small, but I couldn’t help it. Thoughts of the coming confrontation and what it would mean for both packs were constant worries in my head. I’d held them off for as long as I could, but they couldn’t be ignored any longer.
Abraham let out a deep breath but didn’t respond right away. When he did, his voice was rough and full of emotion. “I’m sure it will end with a fight between me and my uncle. I don’t see any other way to end this.”
I turned to look at him, fear clogging my throat. “Are our people going to die?”
His jaw ticked as he ground his teeth. Finally, he nodded once. “It’s possible.”
My stomach plummeted as the faces of all our enforcers flashed through my mind. And worse, if our enforcers couldn’t hold back the Charlotte pack, what would happen to the rest of our people? Maddy, and Sophie, and Fran, and Kyle, and Doreen, and Ms. Elsie, and the dozens of other people I considered family.
“I don’t think anyone should die for this. What can we do?” I whispered.
Abraham took a deep breath, and I watched as his face seemed to age before my eyes. “I’m going to have to kill Conrad before his pack can inflict too much damage on ours.”
I reached out to grasp his hand, knowing he needed me in that moment. It was bad enough when he’d had to kill his cousin. The thought that my sweet, sensitive husband would have to kill another one of his family members gutted me.
“Is that really the only way?” I asked.
His eyes met mine, and in them, I saw resignation. “Conrad won’t stop. I know that for sure. We either stop him or he kills us and I’m not willing to risk a single person in my pack. If the choice is between defending them and killing my uncle, I’ll choose them every time.”
His words settled around us, each syllable like another nail in Conrad’s coffin.
I squeezed Abraham’s hand. “Maybe it won’t come to that. He’s probably not expecting us to have amassed a force as big as what we have now. Maybe he’ll back down when he sees he isn’t outnumbering us.”
Abraham squeezed my fingers back and sighed. “I hope so, baby. But if not, I’ll do what I have to.”
I watched my poor husband as the heaviness of this reality settled on his shoulders. And I knew, no matter what I did, this was a load he’d bear on his own. No amount of support from me could change what he had to face.
“I know you will, Abraham. You always do.”
Just as the silence settled around us again, a loud howl broke the stillness like a gunshot. We both sat up straight before glancing at one another.
“Was that one of ours?” I asked.
Abraham’s eyes were shrewd as they glanced around the forest. “Yes. I need you to go inside.”
I shook my head and stood. “I want to know what’s happening. I’m staying with you.”
He marched over and lifted me off my feet. “You’ll be able to hear from inside.” He walked me through the cottage’s front door and set me down in the living room. My protests meant nothing to him. “Stay in here,” he said before he stormed back out and slammed the door behind him.
There was no way I was going to miss what was happening out there. I’d stay inside, but he hadn’t said anything about opening a window and watching through it, had he?
I raced to one of the front windows and pulled back the curtains before wrenching it open. From my vantage point, I could see Abraham standing at the foot of the porch steps, his shoulders rigid and his hands clenched as he waited for whoever had howled in the distance.
A few moments later, a large wolf went careening through the trees and skidded to a stop in front of Abraham. I didn’t recognize the wolf and I couldn’t smell them from where I was, but a few loud cracks later and a naked Wes was standing there, panting.
“Alpha.”
“What is it?”
Wes took a deep breath as two other wolves raced into the clearing. “They’re coming from the North. It looks like he’s sent every one of his enforcers.”
Abraham’s shoulders inched toward his ears. “Are our men in position already?”
Wes took a deep breath as the other two wolves shifted into humans. It was Wyatt and Mathias and they were just as out of breath. It took a lot for a werewolf to get winded and I had to wonder from how far away they’d run.
“Yes. Beatrice has them stationed along their path ready to strike when they get close enough.”
“I want a group of men stationed closer to home to defend the rest of the pack in case any wolves break through our defenses.”
Wes nodded. “I’ll shift and tell her now.”
“Tell her I’m on my way, too.”
“No,” I whispered, even though I knew he had to. Even though I knew he’d never let his enforcers fight without him.
I ran to the front door and flung it open, careful to stay inside the cottage like he’d asked. “Abraham, I’m coming with you.”
He spun around and stomped back over to me. “No. You’re staying here with Wyatt.”
I shook my head. “I can fight, Abraham. You know I can. I want to help. I want to defend our people. I want to be by your side where I belong.”
He took a deep breath and reached out to grasp my shoulders. “Elizabeth, I can’t have you out there with me. I wouldn’t be able to focus knowing you were in danger. I need you to stay here and stay safe while I go protect our people. Please. Do this for me.”
I shook my head as tears swam to my eyes. “Don’t ask me to sit back and let you run off into danger, Abraham. I can’t do that. I won’t.”
He took a deep breath and pulled me closer, one of his hands slipping off my shoulder to cup my stomach. “El, you have to think about our children. You’re their only protector. You can’t put yourself in danger because something could happen to them. Please, keep yourself and our babies safe and stay here.”
I closed my eyes as a tear escaped and raced down my face. “I can’t believe you’re asking me to sit this out,” I whispered.
He pulled me close and squeezed me hard. “I’ll be back. I promise.”
I opened my eyes and speared him with a hard glare. “You better be.”
He grasped my chin and tilted my face toward his. “My life is entwined with your
s, El, and I would never do anything to endanger you. That means I’m going to make it through this and come home to you. You have my word.”
The tears were flowing unchecked now as I resigned myself to the fact that I was being left behind. That I’d be stuck here wondering and worrying about my people and my husband while they fought a force that might be greater than ours.
I reached up and pressed my lips to Abraham’s hard before pulling away and wiping my face with the back of my hand. “Go,” I said. “Go end this and come back to me.”
He nodded once before stepping forward and pressing a kiss to my forehead. “I will. I promise.” He pulled away and looked into my eyes. “I love you. I’ll be back soon.”
I firmed my chin and tipped it toward him. “I love you too.”
He gave me one last lingering glance before he turned around and raced down the porch steps. A few feet later, and his body was shifting mid-leap. Wes and Mathias shifted back into wolves as well and the three of them raced away without another word.
Wyatt was left standing naked in the clearing.
“Come on in, Wyatt. I’ll find something of Abraham’s you can borrow.”
He shook his head. “I should shift back. We’ll need to keep up communication with the rest of the pack and I can defend you better that way.”
I shrugged as I did my best to keep my eyes above his chest. “Before you shift, can you tell me anything more about what’s happening? Did you see them? Were there a lot of them? Where’s North of the pack lands? Was Conrad with them?”
He shook his head, his lips twitching with a grin. “Maybe you should at least grab me a pair of shorts so I can answer your questions without making you uncomfortable.”
I shot him a small, grateful smile. “That’s a good idea. I’ll be right back.”
I raced inside and up the stairs to the loft. Rifling through Abraham’s things, I quickly located a pair of black basketball shorts and ran back down the stairs with them. I tossed them toward Wyatt and turned around as he clothed himself.
He chuckled behind me. “You always gonna be this shy?”
“Probably.”
He laughed again before he said, “All good. You can turn around.”
When I did, I found him walking up the porch steps toward me. I motioned toward the chairs Abraham and I had been sitting in and he took one while I took the other.
For a moment, I thought about how, just thirty minutes ago, we’d been enjoying a peaceful morning. I’d been reading and drinking tea while he played games on his phone and chugged black coffee. It was so blissfully boring and average and now everything had been turned upside down.
My stomach knotted with anxiety as all the possibilities raced through my head.
What was happening?
What was being done?
Who was out there?
Would everyone make it through this?
If not, which one of my friends would I lose?
Or would it be one of my family members?
Could it be my husband?
“You had some questions?” Wyatt asked, breaking me out of my dark thoughts.
I turned to him and found the lines around his eyes had deepened, and I knew he was as worried as I was. His brother was out there on the front lines. His family was in danger while he had to stay behind and watch over me. That couldn’t be easy for him, and in that moment, I felt more kinship with him than I ever had before.
“What can you tell me about what’s going on?”
He took a deep breath and looked out into the forest, much like Abraham had when I’d asked him a question he didn’t want to answer.
“There seems to be a lot of them. If our estimates are correct, there are about forty.”
I gasped. “That’s more than we have.”
He nodded, his eyes wary. “I know. Our hope is they’re not all enforcers. We were sure Conrad had closer to thirty last we knew, and Nana confirmed that for us. He could have borrowed from other packs, but the more likely scenario is he made some of his pack members join the enforcers. If that’s the case, that’s lucky for us because they won’t be trained in battle and won’t put up much of a fight.”
Suddenly, this was all too real for me. Men and women were laying down their lives for this conflict. Because one alpha had a problem with another one. It all seemed so petty. So ridiculous that lives might be lost because of a dispute between two men.
“Not everyone is going to make it through this, are they?” I asked, my voice soft.
Wyatt sighed before reaching over and grasping my hand. “We’re well prepared, Ellie. We’ve been training for this for a long time and the enforcers we’ve borrowed are just as skilled.”
I shook my head. “I don’t want anyone from the Charlotte pack to die either. No one should have to lose their lives because Conrad has an issue with Abraham. That’s not fair to anyone.”
Wyatt sighed and pulled his hand away to run it through his sandy blond hair. “That’s why we’re hoping to locate Conrad soon so Abraham can confront him directly. If he can defeat his uncle, the rest of the pack will stop fighting as they’ll be under Abraham’s command. That’s the best way to end this for good.”
I bit my lip as I looked out at the forest, wondering where my husband was and how close to the conflict he’d managed to get. “Has anyone spotted Conrad yet?”
Wyatt shook his head. “Not last time I checked in.”
I stood up and nodded toward the woods. “Then you should shift back. We need as much information as we can get.”
Wyatt stood as well. “Okay. You go back inside, and I’ll run the perimeter. If I hear something, I’ll shift back and come tell you.”
I nodded. “Okay, that sounds like a plan. Thanks, Wyatt.”
He shrugged. “Of course, Ellie.”
He turned to walk down the porch steps and I headed back inside to give him some privacy. I heard the loud cracks that signified he’d shifted and closed the door behind me. I also made sure to turn the lock, just in case.
Now that I was inside, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I knew that book I’d been reading earlier wouldn’t hold an ounce of my attention now I had Abraham and the rest of my pack to worry about.
With nothing left to do, I started to pace. I needed to get the pent-up energy out of my system, or it felt like I’d blow apart at the seams. The minutes ticked by as I listened to Wyatt’s thumping feet race around the cottage. I didn’t know how long it’d been, but he hadn’t come to me with any new information and I had to assume that meant he knew nothing new.
That didn’t sit well with me.
The cottage was set on a desolate side road that saw very little action, so when I heard a car approach, it only barely registered in my head. I assumed it would drive right past the driveway, but when I heard the crunching of gravel coming closer, I stopped in the middle of the room to listen.
The tires kept approaching, their speed faster than I would have driven down a gravel drive. I heard Wyatt’s heavy paws thundering toward the moving vehicle before a series of loud pops rang through the quiet forest.
My heart fell to the soles of my feet as I listened carefully to what was happening outside. I couldn’t hear Wyatt anymore and I wasn’t sure what the loud bangs had been, but my gut told me it was nothing good.
Two car doors opened, and I turned around to face the front door.
Who could it possibly be?
Who knew we were here?
And where the hell was Wyatt?
I heard footsteps climbing up the porch steps before there was a knock on the front door. My heart raced out of control as I slowly crossed the room. I didn’t know if I should answer the door, but I also didn’t know if I had a choice. I tried to use my nose to see if I could tell who was on the other side but couldn’t pick anything up.<
br />
Where was Wyatt?
There were only two possibilities.
One was, he knew who this was, and he was allowing them to get this far.
The other was, he was hurt and couldn’t protect me anymore.
If that was the case, I was on my own now and delaying the inevitable wouldn’t change the outcome. With that in mind, I straightened my spine, tipped my chin up and reached for the lock.
I flung the thick wooden door open to find the last person I wanted to see at that moment. And that was when I knew the kind of trouble I was really in.
“Hello, Elizabeth,” Peyton said.
Chapter 58
Abraham
I raced through the woods faster than I ever had in my life. Leaping over roots and crashing through brush, the trees whipped past me in a blur.
“Bea, I need a status update.”
Although we were still miles apart, thankfully, there was no limit to our mental communication.
“They’re almost within reach of our first group of enforcers. We’ll attack and hold as many of them back as we can while the next group readies for whoever gets through us.”
My sister was on the front lines.
That thought played on repeat in my head as I dug my feet harder into the soft earth and propelled my body even faster.
She shouldn’t have been out there without me. I should have been in the first group. I should have been spearheading the fight against our enemies.
“Abey, stop worrying about me. You know I can handle myself.”
I shook my head and pushed my limbs harder. Faster. Testing my limits like never before.
“I don’t like the thought of you out there without me. I should be there within minutes. Did you send a group to protect the pack?”
“I have five men stationed on the edge of our property. If anyone gets past the enforcers I have stationed along their path, they’ll be there to protect the rest of them.”
“Maybe we should evacuate just in case. Or at least get them all to the lodge. We can defend them easier if they’re all in one place.”
“I’ll tell them that now.”
Rise Page 48
