by May Dawson
I imagined myself filled with magic, healing my men as they battled the witches so I never had to fear losing any one of them ever again. And I couldn’t help but shiver. I remembered what Callum had said about why wolves hated magic. Magic’s power was in blood, and he had said, sooner or later, magicians start looking for someone else to bleed.
While I was thinking about it, he said softly, "I've made a lot of mistakes, Piper. Still am. I think my weakest moments were years in the past. Before I became alpha. Except for one..."
"What's that?"
"Trying to keep you when you aren't mine to keep." His voice was rough.
"I'm not anyone's to keep." I ran my fingertips over the rough, calloused shape of his knuckles. "But I am yours. Hopefully that's enough."
“It is. I’m lucky to have you.”
I turned my head to look at him. His eyes looked black in the dim moonlight that illuminated the cell, and with his handsome but heavy features and thick, dark hair, he looked dangerous and unforgiving. It was strange to hear such gentle words in his rough rasp of a voice.
“You’re lucky to have me?” I whispered. “Arthur, we’re in a cell.”
“I mean,” he said evenly, “it hasn’t been the best day.”
Despite the pain in my chest, despite everything, he made me crack a smile. I pressed my face against the bars, and so did he, but we couldn’t get that close. But his hand was on my hip, no matter how awkward the pose had to be for him with his arm stuck through the bars.
“I dreamed about my father,” I whispered. “Sometimes the good memories are the worst. Isn’t that funny?”
“Are they the worst because they might be lies?” His voice was soft in the darkness, and I could barely see him. It felt like it was just the two of us, alone in the depths of the night. No matter how cool the night, the heat of his body against mine kept me warm. “Or because it’s easier to move on from the past if you’re sure your parent is a monster?”
“Both,” I said. “You say that like someone who knows all about having a monster for a parent.”
He shrugged.
“Don’t go quiet on me now,” I whispered back. “You wanted me to tell you all my secrets.”
“You’re too innocent to have any secrets worth keeping.”
I quirked an eyebrow at him, even though he likely couldn’t appreciate my sass in the dark. “Innocent? I thought you were doing your best to correct that…”
“We still have a long way to go,” he said, and the words were full of promise. Then, seriously, he added, “But you are a sweet girl…”
“And you’re a bad man?” I asked archly. “You know I don’t believe that.”
He grinned, and I could see his white teeth shining in the darkness. “Piper’s theories.”
“I’m not wrong.” There were so many pressing questions that I had about Arthur’s past. I decided to start at the beginning. “What happened in Blissford? That’s where you and Callum started to hate each other, right?”
He snorted. “You’re trying to figure out how to get from here—in the cells—to the happy ending where you magically get Callum and me to co-exist in bliss, huh?”
“I almost died today, Alpha.” I stroked my fingertips over his calloused knuckles, and I could hear the soft give of his breath at the tender touch, no matter how innocent it was. “Humor me. I need my dream of bliss.”
“And that’s you want? Him and me?”
“I couldn’t choose between you,” I said, and then realized it was true. “If you two don’t figure out how to get along, I think I’ll die.”
“We can’t have that.”
“No, it would make my father too happy.”
“Wolves don’t usually get happy endings,” he said. “I don’t know if you’ve read any fairytales, or you might have noticed…”
“But the princess always gets a happy ending in the stories,” I said. “And my happy ending involves eight wolves…”
For a few long seconds, there was silence between us. Then he promised, “I’ll do what I can to convince Callum to forgive me.”
It was such an unexpected offer. It was my turn to be silent.
Then I said, “Thank you.”
“But it will take some doing,” he said. “He blames me for not coming when he needed me most. When his brothers needed me most. That’s a hard thing to forgive. I don’t know if I could.”
“You two were friends before,” I said.
“We were the best of friends.”
That wasn’t an Arthur kind of thing to say. It made me think I was hearing a ghost of the young Arthur, the ten-year-old kid with freckles and a mop of dark curls and a triangle-shaped grin.
He sighed and went on. “I was fostered with the Northern pack in Blissford. My father kept the brother that mattered most to him—Roderick, the heir—close, and he sent me to Blissford. From the day we met, Callum and I were inseparable.”
“It was more fun being with the Northern pack. Here I was supposed to always be the alpha’s son. I wasn’t allowed to play with half the other boys in the pack. Eventually, of course, I realized that was because they were my half-brothers and my mother hated theirs.”
I shook my head.
“Sometimes I wonder if I’ll be a decent father one day,” he said, his voice soft, as if he was telling me all his secrets tonight.
“I think so.” My voice was soft, but threaded with certainty that surprised me. It would be a long time before I was ready, but I could imagine the children I’d have with these men, and the happy lives we’d give them, so unlike our own childhoods. “As fucked up as we all are, we know what not to do.”
There was a smile in his voice when he said, “I admire your optimism.”
“You want kids?” Somehow it was hard to picture Arthur wearing a baby carrier, patting the baby with one calloused hand while he issued orders.
“Oh, I dream of putting a baby in you,” he murmured, his fingers sweeping low across my stomach. His touch sparked a throb between my thighs. “Someday.”
That had been a very distracting line of conversation, but I wasn’t letting him off the hook. “But for today, all you can do is tell me a story…”
He sighed. “Must we?”
“We must.”
“Ever since I met you,” he said, “it’s felt like…like I came home the day I met you. I thought I had to make you stay, because I couldn’t imagine going back to the way the world felt before you. It was so…bland. Uncomfortable. And I didn’t realize it until you walked into my life and the world lit up.”
Off-topic, but I didn’t mind it.
He went on, “But I swear, I felt something like that when I met Callum too. Not as intense. But I’d been such a lonely, bored kid—with nothing but fighting and studying to occupy my time. The scraps of my parents’ attention left me angry without knowing why. And then I had a friend. And he felt the same way.”
“I think there’s a bond between him and me, just like there’s a bond between us, Piper. But we didn’t understand it. And neither did the pack.”
Suddenly, I remembered Arthur saying that it had been no loss when the pack in Blissford was destroyed. And I remembered the scars that both Callum and Arthur carried…
“They didn’t understand it was just the bonds between us, while we waited for you,” Arthur finished. “They thought it was something else.”
“They hurt you because they thought you loved each other…”
“Yeah. And no matter how we loved each other—like brothers or future pack-mates or something else—they shouldn’t have done that.”
“They beat you and they sent you home,” I filled in the gaps, and then thought of Arthur, whose father had all but disowned him when he returned from being fostered. “And the pack didn’t look at you the same until…”
“Maybe they never have,” Arthur said drily, “but my ability to kick anyone’s ass has made me hard to criticize.”
I couldn’t stop think
ing about the innocent boys they had been, and all the torture they had gone through. “Now you’ll make sure that doesn’t happen to anyone else.”
“There are those in the pack who would love to return to the old ways,” he said, and he shifted, as if he was looking down the long hill toward the whipping post, which was lost in the darkness. His voice was fierce when he said, “But I’ll never let that happen.”
He was so matter-of-fact about all his suffering, and yet the thought of it made me ache for him. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”
“Don’t be sorry,” Arthur said. “I don’t have any complaints about the road that brought me to you.”
He said the words so gruffly, that there was no doubt that he meant them.
Chapter 17
“There’s a particular memory,” I confessed to Arthur. He had told me so much tonight—the worst, most shameful thing he’d ever experienced—and I could be brave too. “It has to be a lie. It’s the day my baby sister came home, and I’m so scared of what really happened.”
“I’m right here.” His big hand patted my hip comfortingly.
“I know.” He was giving me warmth, giving me strength. I let my eyes drift shut. If I just unspooled these memories, these lies, maybe I’d have the power to save these men. Somehow.
It was time to give up the lies, no matter how comforting they had been for so long.
This was the memory I wanted to press on the least. It was time to let go.
In my memory, I was nine years old when my father carried Maddie into the house. I must have been left alone, while my mother was having the baby, but all of that was murky. I don't remember worrying or feeling sad or jealous. I don't remember what I did to pass the time, alone in that big house like I so often was.
All I remembered was my father coming in the door, carrying Maddie. He sat next to me on the couch and nestled this bundle onto my lap. "I'm going to need you to take care of her," he had said, and his face had cracked as if he was going to cry before he pressed his hands to his face. I'd known then that something terrible had happened. "Your mom isn't coming home," he had told me, and then instead of comforting me, he had walked away and left me there behind with this baby.
My tears had dripped onto the white hospital receiving blanket. I'd nestled her against my chest, my chin above her soft, downy-haired head, for the first time. I'd whispered promises that I would take care of her.
But when I pulled the string and tried to unravel the memory...
It was five years ago, and the screaming woke me.
I ran to the top of the stairs and then hesitated. Unlike in my memory, when it was bright as day, the night was dark. My father had this blond-haired little girl over his shoulder, and she was putting up a wild fight, screaming and clawing at him. She kicked him in the stomach and he let out a woof of pain and frustration before he tossed her down to the ground. She fell hard, her head slamming into the ground with a sickening crack, but she scrambled to her feet. Her eyes were wide and desperate, and she was trying to escape.
I ran halfway down the stairs before I stopped, because I wanted to help her but I didn't know how.
My father spoke in Latin, holding his hand out toward her face, and she stilled. Her hands fell to her side helplessly, her little fists uncurling.
He looked up the stairs at me. "I'm going to need you to take care of her," he said. "She'll be your sister now."
I had to get her out of this house. I knew that, but even as I tried to plan how I would get her out of there and to help--wild, flightless plans, because there was no one in this town that would help us--I descended the rest of the stairs. I wrapped her in my arms and pulled her into a hug.
Even though he'd made her stop fighting, he hadn't taken away one ounce of her agony. Desperate, deep blue eyes met mine, shimmering with unshed tears.
I'd wrapped her tight in my arms and my tears had dripped onto her hair.
When I woke up the next morning, she was sleeping in my bed. I'd leaned up on my elbow and thought, silly little girl, my sister, always coming into my room. I'd thought she'd been with me forever, and when her eyes drifted open, she'd smiled at me like she thought the same thing. She didn't remember a mother or a father or a pack. Just me.
I came out of the memory gasping, sitting up on the floor before my ragged, torn muscles contracted and I half-screamed.
Arthur scrambled to his knees on the other side of the bars. “Piper.”
“He stole her,” I said. “I mean, I knew that, but he…”
I lost the words in a growl. I stopped, frowning, trying to understand what had just happened to my voice.
I pitched forward, onto my hands and knees, despite the twisting agony in my chest. My fingertips and toes throbbed with pain, and then suddenly, it felt like my skin was tearing open. I cried out.
“Piper!” Arthur was on his feet, holding a calming hand toward me through the bars. “You’re shifting. It’s all right. Calm down.”
“Is she okay?” Kai called from across the hall.
I looked toward him, but I couldn’t see him in the dark.
And then suddenly, I could. Suddenly the world was brighter, my vision sharper.
Kai raked his hand through his hair, his face agonized, as he paced the cell, then pressed himself against the bars, as near to me as he could be.
Josh and Logan were similarly on alert, pacing restlessly. Josh’s nostrils flared, as if he could smell my wolf.
“Piper, just relax,” Callum said softly from the other side of the room. “It’s okay if you shift. You don’t have to fight it. Fighting will just make it painful.”
“She’s hurt,” Arthur reminded him.
“She’s tougher than either of us,” Callum promised him.
Arthur let that pass, and I realized he might even believe it himself.
My fingertips were bloody, and claws had emerged from them, long, white claws that gripped the floorboards. I drew a ragged breath. I was caught somewhere between girl and beast, and my heart fluttered, panicked that I might get stuck like this. Logan had told me it was painful to turn, that it had left him ravenous to hunt. What if it was like that for me, when there was nothing to eat? Would I pace the cell like an animal until my father came to see me?
“What do you want, Piper?” Callum asked gently. “If you shift into a wolf, it will help you heal.”
I didn’t want to be a wolf. Not like this. Not with five men I loved to witness me turn into an animal, when I didn’t know what that would be like.
But I thought of the open door my father had left behind him when he came into my cell. If I could heal myself, it might give me a chance to strike back when my father didn’t expect it.
My feelings didn’t matter. Winning this fight was all that mattered.
“Wolf,” I said, with effort, and my voice sounded unfamiliar, deep and rough, my words thick as if I were drunk. The sound of it terrified me.
“I’ll help ease your pain as you shift. Come here.” Callum told me. Then he muttered, “Hopefully, Arthur won’t hold this against me later.”
“You know, I like you better when you’re openly aggressive,” Arthur said. “This passive-aggressive shit doesn’t suit you.”
“Oh, and that’s too bad, because I care so deeply about pleasing you,” Callum said.
I crawled toward him across the floor, keenly aware of how ridiculous I must look, but when I managed to sag against the bars and look up, Callum’s gaze was fond. He gave me an encouraging nod as he rested his hand on my shoulders.
As he began to chat in Latin, I looked up, and realized everyone one of the guys was looking at me with concern and affection. I’d been stupid to think I couldn’t be weak in front of them.
Callum’s hands were in my fur.
And as the pain lifted, the world shifted beneath my feet.
Chapter 18
Fiona
I smoothed yet another set of sheets over yet another bed, making the goddamn Sh
enandoah pack at home. Then, glancing at the empty hallway outside the door, I hurried into the bathroom. I plucked the clean glass from upside-down on a paper towel on the counter, spit in it, and wiped my spit across the rim with my thumb so no one could see it.
It was petty, but I was biding my time for my first real act of rebellion.
When I left the bathroom, a tall, sandy-haired shifter was coming into the bedroom with a duffel thrown over one broad shoulder. He was the one who’d volunteered to stand in as alpha earlier. Tuck.
He stopped, raising his eyebrows at me and almost bowed forward at the waist. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”
I flashed him a smile. I must’ve looked frozen for a second, since I’d almost been caught spitting in his glass.
“Just finishing up your room,” I said, which certainly wasn’t a lie.
“All right.” He nodded, and then for some reason, he went to the door and closed it.
He’d given me a good vibe on the porch, for the few seconds that I had noticed him, but now I was worried about why he wanted to keep me in this room with him.
I’d show him that he didn’t want to be trapped in a room with me.
“I have one question.” I leveled my finger at him. “If you don’t mind.”
“I’ll know that when I hear the question.” He smiled at me, his tone almost flirtatious, and it made me want to slap him in the face. We’d lost a tenth of our pack tonight. People I knew. Some people I even liked.
“Where are our cubs?” I demanded.
His face tightened. I couldn’t tell if it was with anger or regret.
“They’re with ours,” he said, his tone dark.
So, both. Anger and regret.
I nodded, heading toward the door, but he stopped me with a hand on my shoulder.
“I saw you with that dark-haired girl earlier,” he said. “If she asks you to go with her tonight? To go to Arthur?”
Shit.
“We wouldn’t do anything like that,” I lied. “I don’t even like Arthur.”
