“Who are you?” I demand, the question weighed down by more of a snarl than I intended. I want information, not a fight, and yet I feel primed for violence.
“Your mates,” the light-furred wolf bays in my head.
I don’t know how I know he’s the one that’s talking, but I do. And as soon as the word mates leaves his mind, I realize that his voice isn’t as unfamiliar as I thought.
I know it.
I know him.
He was the one watching me from the woods that night with Gannon on the deck.
A shiver threatens to roll down my spine, but I tense my muscles because I refuse to let them see my fear. I hope they can’t scent it.
The wind swoops in then, changing direction, swirling puffs of snow toward me. I try to scent this group again, taking in a deep pull of frigid air that burns my lungs. This time, when I pick up nothing, that lack of scent serves as confirmation of a dreaded truth. There was no scent at my hotel or in the woods behind the deck.
These are the shifters who’ve been following me, and I’d bet my ass that these are the fuckers who threw me in the Hunt.
A spike of ice punctures my gut at the realization.
A furious snarl works its way up my throat, and I start moving for the other wolves before I know what I’m doing.
“You’re not my mates,” I snap at them as I pick up my pace, paws stinging from the arctic slush. “You’re the cowards who jumped me from behind and left me to be hunted. You’re the scared little bitches who’ve been watching from the shadows. What the fuck do you want?”
“What’s rightfully ours,” the wolf bellows. “You’ve had your fun making us jealous, and now it’s time for the game to stop!”
Game? He thinks this is a fucking game?
Rage thick and acidic pumps through me, and I’m suddenly bursting with the need to close the distance and tear into these assholes. I’m sprinting for them before I can stop myself. Focus narrowed, teeth bared, paws digging into the dirt with each powerful stride, I’m going to rip them apart. I half the distance between us in seconds, and that’s when furious growls fill the air around me and I hear more wolves crashing through the brush to my left.
Shit!
Anger and alarm skewer me, my veins cinching and stopping my blood when I realize I’ve just fallen for an obvious trap. The three taunting me from the front were just a distraction, and now I’m going to have to fight off the ones who’ve flanked me.
I spin with a snarl to meet my new attackers head-on. My lips peel back from my fangs, and I stand ready and waiting, a menacing growl pouring out of me, flooding the sky with my outrage.
I have just enough time to realize I should have projected a warning to the guys, but it’s too late now.
Four wolves leap out of the cover of the trees. My hackles rise and I prepare to fight with every ounce of strength I have, and then I realize I know these wolves. Ellery, Gannon, Perth, and Ruger sprint for me, their snarled warnings flying through the air just as their scents hit me with all the force of a slap.
It takes me a minute to process what I’m sensing as they skid to a stop, the four wolves forming a barrier in front of me.
“What the fuck?” I bark as they spin to snarl at our surroundings. “You assholes could have announced yourselves!”
They don’t answer as they scan the forest, glaring at the gaps between the trees where the other wolves once stood. Now, only shadows remain, the ghostly figures faded to nothing just like the apparitions I thought they were when they first appeared.
But they are out there.
And now I know they’re watching me.
I was targeted on my first night here.
Targeted and attacked.
And followed ever since.
“What happened? We felt your panic and then your rage,” Ellery demands, his amber gaze bouncing from me to the surrounding forest, though there’s nothing left to see.
I can’t help the way my knees go weak any more than I can help the fact that my inner voice quakes as all the strength and ferocity inside me evaporates, ripped away by the reality of what just happened.
“They were here. The bastards who attacked me before the Hunt, they were just here. It’s not a lone wolf. There’s an entire den. And they think I’m their mate.”
29
NOAH
The crackle and pop of flames consuming logs is the perfect soundtrack to my brooding. I’m tucked into the middle of the long couch, hidden beneath a soft red blanket, and staring at the roaring fire the guys built in their double-sided fireplace. It’s been over an hour since we got back, and everything is still in a state of frenzied chaos.
Ellery is near me on the couch, poring over my case file on his laptop. Gannon and Perth are examining camera feeds in case these bastards followed us back, and Ruger is doing his best to care for everyone by plying them with food and stress baking. Me? I’m chewing on my cheek, staring into the flames of the metaphorical dumpster fire that is my life, and wondering how I got here.
Unfortunately, I’m suffering from Swiss cheese brain. I have yet to come up with one credible answer even though I’ve been wracking my mind since the run back home. I’ve combed through every detail of what’s happened to me since I stopped for dinner at Droolies. I’ve shined a spotlight on everything I can remember about my mom, our house, and the pieces of my childhood that are just starting to come back to me. I’ve got nothing.
Worse than nothing, actually, because instead of answering any of the questions on my long-ass list, I now have more to add. I keep bouncing back and forth between questions about my past and questions about my present.
What the hell is my dad’s name? Who were all the dirty kids in that warehouse I keep remembering? Why the fuck would someone throw me in the Hunt? Why would this other den think I’m their mate when everything the guys say makes it seem like that’s impossible?
But the one thing that keeps nagging at me the most, the one question that’s leaving the sour taste in my mouth right now: Why wouldn’t my mom tell me what the hell was going on when she was dying?
She knew I had no one. She knew she’d be dooming me to the life of a naif. And yet I can’t remember one conversation where she even hinted at eeries or shifters or that my father was alive and a threat to our safety. Not one.
Cancer sucks and I know she was in pain, but she had time. She had so much damn time. So why take all these secrets with her? Why didn’t she want me to know?
I sigh and burrow deeper into the couch and the guys’ clothes. I’m wearing a long-sleeved shirt from Perth. Pants from Gannon. The blanket I’m wrapped in came right out of Ellery’s room, and the pillow next to me—in case I decide to nap—is Ruger’s. It’s weird, but I’m not even sorry.
At my forlorn noise, Ellery looks up from his laptop and surveys me.
“You okay?” he asks, for the fortieth time, and for the fortieth time I say I’m fine, because it’s easier than saying no and then having to deal with why.
“I’m sorry.” I apologize for the millionth time for getting caught up, for not paying attention, for all of it.
Ellery gets a little wrinkle of consternation between his eyebrows. He reaches a long arm out, snags my ankle from underneath my blanket, and then pulls me across the couch until I’m next to him.