by J. L. Wilder
“I’m looking for Charity Green.” Weston held his breath.
“She’s not here. We’re closed.”
So she did work here. Weston felt as discombobulated as if he’d seen a ghost. Charity, his Charity, had been here. “Is she working tomorrow?” he asked.
“I can’t give out information about my coworkers,” the man said.
“Right. Sorry.” Of course, he couldn’t. “Thanks anyway.”
The man shut the door. Weston walked a few yards down the sidewalk. His knees felt watery.
He’d found her.
He would come back here tomorrow, he decided. He wanted answers from her. He wanted to know why she’d abandoned him so utterly, so abruptly. He wanted to know whether she had ever really loved him.
And he also wanted to tell her to run.
Because Hawk was after her. And no matter how he felt about her, no matter how upset he still was about things had ended between them, he didn’t want her to be caught.
He pulled the phone out of his pocket, turning and making his way back toward the bar where he’d left his bike. As he walked, he sent a text to the pack’s group thread. Status updates?
The response came quickly. Head back home, Hawk sent. We’ve got her.
Weston’s stomach lurched.
We’ve got her.
He had found Charity. But someone else must have found her first. He had been too late to save her from Hawk.
He was going to see her again. But it would be under the worst circumstances conceivable.
It all seemed too horrifying to be real. For several long seconds, he couldn’t seem to move a muscle. Then, as if something inside him had snapped, he was sprinting back to his bike, faster than he’d ever ran as a human in his life.
Chapter Six
CHARITY
She got her hands under herself and pushed her body back into an upright position. Already her mind was racing as she tried to collect herself, to assess her situation and figure out what to do next.
Kidnapped. She had been kidnapped. That nightmare scenario of all omegas, the thing she and her sisters had once scared themselves to sleep with as children. It was actually happening.
She had known, since the day she’d realized she was an omega, that it was a possibility. Every pack wanted an omega. It was the entire reason she’d had to run, rather than risk anyone among the Hell’s Wolves finding out what she was and forbidding her to leave. But it had felt possible in the same way that getting hit by a bus had felt possible. Sure, it could happen, but it wouldn’t happen to her. She was careful. And besides, she lived a human life now. Humans didn’t know about omegas, and if they did, they wouldn’t care.
But this van definitely belonged to wolves. Just the smell was enough to confirm that. It was overwhelming. And the really frightening thing about it was that it didn’t actually scare her at all. Instead, it was familiar. It reminded her of the life she’d had once. It felt like coming home.
She shook herself. This was not home. This was not safe and familiar. These were kidnappers, and they were almost certainly planning to do terrible things to her.
“Charity?” a voice spoke in the darkness.
Charity’s heart felt as if it had been squeezed in a vice. She had been sure she was alone back here. “Hello?” she said hesitantly, her voice trembling like a plucked violin string.
“Are you okay? You’re not hurt or anything, are you?”
“Who are you?”
“It’s Lita.”
Lita.
They had been part of the same litter. They had been sisters. They’d grown up together, sleeping in the same bedroom, raised by the same alpha, sharing meals and playing together, and when they were older, gossiping about the same boys. She had never expected to see Lita again after the night she’d run away from home.
“I’m not hurt,” she managed, feeling faint with shock.
“I told Gino not to be too rough.”
“That was Gino?”
“We’re sort of...together now.”
“Oh.” Charity couldn’t think what to say to that. “Lita, what’s going on? What is this?”
“We’re bringing you home.” Lita actually sounded sort of happy about it, as if being brought back home to the Hell’s Wolves was something Charity had been looking for, something they had been generous enough to give to her. “Hawk thought you might still be in the city, and he sent everyone out looking for you.”
“Hawk.”
“Oh, I guess you wouldn’t know,” Lita said. “Hawk’s alpha now.”
“I thought he might be.”
“He was so eager to get you back,” Lita said earnestly. “I’m so glad he was right about you living in the city, Charity. Can you believe it? You’ll be back with the pack, and it’ll be just like old times again.” A hand landed on Charity’s arm. “I’ve really missed having a sister.”
“What do you mean? What about all the others?”
Lita hesitated. “Almost everyone is gone,” she said.
“What do you mean? Where did they go?”
“They left. Not long after you did. After the alpha ceremony. Nobody really knows why,” she said. “It was really messed up, seeing them all go like that.”
But Charity could guess what had happened. She had grown up with Hawk, after all. He was arrogant, and he never listened to anyone. Unless he’d changed drastically, it was pretty clear what kind of alpha he would have turned out to be.
And she was being taken back to him...
“Lita,” she said. “Do you know what Hawk wants with me? Why was he so interested in finding me after all these years?”
“He thinks you’re the omega,” Lita said. “Because nobody submitted at the ceremony. There was no omega. And you were the only one who left before that happened.”
Charity’s heart sank.
“Is it true?” Lita asked. “Are you the omega?”
Charity didn’t answer. This was her secret, the thing she’d been hiding from everyone for as long as she’d known it to be true. To just give it away now would be making herself far too vulnerable for words.
Lita seemed to pick up on her reticence. “You might as well tell me,” she said. “Hawk’s going to know as soon as he gets a whiff of you. Obviously.”
And what else was there to say? Lita was exactly right.
“Yes,” Charity said quietly. “I am.”
“And that’s why you ran away?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s wild,” Lita said. “But you shouldn’t have run! I mean, it was pretty clear by then that Hawk was going to be the alpha, so what were you so afraid of?”
Was she serious? Had it never occurred to Lita that someone might not want to be mated to Hawk? Hawk had been a bully when they were younger—Charity could still remember watching him chasing the other boys around the yard, punching them in the back if they let him get too close. When they were older, he’d made a habit of sitting in trees and leering at the girls as they walked by beneath him. She’d thought Lita had felt the same way she did about it. Lita had certainly been willing enough to join in complaining about Hawk’s antics in the privacy of their shared room.
But then, Lita had complained about all the boys, Charity remembered. She had certainly done a fair bit of complaining about Gino. And apparently, she and Gino were a couple now. So maybe there was no telling. Maybe it had all been for show at the time, a sort of posturing, a way of getting her own back on the boys. Maybe it was Lita’s way of flirting.
Which meant that maybe the pack had expected Charity—if she was the omega—to be willing to go along with whoever the alpha had turned out to be.
Lita was waiting for an answer, and Charity didn’t dare let on that she was afraid of Hawk. “I just wanted to be on my own,” she said quietly. “I wanted to live a human life. That’s all.”
“A human life?” Lita sounded disbelieving. “But you’re an omega!”
“I know. I know I am.
”
“So why would you want a human life? You’re the most valuable member of the entire pack, Charity! Why would you give all that up to go and live as a stupid human?”
“I’m not the most valuable member of the pack.” Charity was starting to shiver now, and not because it was cold in the back of the van. Certain things were beginning to sink in. She had felt homesick in her human life at times, but she had never wanted this...
No one would miss her, she knew, until tomorrow when she didn’t show up for work. The girls at the restaurant would wonder where she was. Would they worry about her? They might, she reasoned. She didn’t have a habit of missing work, so it would be strange that she wasn’t there. And they would know she’d walked home alone last night...
But they were human. They weren’t trackers. They wouldn’t investigate the situation for themselves. At the very most, they would start watching the news to see if she was found dead somewhere. Which she wouldn’t be. The Hell’s Wolves weren’t kidnapping her to kill her.
She knew exactly what they were kidnapping her for.
But they wouldn’t see it as kidnapping, she was sure. As far as they were concerned, she probably belonged to them. She wasn’t just a missing member of the pack. She was the omega. She was their omega. And she knew how Hawk was—when he received the rank of alpha, and no omega emerged, he would have felt cheated of something he was entitled to.
He probably saw this as no more than retrieving his own stolen property.
Charity shuddered a little, and a sob escaped her.
“Charity!” Lita sounded shocked. “Charity, don’t cry! What’s wrong?”
Charity felt more emotionally confused than she would have thought possible. On one hand, she was being kidnapped, and she knew her kidnappers meant her harm. But on the other hand, this was Lita. This was her sister. And despite everything that had happened, she couldn’t help feeling a sense of safety and familiarity.
“I want to go home,” she said.
“But we’re taking you home.” Lita sounded confused. “You’ll be back where you belong, Charity.”
“No. I don’t want to go back. I want to go home. I want to go to my apartment. I want to keep working at my job. I want to go back to my life.” And to her horror, she was crying in earnest now.
Lita scooted closer and wrapped her arms around Charity, and even though Charity felt resentful of her sister for being part of this kidnapping, she couldn’t resist taking comfort. She leaned into Lita’s warmth. There was something reassuring about being with someone who knew every part of her, human and wolf, after all this time pretending to be something she wasn’t.
If only she could actually enjoy the moment. If only she could feel happy about seeing her sister again. But she couldn’t because of everything horrifying and dangerous that came along with it.
The van jerked to an abrupt stop, pitching Charity even more heavily into Lita’s arms. “We’re here,” Lita said quietly.
“The cabin?”
“Yeah.”
The van’s back door opened. This time, Charity could make out Gino’s features. He had changed since the last time she’d seen him. As a younger man, he’d had an attractive mop of curly dark hair. Since then, he had shaved it all off, opting for a close-cropped look that didn’t suit him at all. He had several days of untamed facial hair growth. He was also much taller and more muscular than the wiry kid she remembered.
“Everybody out,” he ordered. “Hawk’s waiting.”
Lita crawled to the front of the van, wrapped her arms around his neck, and swung down to the ground. As she did, Charity got her first look at her sister. The change in her was also remarkable. She and Lita had looked alike as children, but now Lita’s hair was dyed black and she had several facial piercings. She also had tattoos up and down her left arm. Charity almost wouldn’t have recognized her.
“Out,” Gino repeated.
There was no point in resisting, much as Charity would have liked to. If she made him come in after her, it would be worse for her, she knew. She scooted forward and slid out of the van.
The cabin hadn’t changed at all. It was just as she’d remembered it. For a moment, she felt so homesick for the life she’d had growing up that she almost couldn’t keep her feet. Whatever happened to her now, she knew, it would be nothing like the fondly remembered days of her childhood. Before, she had been able to disappear into the pack. She had been able to blend in. But now everything would be different. She was the omega, and that would always set her apart.
Gino took her by the arm and steered her forcefully toward the front door. She stumbled, trying to keep up. “You don’t have to drag me,” she objected. “I’m coming.”
“Hawk’s orders,” Gino said.
“He ordered you to drag me?”
“He said to make you come in.” Gino shrugged. “I’m making you.”
They made their way up onto the porch and through the door into the kitchen, where Charity was greeted by another surprise. Norma was standing at the stove, stirring something in a pot.
“Norma?”
She looked up. “My God! Charity! Is it really you?” She put down her spoon, swept across the kitchen, and gathered Charity up in a hug.
It was all Charity could do not to break into sobs again. Norma. Norma had been like a mother to her throughout her childhood. It had been Norma who had held her when she’d cried, kissed scraped knees, cut the crusts off her sandwiches. It had been Norma who had taught her how to shift and how to make the best use of her skills as a wolf. If there was one person here who loved her, really and truly loved her, it was Norma.
Now Norma held her at arm’s length. “Look at you,” she said. “I can’t believe it’s really you! You look so grown up, honey. We’re so glad you’re home.”
I’m not home. “It’s really good to see you,” Charity said.
“I’ll make you something. What can I make you? Do you still like those banana nut muffins?”
“You don’t have to—”
“She’s supposed to go right to Hawk,” Gino interrupted.
The smile dropped off Norma’s face. “She’s back,” she said. “Isn’t that good enough for tonight? Can’t we forget about the rest of this nonsense?”
“I have orders, Norma. So do you, actually.”
Norma looked very out of sorts. “He’s right,” she said to Charity. “I’m under strict instructions to stay in the kitchen and make the lasagna. You’ll have to face him alone, I’m afraid.”
“I can handle him,” Charity said, even though she wasn’t at all sure she could. She would have loved nothing better than to have Norma in her corner. She still wasn’t sure how much she could rely on Lita. Her sister seemed genuinely happy to see her, but she also seemed unaware of the danger Charity was in.
Gino propelled Charity out of the kitchen and into the den. Hawk was there, seated in a massive recliner that hadn’t been part of this room the last time Charity had been in it. He had cropped his hair in the same close style as Gino had, and he was, if anything, even more muscular than his brother.
“Charity,” he said.
His voice had been high pitched when they’d been younger. Now it was gravelly, even ominous. “Hawk,” she managed.
“So, you’ve come back.”
“I didn’t come back. I was kidnapped back.”
He waved a hand dismissively, as if to say that one was more or less as good as the other. “And now that you’re here, what should we do with you?”
“Do with me?” A thrill of fear. “What do you mean by do with me?”
“Well, we can’t very well have you running off again,” he said, a malevolent grin spreading across his face. “Not now that we know what you are. Little Charity, our omega. And all these years, I never suspected. Foolish of me, but there you have it.”
“I was allowed to leave,” she said. “Karl never said—”
“Karl never thought he had to say it. But I’m sa
ying it now. I forbid you from running away from us ever again.”
Charity’s breath caught in her throat. She waited, expecting to feel the oppressive weight of an alpha’s command on her psyche. But to her surprise, she felt nothing. Had she simply been away so long that she’d forgotten the feeling?
Or was it possible that Hawk had no power over her anymore?
Hawk now turned to Gino. “Put her in lockdown,” he said.
“Why?” Gino seemed edgy. “You ordered her not to go. Isn’t that good enough?”
Maybe Hawk suspected that it wasn’t good enough, or maybe he simply wanted to flex his authority. “I gave you an order,” he pointed out to Gino.
And that was strange too, Charity realized. Gino hadn’t obeyed the order he’d been given right away either. Did Hawk not have power over him?
She thought he must. Norma would have stood by her if there hadn’t been an order forbidding it. Clearly, Hawk had some power here.
But maybe he didn’t have as much as he thought he did.
It didn’t stop Gino, though. He pulled her out of the den and down the hall to a door that hadn’t been there in Charity’s memory. “What is this?” she asked.
“New addition to the house.” He opened the door to reveal an unfinished room. There was a rickety metal bed frame with a thin mattress pushed into one corner, but other than that the room was completely bare.
“In you go.” He propelled her in with a shove that was neither violent nor gentle; it was merely functional. Knowing there was no point in fighting back, Charity went inside.
Gino hesitated. “Listen, I am sorry about this,” he said. “I don’t know why it has to be this way. But—”
“But you’ve got orders.”
“Yeah.”
“Gino, I was happy.”
“You’ll be happy here,” he said. “This is where you belong, Charity. We’re your pack. Those people in the city, they were nothing like you. And you’ll never be a human. The human life isn’t for us. Shifters who go and try to live that way never settle in. They don’t last. You would have been back eventually.”
