Author: Katherine Rhodes
Date: 2019-04-09 04:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Paranormal
Description: Five friends. One Summer. Everything changes. We wanted to celebrate the end of college. The end of all the hard work, the beginning of our new lives. Brandy had the perfect place: Alaska. Addi I needed the vacation to get away from the hell that was my life. Alaska was about as far away as I could get from Oklahoma and Africa. I felt safe, and meeting a really hot guy, with a crazy secret, was the adventure I needed. What I didn't need was him hiding a secret from me that would pull us a part and nearly break my will to keep going. Handsome, sweet, intelligent--and a liar. Patrick I was jealo
Publisher: Amazon Digital Services LLC - Kdp Print Us

The Juneau Pack 3

By Katherine Rhodes

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

Exploring Alaska

All rights reserved.

Copyright 2019 © Author

Cover: JRA Stevens for Down Write Nuts

Formatting: Down Write Nuts

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher.

Contents

The Beginning

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Epilogue

About

Katherine Rhodes

WARNING:

Please be aware that this story addresses child sex trafficking and FMG (Female Genital Mutilation). These topics are sensitive for some.

The Beginning

“Addison!”

I wasn’t sure that was my name.

I thought it might have been at one time, but The Man had been calling me Ghalyela.

Valuable.

Bought and sold. Over and over. Until I had stayed here.

“Addison.”

Maybe that was my name. It had been so long since I had heard anyone use my name. All I knew was pain.

At first I struggled. But that only brought me more pain. My first beating. My first caning. My first rape. I had been in pain so long now I wasn’t sure I could ever feel pleasure again.

Traded. Bought. Handed along as one grew tired.

Not all of them raped me. In fact, few did.

White devil.

But enough.

Those who didn’t, used me around the house. Beat me into submission, humiliated me. I was nothing more than a housekeeper while their wife or wives bore them children. We were all in our own hells.

But The Man. He raped me. He liked it. I left my body, so it didn’t bother me anymore. It was just a body, just a vagina.

What he didn’t like about Ghalyela was her response to him. That there was a chance he could cause her pleasure. She was intact.

I was intact. My parents were fools for not giving me The Cut. I was well beyond the years where the girls were given The Cut and it made me unruly.

Instead of calling the village doctor—who would tell the elders I was there, and tied up, and raped repeatedly—he called in a friend who had a sister who had been Cut.

I didn’t remember getting Cut. I didn’t remember much after the first touch of the knife on my vulva. I passed out, maybe, or left like I did when The Man raped me. I wasn’t there.

But I was awake a few hours later—lying in wet dirt. Shivering, cold, alone, in the dark, with a terrible pain in my vulva. With my skin pulling, with darkness creeping in.

The friend had messed up The Cut.

I was dying.

“Addison!”

That was my name. I was Addison. I was a little girl. I belonged in my school in Oklahoma. I missed my silly white dog.

I missed the dreams of the big, gray and red wolf that would come visit me at night and comfort me.

I missed being a little girl. Now, I could never be.

“Addison!”

The voice was so close and so familiar.

I didn’t think it mattered anymore. I was dying. I’d be dead soon. It was better than living, and better than being raped again and again.

There was gunfire. Three pops, no screams. I hoped the next shots were for me.

The bush I lay under rustled and someone parted it.

“Oh, Addison…”

Looking up, I saw a familiar face, dressed in fatigues and armed with a massive gun. I shivered and curled up again.

“Medic! Medic! Bring me a blanket! Fast! Blanket.”

The familiar face knelt next to me. “Addi, please say something?”

“Ghalyela,” I mumbled. “No more.”

“Sweetie, do you know me?”

I managed to turn and look at him again.

Brother. I had a brother. “Winter.”

“Oh, gods, babydoll.” He gasped. “I’ve been looking for you for two years.”

Someone appeared behind him and handed him something. The next thing I felt was the warmth of a rough wool blanket around me. An army blanket.

My brother picked me up. “Come on, Addison. I’m taking you home.”

I didn’t even know what home was anymore.

Prologue

“I told you this would be worth it!” Brandy crowed.

“My ass is killing me,” Delia answered. “How much farther? Why does this road suck so much?”

“Should be just ahead.” Brandy was clearly excited. I just leaned on my fist. The cabin had been ‘just ahead’ for about an hour.

Thankfully, the window I was staring out of had a great view. I had never been to Alaska and the views of Favorite Channel and Berner Bay were stunning as we managed to rumble, slowly and carefully over the rough road alongside Davies Creek. A small sign, after a half an hour of plowing through the underbrush scraping and dinging and ripping the paint on the Land Cruiser and banging around against the SUV and each other in back seat, that directed us away from the precipice that had been getting closer. I let out a sigh of relief as Brandy took the turn.

Zanna admitted, out loud, she’d been afraid of heading straight for the ice field at the top. I hadn’t told her about the deadly cliff on the left.

I questioned the road even more after a very long mile drive. Couldn’t blame me—my ass cheeks simply couldn’t be any more numb.

The view as we rounded what I thought was supposed to be a corner, was well worth it. The bay, channel, and the archipelago that hid Glacier Bay National Park from view were set up neatly in picture-perfect early summer scenes. It was everything I had ever dreamed June in Alaska would look like and the delightful shock that I was actually in Alaska rolled up from my toes.

The rough-and-tumble, well-love—also known as beat-up—Land Cruiser managed to bust through the last bit of underbrush and into a clearing. Allegedly, the cabin would be there, slightly protected by the trees at the edge.

Brandy threw the vehicle into park. Her eyes grew wide, and her face contorted with complete disgust. “No!”

Yanking her seat belt out of the lock, she nearly ripped the door off the hinges as she burst into the cool early summer air—and mud. “No, no!” Her feet stuck in the thick, sucking mud as she headed for what sort of looked like a porch. Yanking branches out of the way, screaming and yelling the whole time, it took only a minute before we could see a front door.

Brandy’s words echoed back to us through the trees. “This place is a mess! No! This can’t be! Harrison swore the place was in good order!” She turned to us, as we all climbed out of the SUV.

“That lying fucking dick-weasel!”

Chapter One

I wasn’t impressed with Juneau at all.

After the mess of the house, and the hard sleeping on the floor last night, it was a letdown. I was hoping for something a little interesting.

Or larger, anyway.

Then again, I didn’t think I was supposed to be impressed, and we weren’t here to hang out in the state capital. I wanted to get back to the cabin and plop my ass in a chair and read, enjoy my months in Alaska, and that was it.

Now, we had to outfit the damn cabin.

Thank God for Delia and her megabucks.

“Is Jess going to be okay up there on her own, with that electrician coming?” Delia looked at each of us.

I shrugged. “Someone had to stay. We can’t all keep hovering over her all the time. It’s been almost a year, and she needs her space.”

“I wanted this to be a damn vacation.” Brandy slammed her hand on the wheel and scowled at the store’s edifice. “Home Depot, on vacation. How is this a vacation? I don’t want to pick out plumbing.”

“Come on, Bran, let’s go get a new, clean fridge and we’ll worry about everything else later.”

I felt terrible for Brandy, and I knew she blamed herself for this mess when it wasn’t at all.

Harrison had called her months ago, offering her family land outside Juneau for an unreasonable amount. She wanted that land and was pissed that she had to pay for them, but we all helped her raise the money for the down payment, and to qualify for the mortgage. Lo and behold—she got both.

And we were off to Alaska as a post-college romp for three months!

Her cousin Harrison had swindled her out of the money for the land and the cabin. If it weren’t for Delia, we’d all be paying change fees for our plane tickets.

Instead, I was heading to appliances with Brandy to find a new fridge.

She was grumbling the whole time. I was trying to be serious, but she was just so ridiculously angry, I couldn’t help snickering.

“Brandy, you have to calm down. You have the place. We’ll get it up and running just fine. Pick out a nice mid-priced fridge that can hold enough food for five women whose cycles have synced and get the munchies within hours of each other.”

She gave me a sidelong glance, then sighed and slumped. “Can I sue him? Is that legal? Is there real estate lemon laws?”

“Forget him, Brandy. You can afford the mortgage and we’re all here. I didn’t think we were going to be able to pull this off, but we did. Let’s just think of this as an adventure.”

“Fuck adventure.”

I burst out laughing. “Pick out a fridge so I can stick your hot head in it and cool it off.”

She finally smiled. “Yeah, I mean. I guess I should just relax about the whole thing. We’re going to need more appliances than just the fridge, though.”

I leaned in and whispered in her ear. “Delia’s rich. Don’t even think twice about asking her for help on this. Let’s also pick out a stove because I suspect that one up there makes a hibachi grill look sophisticated.”

Brandy snorted and I knew I’d gotten her calmed down. She really didn’t need any more stress than she had.

She picked out an apartment refrigerator. I talked her into a proper, full size side-by-side without an icemaker. I didn’t actually want to add to Delia’s bill for this.

We picked out a nice midrange stove with a cool split oven that could heat at two temperatures. With five women, we needed that. Especially if my digestive tract decided to revolt and I had to cook some bland shit again.

God, I hated that.

Delia dragged us to the furniture store, where beds, living, and dining room furniture was bought. She bought four queen-sized beds, one with a queen trundle, and a queen-sized pullout couch for the living room—plus a loveseat, regular couch and two chairs.

Then she bought a massive smart TV and aircard so we could watch movies.

There was a reason we all loved and protected Delia. She was the purest kind of bad ass on the planet.

At the same time, she was a little off, judging by the restaurant she picked for lunch. She was going on about some pine beer, but I was stuck on the menu.

“Elk? Elk burger? Caribou? Are you serious?”

Brandy sighed. “We’re in Alaska, Addison. What did you expect? Vegan kale bean burger and kombucha?”

“But… reindeer…”

“Mm. Dinner,” Zanna teased me.

Delia waved at the two of them to shut up. “Addi, they have chicken, and fish. Look. Fresh salmon.”

I was about ten seconds from being a vegetarian, and offering me reindeer for dinner was a good way toward closing that gap. I’d already given up pork and beef, and I was definitely not venturing into reindeer.

I slapped the menu closed. “Kombucha is disgusting. Fuck your caribou. I’ll get salmon.”

What should have been a perfectly delicious ice cream sundae after such a perfect piece of salmon suddenly went dead on my tongue.

My whole body shivered, and a nausea settled in my stomach.

There is a man staring at me.

I put my beer down. “Do you feel that?”

Brandy twitched her nose. “The dude staring at us?”

“Yes. At that bar. He’s been watching us the whole time, but he’s started staring, hard about a minute ago.”

“He’s creepy. He has beady little eyes.”

Zanna wrinkled her nose. “I agree. Creepy.”

I needed to get rid of the feeling of filth and disgust that he was giving me. I leaned forward. “He’s the kind of guy who thinks a dick would make you straight, Bran.”

Brandy shook her head. “Nope. No interest.”

The man just kept staring at us, and his eyes would land on me for just a few moments too long. Panic would start to rise and then—

He’d move away.

Brandy eyeballed me and thumped her beer on the table. “What are we doing about this guy? None of us are interested and he probably doesn’t care that we aren’t interested in his tiny... ego.”

“Tiny ego?” I chuckled as the waitress placed another round of beer on the table.

“Well, that’s not right,” Zanna said. “The penis is an inverse unequal correlation with ego. Small dick, big ego. Big dick, big ego.”

Brandy’s forehead wrinkled. “Wait, what?”

“Guys just have big egos,” Zanna said. “Some just don’t have the dick to back it up.”

She shook her head. “I don’t know how you all put up with that shit.”

“The same way they put up with our mood swings.” Delia nodded sagely. “If you come at me helicoptering that thing, I’m going to give you a mood swing in the balls.”

Even though we all burst out laughing, I could feel the slimy guy moving across the bar, toward our table.

“Oh, hey, look at that,” Delia grumbled. “He’s on his way over.”

I only saw him out of the corner of my eye, but I could tell he moved like a predator. Delia quirked an eyebrow at me. Of all five of these women I called best friends, Delia was always the most observant, and the best at non-verbally asking if we were okay. She was our group’s secret weapon—she had deep-seated suspicion of everyone around her, save those she trusted, and she could spot trouble a mile away.

Slimy stopped between me and Brandy.

“Ladies…”

I was pretty sure Brandy’s eyeroll sprained something. We all chuckled at her, but he thought we were laughing at him.

“What’s funny?” he snarled.

Zanna cleared her throat. “Inside joke.”

“Inside your pants,” I heard Brandy whisper under her breath. I choked on my sip of beer.

His creepy, yucky smile was back—which meant he hadn’t heard Brandy. “So, which one of you ladies wants to dance with a real man?”

Zanna smiled and raised her hand. “Let me know when he gets here.”

Both mine and Delia’s eyes grew wide and shocked. Was she insane? Could she not tell how dangerous this guy was? This guy was bad news.

And of course he walked around the table to where she was sitting and grinned at her. As fast as lightning, his hand was around her throat.

Nope. Not on my watch.

I was around Brandy to the guy as fast as I could and drove my two fingers into the nerve on his wrist and held on.

He screamed like a wounded dog and let go, and with a step into him, I used the momentum of my body and my other leg to shove him backward into the wall fifteen feet behind him.

I strode over and let my hands hang loose at my sides. “Get the hell out of here, you asshole.”

He clutched his hand and growled.

Growled?

He leapt off the ground and darted back inside, smashing through the tables, tossing the place into chaos, and slamming out the front doors.

“Zanna, are you insane?” Delia snapped.

“I didn’t think he was going to choke me!”

Brandy shook her hand. “Zanna. Even I knew the guy was unstable. You shouldn’t have poked the bear.”

Chapter Two

Jess got herself laid, and good, by a delicious brute of a man. She was smiling stupid the whole night.

Delia and I fist bumped when Delia shared the news with me. I grinned the whole time, but deep down, I was not only jealous but angry.

Things like that never, ever happened for me.

Brandy plunked down on the couch once Hot Electrician and All Around Hunky Handyman Garrett Pauler left, and our teasing was thoroughly fleshed out.

Brandy needed one more jab, though.

She grabbed one of the pillows we’d just bought. “So, what did you and Garrett do to my house… aside from befouling it with your sex romp?”

Jess narrowed her eyes, trying to be angry, but the blush that rose told everyone she was pleased and sated.

“You’re getting a whole new power system, solar and wind. There’s new bathrooms coming in, the chimney is going to be fixed. New front door, new back door, new deck, and later this summer new windows. A new water heater, and everything is getting painted. He’s also going to have someone come in and check the septic tank so we’re not dealing with a field of shit as we’re packing up at the end of the summer.” She paused, then finished, “Oh, and a whole house fan.”

“Which we’re going to need if you keep having sex in the living room,” Delia teased.

“I fully plan on sullying one of the new queen beds as soon as possible.” She gave Delia a ‘fight me on it’ look, and we all cracked up laughing.

“And you’re sure you’re okay with paying for all that?” Brandy asked, her voice quiet and unassuming.

“Yes, yes.” Delia waved her off. She cleared her throat. “So, I’m going to be doing some hiking on Thursday. Anyone want to go?”

“Are you doing hard ascents?” Zanna groused.

“Of course. There’s no real verticals around here, so I had to do hard ascents.”

“By yourself?” Jess cocked her head at me.

“I’m crazy, not stupid. I hired a guide. A local guy who’s certified in search and rescue. I thought it would be smart to have that since I don’t know anyone up here.”

I was about to open my mouth and tell her I would go with her, but the little voice in the back of my head, the one that saved my sanity and my life over and over, spoke up, No. This is her trip. It is important that she go alone.

Okay. I’d go another time. We had three full months to go. And I had an e-reader chockful of awesome books I wanted to get around to reading during that time.

I was good.

* * *

Delia whipped the curtain open.

I could hear the coyote pissing on the door.

Zanna gasped. “Oh God.”

Delia screamed.

Zanna screamed back.

The coyote howled, then ran.

This would have been hilarious if there weren’t a pack of coyotes circling the house, yipping and howling.

Jess’s phone was letting out a shrill ring, and someone on the other side tried to say hello. “Hrrrrr?”

“Garrett? I’m so sorry. We don’t know what to do…”

“Jessica?”

“Yes.”

“What’s going on?” He coughed and cleared his throat. “What’s wrong?”

“The coyotes are at the door. The fireweed doesn’t keep them back anymore. We’re almost out of it. We don’t want to shoot the coyotes.”

“How close?”

“Peed on the door.”

There were only a few seconds pause, and he sounded more awake. “I’m on my way. I’m bringing someone with me. Keep the doors closed and the lights on, and the fireweed burning in the fire.”

“Thank you.”

“And, Jess? Don’t be afraid to use that gun.”

“I won’t.” She swiped the phone off.

Delia and Jess were taking the brunt of our angry stares. I couldn’t believe she bought a gun and had it in the car when we drove back. Jess walked to the kitchen pantry where she had stashed and held it out to Zanna.

“You know how to do this better than me.”

Zanna’s lip twisted. “I hate you.” She snatched the gun out of Jess’s hand and marched to the window while settling the gun in her shoulder.

“I can’t believe you,” I hissed at her.

“We needed to be safe,” Jess said with a shrug. “I just didn’t feel like we were after last night and the scratching at the walls.”

“And you called your fuck buddy to help us?”

Jess’s mouth fell open. “Addi, I’m not going to argue with you. I didn’t want you to know we had it. And Garrett said to call him if we had a problem. I didn’t think it would be this quick.”

“I still can’t believe you slept with the electrician,” Brandy said. “We were only gone for four hours.”

Jess was angry. “There was no sleeping. And, you’re lucky we felt like being decent and not just fucking our way through the house.”

“Shut. Up,” Zanna barked from the window. “I’m glad we have the gun. I’m glad you finally got laid, and I’m glad you called him. Now all of you. Just shut up.”

Everyone was about to start arguing again, when there was suddenly a howl at the front door. It was echoed at the back door. We all exchanged glances.

I looked out the window again, watching the animals pacing and circling, yipping and barking. They were nipping and pushing each other.

“I think they’re rabid,” Brandy whispered.

“I think you’re right,” Jess said.

Delia wrinkled her nose at her.

“What? I think she’s right. This is not how animals behave.”

One of the coyotes danced up onto the porch and sat, grinning at me. Grinned at me. I gasped and nailed Delia in the side with my elbow, and pointed out the window. “Look at that one.”

Delia peeked out the window with me, then gasped. “Holy shit…”

“Right? The guy I slapped into the wall for choking Zanna.”

“Who choked Zanna?” Jess’ voice was angry now.

“This guy at the bar we ate lunch at,” I explained. “He was a real creeper.”

She frowned. “You didn’t bring me anything?”

Delia grinned. “You had sausage.”

It was enough to break the tension in the room a bit.

Brandy poked her head out and stared at the animals outside. “Are you saying you think a guy in the bar is also a coyote?”

“I might be,” Delia said.

Zanna shouldered us both out of the window. “Clam it. Jess, how long until Prince Charming gets here?”

“I didn’t think to ask. He lives at the bottom of the hill.”

“This hill or like, two mountains over?”

“I didn’t get his fucking autobiography, okay?”

There was a flash of lights through the trees and a moment later, we all watched as the white van that declared ‘Timberwolf Electrical’ cleared the last line of trees.

Jess gave a broad gesture. “There you go, there’s your answer.”

The coyotes all froze where they were when the lights from the van swept over them. Shuffling and snuffling a bit, they looked like they were waiting for someone to climb out to make a decision about leaving.

Another howl pierced the night air. The long, slow crescendo of a wolf rose from the far side of the truck. A moment later, a dozen more wolves answered, filling the dark with an ominous, frightening chorus.

“I’m currently afraid I’m going to shit myself,” Zanna whispered.

“Wolves, now?” I whispered. What the hell was going on? This wasn’t normal. Nothing about this was normal.

As the chorus continued the coyotes yipped and danced and started to back off the house. The doors to the passenger cabin of the van popped open and two figures, one Garrett, and the other—

My heart just absolutely seized in my chest.

He was clearly Garrett’s brother, but he was also one of the most achingly gorgeous men I had ever seen. Broad shoulders, tousled brown and red hair, sharp green eyes. His button nose would look strange on someone else, but on him, it was perfect.

They both marched to the porch, swinging a bright flashlight, and the coyotes scrambled. As soon as the last coyote jumped from the porch, Garrett and his brother started climbing the stairs. Jess unbolted the door and pulled it open.

His big arms folded her into his embrace. She had such a happy grin on her face, such a sense of right, that the feeling of jealousy/hate tried to shoot me again, right in the heart.

Garrett spared a smile for the rest of us. “Hello, ladies. Good to see you all again. This is my brother, Patrick. Patrick, these are our new neighbors. Jessica, Addi, Delia, Zanna, and Brandy.”

Sweet jumpin’ Jehoshaphat. Patrick was perfect.

Zanna was trying to yank Patrick out of the door so she could close it.

I felt the sudden urge to slap her hand away from my man.

What?

She groused at him. “Come on, come on, there are coyotes and wolves out there now!”

Patrick grinned, and I died a little from bliss. “Don’t sweat the wolves. They won’t hurt you. I saw one or two on the way up. They’re part of the local pack.”

“You know the wolves?” Jess looked at each of us. It was a good question. How did you get to know wolves?

I blanched. “You know the coyotes, too, don’t you?”

“We do, unfortunately,” Patrick said, facing away from me and peering out a window.

His ass was magnificent.

He moved to another window. “That’s why you’re going to come back to our compound for the night and we’ll have people up here tomorrow to repair and secure the property. Pack a bag, ladies. Come on down to the Mendenhall-St. Terese compound.”

“Just leave the place?” Just the tone of Brandy’s voice told us all how she didn’t like that idea.

“Just for tonight.” Garrett tipped his head.

“But, this is my place. I shouldn’t be scared away by some mangy mutts. I need to stay and defend—”

There was a bark and a sharp growl from beyond the trees, and all of us jerked back from the door.

“I’ll get my bag,” Brandy said, scurrying off.

Chapter Three

I wasn’t happy. Not at all.

A 2:00 a.m. wakeup call from my idiot Beta brother demanding I go with him meant I had no choice.

“Knock! Goddamn it!” I screamed at him, throwing the covers over Molly.

“We have to go. Come on.” He pitched my jeans at my head.

“Uh, I have a guest.”

He stared at me. “The coyotes are at the door.”

I shot up in the bed. The damn coyotes. I snagged the boxers off the floor and yanked them on.

“At the door?”

Garrett nodded. “She said one of them pissed on it.”

Someone marked the door of the house that Beta’s mate was staying in. “Too far, man.” I jerked the jeans up and buttoned them.

“Patrick?” Molly fluttered her eyes at me and let the sheet fall down to show her breasts.

Mrph.

“I gotta go. Stay if you like, but I don’t know when I’ll be back.” I grabbed the sheet and tossed it back up.

She engaged her puppy dog eyes. “You’re going to leave me here all hot and bothered?”

Garrett had moved back to the doorway, and I sighed at him. “Stay or go. I don’t care. My brother needs my help.”

Her look would have withered a lesser wolf. But I wasn’t a lesser wolf. I was the son of the Alpha and born to be the Beta of my brother’s pack.

Garrett was pissed at that look. “Stay or go, Molly Gorsky, but you will not keep my brother from helping me.”

She shrank back like a wounded dog, and there was a whimper that didn’t make it far. Before Garrett could make this worse, I grabbed his arm and we headed out of my house.

Trotting to Garrett’s vehicle, we jumped into his truck and I knew what was coming.

“Molly? Really, Patrick?”

“Drunk. Horny. Willing. Stick it up your ass. And for the record, I’m still well buzzed.”

“Great.”

“What’s going on, anyway? Why are the coyotes pissing on doors?” The stupid seat belt finally clicked in.

“Jessica called me. That’s what she said. The coyotes are circling the house. They all sounded terrified.”

“You sure she’s yours?”

“Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” I managed around a yawn. “Honest question. How do you know for sure?”

Garrett peered at me as we pulled up to one of Dad’s enforcer’s houses. “Everything they’ve ever told you about meeting your mate? Dead accurate.”

I raised my eyebrows. Even in my inebriated, post-coital haze, that cut right through. None of our friends or siblings had found their mates yet, so we all thought the ‘instant connection’ was bullshit.

Now, here was the future Alpha of the St. Terese pack telling me it was dead-to-rights true.

We picked up three more of the pack on the way up the hill: the twins Miles and Giles, and Ivan. Garrett explained exactly what was going on as we drove, and we dropped them off about fifty yards from the top, so they could go around the house and funnel the coyotes away.

Garrett pulled up and parked. From the other side of the van where no one could see me, I leaned my head back and let out a howl to beat all howls.

Garrett rolled his eyes as I followed him to the front door. “Really?”

“What? That’ll get the stupid coyotes thinking.”

He didn’t even have a chance to knock. Once the mangy mutts were gone, the door yanked open and Garrett threw his arms open to welcome the woman standing there.

“Hello, ladies,” he rumbled.

He was cheerful. At two in the morning. Bleh.

I was still mostly drunk, so I just followed his lead with introductions and the like. I think I made a few smart-ass remarks, but wound up inviting them down to the compound in the end.

A bark, a growl, and a howl convinced them it was a good idea. I chuckled as they scattered to grab a bag each.

I headed over to the kitchen, but didn’t make it.

The scent hit me.

My mate was in this cabin.

I sobered instantly, turning and staring at Garrett. “No way.”

“What way?” He looked around confused.

“There is no way that your mate and mine are in the same cabin.”

Garrett’s eyebrows shot up. “No way.”

“Exactly.”

“Dude.”

“I know. I don’t even know who it is,” I mumbled. “There’s five of them, right?”

“Yes, and we can automatically eliminate Jess.”

I nodded and trotted over to where my brother was standing in the door. “Usher them out as they get their bags. I’ll be able to tell.”

Garrett nodded as the first of the five—someone I thought was named Zanna came trotting out with a backpack. She had a grim smile on, and Garrett ushered her out onto the pouch.

Nope.

Jess came next, with… Brandy on her tail. They walked out to the porch.

Not my mate but…

Garrett shook his head ever so slightly. So, he knew it too. Which meant Dad already knew. Brandy would be looked after carefully.

The next was Addi. She had a rolling bag with her—

Mate.

She didn’t even make it across the room before my wolf went bananas. I was now stone cold sober, and I watched her walk across the room. Sandy blonde hair, soft hazel eyes, curves for days, and… something that made her pull herself in. Not outgoing like Zanna. Not take charge like Jess. She… withdrew as much as she could to not be noticed.

Garrett ushered her out the door and it took all I had not to grab her and pull her to me.

He cocked his head. I let out a breath and held myself back from following. “Yep.”

Garrett shook his head, and I could see him trying not to laugh at me.

The last of the friends came barreling out with a backpack. Dalia. She skidded to a halt. “We can still come back here, right? I have all my hiking gear here, and—”

“You can come back,” Garrett said. “The cabin is still here and you all have the only keys. We’ll just keep you in the compound until we have a chance to re-secure everything.”

“Okay, good. Let’s get away from the piss-crazed coyote. I need some beauty rest.”

“You need a beauty hibernation.” Jess laughed.

Dalia gave her the middle finger as she walked by.

* * *

I jumped out of the van and pulled it open as Dad and Mom walked up to the gate.

“Brandy, Zanna, you’re going to be staying with my parents for the night. Mom, Dad, this is Zanna Kilkenny, and Brandy Yéil.”

Dad reacted to the name I knew he would, and then covered it. We were smart to bring her to the Alpha’s house.

He smiled and held out a hand. “Welcome to St. Terese, ladies. I’m Martin Pauler, and this is my wife, Olga. We have two warm beds and a hot breakfast in the morning.”

“And no coyotes,” Zanna said, jumping out of the van with her bag. “Sounds like a plan.”

Brandy rolled her eyes and climbed out, following our parents into the house.

I pulled the door closed and Garrett rolled the van forward, driving another half mile down the road to my house. I pulled the door open.

“Addi, Delia, you can crash with Patrick. I live right across the street, so Jess and I will be there. Get some good sleep. No one is getting a wake-up call until ten, because this four a.m. shit is for the birds.”

Jess’s face was priceless when she realized we had just set up a perfect booty call for both of them.

Addi and Delia followed me down to the house as Garrett pulled into his own driveway. I unlocked the door and led the two women into the house.

The house seemed to sigh with relief.

My mate was home.

This was not the ideal situation, since I could still smell Molly in the air, and the bed was probably a mess. Not that she’d be sharing it with me tonight—that was too much for a human to handle.

Also, I smelled like booze and tawdry sex.

That was a great thought. Time for a shower.

“All right, ladies, welcome to my den. I’ve got a bedroom for each of you. I’m afraid the covers are just for show. I’ll grab some sheets for you and we’ll get them all made up.”

This was hard. Trying not to grab Addi and see what she tasted like? What her breasts felt like pressed against me? To hear what she screamed when she came—

Damn. Too much. My dick was getting into the game. Absolutely had to play it cooler than this. There was a lot I had to explain. A whole lot.

“Which one is yours?” Delia asked.

“Down the hall, last door on the right. Both of the guest rooms are on the left. Take your pick.”

Addi pointed to the one room. “It’s a king. Why don’t we just share this? That way we can not make two beds.”

Delia narrowed her eyes. “As long as you stay on your side.”

She called after her friend as she walked away. “Girl, you know damn well I don’t swing that way.” Just as Delia turned into the room, her countenance fell, and her voice dropped to a whisper I shouldn’t have been able to hear. “I don’t swing any way…”

There was more to that. But it was more than my four in the morning brain wanted to handle. Instead, I pulled out the sheets and motioned to the bedroom.

“Let’s get some sleep.”

Chapter Four

I sat up in bed.

Pancakes. Bacon. Fresh bread.

What?

Looking over to the right, Delia was nowhere to be found. Her side of the bed was sort of made. Her pajamas were folded on the chair and her shoes were missing.

Finally, I thought to look at the clock.

Twelve-oh-three.

“In the afternoon?” I positively shrieked the words, shooting out of bed and racing through the house to the kitchen.

Cool as ice, Patrick was standing at the stove in his boxers, whistling and flipping pancakes.

“It’s one! We’re supposed to be at—”

“Good morning, sleepyhead.” He grinned.

I stopped and brought my feet together. I studied him for a moment. He was utterly nonplussed at the time.

“What’s going on?” My voice dropped from its hysterical register.

He glanced at the stove and back at me. “Breakfast?”

Raising an eyebrow, I walked closer to him. “I can see that. Aren’t we all supposed to be at the cabin right now? Working on it?”

“Eh. Garrett and I talked earlier. We have sunlight until nearly ten this time of year. No need to rush up there today. We should make a schedule of what’s going to happen when anyway.”

“So...where’s Delia?”

“She went to Garrett’s to tease him about humping Jessica.”

I tossed my head back and laughed. That was Delia. Finding a chair at the table, I sat and pulled the orange juice and cup over to me.

And that’s when I noticed Patrick.

My eyes widened as I watched him moving in front of the stove. He was humming and dancing a bit to the tune he invented. His broad, strong back rippled as he flipped one of the pancakes. He danced over to stand on one leg while checking the bacon.

Oh.

That ass.

The sudden overwhelming urge to grab a handful and squeeze was shocking.

I’d never felt any kind of sexual pull toward anyone. Ever. I figured years ago that my libido had been destroyed. I was able to appreciate a handsome face, a nice bod. But to actually feel sexual was beyond me.

And yet here I was a liquid warmth between my legs that made me think filthy things about this man dancing in the kitchen, flipping pancakes in his boxers.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. His boxers.

He was basically naked in here.

I bit down on my thumb to try to get myself to relax.

Even his shaggy hair—the wonderful dark brown with red highlights—called to me to run my hands through it.

What the hell was going on?

“Do you mind waiting for the food?” he asked.

I looked around. “What?”

“We’re all heading over to Garrett’s for breakfast at one.” He turned his head to look at me over his shoulder.

Rippling back. Piercing green eyes. Dimples.

Shit.

“Addi?”

“Oh. Yeah. I’m good with that.” I had very little idea of what I had just agreed to. “Can I use the shower?”

“You have an en suite, it’s all yours.” He gestured around with the spatula. “I spared no expense when I built her.”

I was halfway to the hallway and stopped dead at that. “What?”

“I spared no expense?”

“After that.”

“When I built her?”

My eyebrows shot up. “You built this house?”

“Yup. Me and my brother and my father.”

He could cook, he could build, he could fold a fitted sheet.

Was the ability to fold a fitted sheet supposed to turn me on? I had no idea. But it was. So was the whole sweaty carpenter building his own house thing…

“That’s impressive. I’m going to go take a quick shower.”

“Fair enough. Then you can watch the bacon while I shower.”

Oh, God, wet naked man fantasy.

I needed to call my therapist. Now.

Grabbing my phone and my toiletries, I locked myself in the bathroom and dialed her number. It would be late back home, but she always made exceptions for a few of her hard cases. Like me.

“Olive Tammerlane.”

“Hi, Doctor Tammerlane, it’s Addison.”

“Oh, hello! Hold on a minute. Let me get somewhere quiet.” I heard her shifting and moving. There was a rustling, and shout, and what sounded like a buzzer.

“Am I interrupting?”

“It’s my son’s basketball game,” she explained. “They’re smashing the other team and he got benched to allow some of the other players a chance on the court. No big deal.” Another moment and she came back. “Okay, Addi, what’s up? It’s been a long time since you called outside hours.”

“I, um…” I cleared my throat. “Well, it finally happened. There’s a guy and…”

“Your libido woke up?” Her voice was somewhere between concerned and ecstatic.

“In a big way,” I breathed, relieved she understood.

“Addi, this is good.”

“It’s terrifying.”

“Let’s explore where it’s coming from. What triggered this?”

“His ass,” I said, then gasped that I said it.

The doctor chuckled but didn’t scold me. “Go on.”

“Well, I noticed his back first. He’s really well built, and handsome. He was parading around his boxers, and dancing at the stove. And when he went to lean one way his butt…well…”

“Excellent, Addi. How did you feel?”

“Like I wanted a handful of butt.”

She laughed. “I mean you. What did your body do?”

“Tingles. Everywhere. And my…”

“Sex?”

“Yeah, that’s a good word.” I was glad she offered it. I occasionally still freaked out at even the correct biological terms. “My sex got warm. Hot actually. Liquidy.”

“And what went through your head?”

I paused. “That I liked it. That I wanted a bit more.”

Doctor Tammerlane exhaled. “This is excellent, Addi. This is what I was hoping would happen. Everything is just fine. You’re reacting normally. It was only time until you finally moved from ‘appreciation’ to ‘lust.’”

“This is lust?”

“Sexual desire, yes. Please don’t confuse that with sexual compatibility. You can desire someone and not be compatible. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try.”

My eyebrows went up. “Try? Are you telling me to have sex?”

“I’m telling you to follow your feelings. Sex, any true intimacy, is going to be very hard for you the first time. And you have to promise me that before you do anything with this man, if you choose to, he will know what happened and agree to be willing to slow down or wait for you to be comfortable and ready.”

“You’re telling me to have sex.”

“I’m telling you it’s okay to feel sexual and want to have sex, Addi. That’s where you are right now. You have to be prepared for an episode, and you have to prepare your partner for that.”

“So, it’s okay that I want to get naked with this guy?”

“It’s okay, but are you ready? That’s what I’m trying to reinforce. He has to know about what happened.”

“He’s going to think—”

“Projection, Addi. I’m cutting you off to stop that right now. You don’t know what he’s going to think. I get the feeling you just met him?”

“Yesterday.”

“Then give yourself time. You don’t have to act on this right now. You don’t have to explain anything. We already know you’re fine with light physical contact. Keep it there. And keep in mind that if he pushes, he’s not the right guy. Real men respect and listen to their significant other.”

I took a long, slow breath. “Right. Don’t have to act on it. Don’t have to be pushed. When I’m ready.”

“Good, awesome, Addi. You’re doing so damn well, I’m proud of you. Don’t forget to ask your friends for help. You said they knew the whole story, so you can lean on them.”

“Yes, they do. I can ask. Thank you.”

“And, Addi?”

“Yes?”

“When in doubt? Knock him out.”

I had to choke back the laugh. “Good point, Doctor. I had to nearly do that yesterday for a friend.”

“Anything bad?”

“Just a creeper.”

“Huh. And you acted on behalf of your friend?”

“Well, yeah, he was being creepy and gross.”

I could hear the smile in her voice. “We have made better progress than I thought, Addison. Three years ago, you would have never moved. You would have been frozen. I think between the therapy and the akido, you’re further along than we think. I’m proud of you.”

“Thanks.”

“All right, it sounds like we’re in a good place for now. Any time you need, Addi. I’ll be here. Enjoy your trip.”

“Thanks, Doc Tammerlane.”

“Truly, Addison, my pleasure. Talk to you soon.”

The phone disconnected, and I stared at it for a moment. She was right. Dead right. Even a year ago, I wouldn’t have moved to help Zanna. Yesterday, I actually acted without thought, and then never thought about it again.

Maybe, someday, I would be able to handle normal interactions with other humans.

I jerked my head up and realized where I was.

I was in Patrick’s bathroom. I had run into his bedroom. It was only him and me in the house. I didn’t know him well at all. Delia had trusted me to stay here alone.

I hadn’t panicked. At all.

A laugh bubbled out of me. This was awesome. The doctor had been right—I was further than I thought I was with this. There hadn’t been an ounce of panic in the kitchen—just desperate curiosity to find out where Delia had gone.

For her safety.

Snatching the phone back from the countertop, I shot off a text to Delia.

MaddyAddi: I’m alone in the house with Patrick.

MaddyAddi: and I’m not, repeat, NOT panicking.

Deli-A: Oh, God, I’m sorry, Addi. I didn’t leave a note. Do you need me to come back?

MaddyAddi: No. Stay where you are. I’m fine.

MaddyAddi: Delia. I’M FINE. Do you know how awesome this is?!

Deli-A: Seriously? You’re fine?

MaddyAddi: YES. It’s amazing!

Deli-A: Are you coming over for brekky?

MaddyAddi: I guess so. Patrick is in the kitchen cooking. I’ll text you if we aren’t.

She sent back a thumbs-up, and I tossed the phone on the counter.

Shower time. I needed one—I didn’t want to hurt Brandy’s feelings, but that house was crap. Showers were critical. And not feeling like there were bugs on everything. Or dust. Or dirt.

And it was nice that there were no coyotes at the door.

* * *

The door opened and shut, and I barely looked up. I’d heard my mother’s footsteps on the stairs, knew she would let herself in.

She stood in the doorway of the kitchen, staring at me.

“Is it true?” she asked.

I glanced up and hid my smile. “Is what true?”

“You’re cleaning your house because of a woman?”

There was no stopping my laugh. My mother was one of the best women I knew, and I loved her to death. She also had a mean streak a mile wide and a sense of humor that was twice that.

“Yeah, it’s true.” I peered under the fridge again. “How the hell do you clean under this?”

“You move it.” She shrugged. “So, tell me about her?”

“She’s my mate, what more is there to say?”

Taking a seat at the table, she rested her chin on a fist. “You’re going to lose her with that attitude.”

“What?”

Mom sighed. “Where did we fail with you? You can’t just say, ‘she’s my mate’ and think that’s it. What about her. What color are her eyes? Is hair like spun flax, or tawny brown? Does she listen to Dylan or Keith Urban? Does she like the Beatles or would she prefer Elvis? What about flowers? What if she has an allergy? What if she likes satin sheets and not cotton?”

I sat back on my legs. “But she’s my mate. We’ll get to know each other.”

Mom leaned forward and poked me in the shoulder. “She’s your mate, not a blank notebook. She’s also a damn human, and you know that’s tricky. Look, you’re the youngest of my pups right now, and you’re one step behind Garrett finding your mate. Normally, we all let you screw up once and then help you figure it out. But this…well.

“You have to remember that she’s human, Son. Humans are of the date first, mate later. Wolves, in fact all shifters, are mate first, date later. Our wolves are happy enough then to let us get to know the person.

“But that’s not what she expects. You need to woo her. And don’t look at me like that for the word woo. It’s a perfectly fine word, screw linguistic drift. You have to. You have a very big secret you need to tell her, and you need her trust first.”

I sighed. I had been thinking about just getting her into bed and worrying about the rest later. But my mother was right—I did need to take my time.

Mom didn’t know just how right she was with all the secrets I would have to tell her. She thought I hadn’t done the screwed my life up completely thing yet.

Ha.

Standing up, I dusted off my hands.

She looked up at me. “That didn’t mean stop cleaning the house.”

The laugh slipped out. “No, I know that. I’m just going to get the vacuum. It’s gotta be easier than crawling on the floor.”

Watching me head to the closet where I keep the cleaning supplies, she called after me. “So? What do you know about her? She had her eyes on you all during breakfast.”

I rolled the vacuum out. “Truthfully? Not much. We haven’t really had a chance to talk. Either she’s around someone or she’s up at that cabin working.” I sighed. “I’ve been trying to get her alone since I scented her. But, damn are her friends protective.”

“You are just as tenacious as her friends,” Mom said. “Plus, I heard that Delia has her eyes on Jason McGarrigal.”

Twisting my lip, I gave her a confused look. “When did that happen?”

“Yesterday. All over Mendenhall, according to Jessica.”

“Are you already one on one with my brother’s mate?”

She looked sheepish. “I might have eavesdropped. A little.”

“A little?”

“Okay, a lot. I’m shocked he didn’t scent me standing there.”

I laughed. “Mom! You’re really going to hear things you don’t want to hear like that.”

A grimace passed over her face. “I already have.”

I let out a raucous guffaw that time.

Eventually, Mom took pity on me and started helping me clean the house. She took over the kitchen and living room, which was fine. I didn’t want her in my bedroom. At all. She didn’t need to step foot in that unholy shrine of sexual deviation.

Stripping the bed, I realized it was time for a new one. If I was going to have a mate, there was no way I was going to lay her down in that bed of filth.

It shocked me how fast I swung from manwhore in the bedroom to is it legal to burn this mattress on my front lawn. It didn’t really deserve much more.

Staring at the naked, filthy mattress, I really wondered if I deserved better. I was young for a wolf, just thirty-nine, but all I had done for the past eleven years was hop in the sack with whatever woman was willing and able.

Sometimes more than one.

I yanked the mattress off the box spring and dragged it through the doorway, through the hall, and out the back door.

“What the hell are you doing?” Mom was running after me.

“I’m going to order a new mattress! I want this one gone.”

Stopping on the porch, she watched me. “That’s a sudden decision to make…”

I flopped it down in the grass. It was even more disgusting in the sunlight.

“Ew. Ew! Patrick, what the—No. You know what? This is one of those times a mother turns around, walks away, and shuts the door behind her. Burn that.”

“Is it legal?”

“I don’t even care. Burn it.” True to her word, she turned on her heel and marched back into the house, closing the door.

I guessed I was burning it. I grabbed the chainsaw from the wood shed and hacked the thing into smaller chunks, then toss the pieces on a burn pile, with plenty of kindling in the form of dead branches and old law cuttings underneath.

There was a lighter in the shed, and I quickly had that whole pile burning.

I’d sleep in the other spare room until I could get the smell of sex out of mine, and get a new mattress delivered.

Might be a while.

“Oh my God, Patrick, what the hell?”

I whipped around.

Addi was standing in the doorway, looking in shock at the flames.

“Oh. Uh. Hi. It’s burn day, so…”

“Your mattress?”

“I’ve been meaning to.”

She put her hand over her mouth and gagged. Shaking her head, she ran back into the house.

The wind changed direction and a breeze of toxic fumes drifted over me. After an accidental lungful, I ran after her, gagging my own way into the house.

“Holy crap, Addi, I’m sorry! I didn’t realize that was going to stink that much.”

“The mattress store would have hauled that off.”

Er. Ew. No, they wouldn’t have touched it with a ten foot poll. Which was why it was burning in the backyard. “Yeah, it was an…impulse.”

“Global warming, you douche,” Addi bit out. “Don’t make it worse.”

“Yeah, Son, don’t make it worse.” My mother was standing behind her, her whole face trembling with a laugh she didn’t want to let out. “I’m going to go…clean a bathroom.”

As soon as she was out of sight, I heard her laugh.

Properly chastised by my mate for the first time and in front of my mother. Would never live that down. I sighed.

“I am sorry, Addi. I didn’t mean to make anyone gag. Or kill the seabirds.”

She laughed.

My traitorous dick reacted. Ugh.

I looked around and realized Delia wasn’t there. “Where’s your partner in crime?”

“Delia? She’s off schtumpfing the hot tour guide.”

Quirking an eyebrow, I was confused. “I’m sorry, what? Schtumpfing?”

“Yeah. Horizontal hula? Naked tango? Dirty disco? Any of this?”

I laughed. “Got it. She found a bed buddy.”

Addi nodded. “And a field buddy. And a tree buddy. And a river buddy… Well, they’re active. She won’t be home…tonight or possibly the rest of the summer.”

I took a deep breath. “Would you like to have dinner with me?”

My mother’s snort and laugh came barreling out of the back room. “You’re as smooth as a lava bomb!”

“Mom, shut up,” I grumbled, with a hand on my head.

Addi smirked and stared at me. “She’s awesome.”

“See?”

“Mom!” The yell came out hoarse and embarrassed.

Still, Addi hadn’t made an excuse and run. Yet. “You’re serious?”

“As a lava bomb!”

“Mom! Go home!”

She did go, but she cackled all the way out the door. I just stared up at the ceiling, clenching my jaw until I heard the door close.

Addi burst out laughing. “I like her. She’s funny.”

“She is mortifying.” Rolling my eyes, I turned back to the window to make sure the burn pile hadn’t caught half the Tongass on fire.

With quiet steps Addi was next to me, looking out the window at the inferno. “Why did you suddenly burn that mattress?”

“Impulse control problem,” I answered. “I wanted a new one and the only way to make sure I actually ordered it was to burn it.”

“Extreme but effective.”

I let out a sigh and stole a glace of her perfect-for-me profile. “So. Date? Coffee? Beer? Dinner?”

She seemed surprised. “You are serious.”

I gave a brief nod.

She gave a brief nod back. “Yes.”

“Really?” The words fell out of me.

“Well, did you want me to say no?”

“No! Not at all. I just thought that…”

She smirked. “I’d play hard to get? Nah. I’m old and too complicated to play games like that. So. Yes, Patrick, I would love to go out to dinner with you.”

I grinned. “Sweet.”

“Your mother’s right, though. You’re as subtle as a lava bomb.”

“I think she said smooth.”

Addi cocked her head. “Have you ever seen a lava bomb?”

Chapter Five

I held out my fist and poised it over Patrick’s hand.

He was confused, but offered his palm, and I dropped the rock into it. The spiky edge poked his skin and he let out a small yelp.

“Ouch! Hey, what the heck…”

“Small lava bomb.” I grinned. “I had Delia find it just for you.”

He looked at it and started laughing.

A wave of relief washed over me. It had been a calculated risk, but one I didn’t want to pass up. It was a kind of test: I wanted to make sure he had a real sense of humor.

I had also chosen to play stupid with his mattress. Jess had explained to me that Patrick was a player who was trying to mend his ways. The mattress was most likely one of the most disgusting things I would have ever laid eyes on. Garrett had been relieved when their mother told them he had hauled it out and burned it.

Even though he shouldn’t have burned it.

Patrick put the small lava rock on his mantle. It wasn’t a big stone, it barely qualified as a small sample of Pele’s Tears, but it was perfect for what I wanted to do. Which was make Patrick laugh.

Opening the front door of the house, he motioned me forward. I walked ahead of him and we headed for his car, as he pulled the door closed.

“I didn’t want to take you to the usual restaurants,” he said. “Midsummer, we’re all full up with tourists. Everything has a two-hour wait. So, I thought we might do something a little different.”

“Uh-oh.”

He held the door of his car open. “Trust me?”

Sitting down in the car, I shrugged. “I guess so.”

The Subaru Outback, which was the most common, non-pickup style vehicle I had seen, wound through the roads of the compound to the main highway into the city.

We drove quietly, and I could see the buildings of Juneau in the distance, but we turned off long before they could grow into a marina with all kinds of boats and planes.

Patrick guided the car to the end of a dock and parked. He smiled and headed around the car to help me out.

The salt water was pungent. There was something about northern ocean water that was so much more strongly saline than anywhere else. I really liked it and let the scent just drift by.

He stopped us halfway down the dock, after taking my hand and leading me down the plastic decking.

“No wood?”

“Rots fast in the extremes of weather,” he explained. “The textured plastic lasts.” He popped the door open on a single prop engine seaplane.

My eyes grew wide. “What?”

“Come on. It’s Cessna Two-oh-Six Floatplane with a Soloy turbine engine.”

“Yeah, you may as well have been speaking Klingon.” I stared at the plane.

“ylDohgQo.”

“What?” I stared at him this time.

Patrick grinned. “That actually was Klingon.”

“You speak Klingon?”

“A little.”

I chuckled. “Why?”

“Because we have really long winters.”

I shook my head. “But you really expect me to get on that plane?”

“Yes, of course. It’s a good plane. People pay a lot of money for these and my dad bought it when we were kids for a fraction of what it’s worth. I keep it perfectly maintained and have been flying since I was six.”

Cocking a hip, I stared at him. “Why do you sound more like a car salesman than a guy trying to take me on a date?”

“I do flightseeing once in a while during the spring and fall, and I’m used to people freaking out at the pontoons. More than one person stopped at the dock and said no…” He rolled the window down. “And I really don’t want you to say no.”

He was sweet. I wasn’t thrilled about this idea, but I could play along. Screwing up my courage, I walked to the edge of the dock and grabbed the ladder.

“Spot me, man. I don’t want to end up in the drink.”

“Step on the pontoon and then lift off the dock onto the ladder.” Patrick put a hand on my hip to guide me.

And there were sparks and shivers from the touch. All the way through my body, up my skin, down my arms and legs. The skin pebbled, and I had never ever felt that at a touch.

I thought for a moment that I heard Patrick suck in a breath, but the plane slammed against the dock at that moment, caught in the wake waves of a nearby motorboat.

“Upsie daisy,” he said, and I climbed the ladder into the airplane.

Ducking down not to hit the ceiling, I maneuvered my butt to the other seat and sat. Patrick was already up and in and closing the door. He plucked a headset off a hook and handed it to me.

“Go ahead and put that on. Once the engine’s running you’ll be able to talk to me.”

Looking at the headset, it seemed like it had been last replaced in the late seventies by the deep brown color with orange highlights.

“Got a wet wipe?”

He looked mildly offended. “I sanitize them after every flight. Whether or not they were used. The wipes are under your chair.”

“Sorry, Patrick. But… I have issues.”

“Don’t we all?” He grinned and slapped his own, more modern headset on. There was a crackle, and then I heard him in my headset. “Okay, it’s going to be really loud for a few minutes. Once we’re in the air, it will be better.”

He buckled in, and I did the same with the slightly more-than-a-commercial-airline seat belt. The plane sputtered to life, not exactly instilling confidence in it. But Patrick’s hands moved over the controls like a master conductor and we moved away from the dock as he talked with the tower of Juneau International for clearance.

I’d never paid much attention to flying, being in the back of the plane 100 percent of the time before this, but by the ease with which he moved his hands across the boards and levers, he was at home in this thing.

It was only a moment before we were picking up speed and he pulled back on the yoke, lifting us up and out of the water. We picked up even more speed, and more Gs as he angled us up and away from Juneau, out to the islands that protected the coast from the sea.

“Juneau is on the Inside Passage. It’s always been safer to get up the coast this way. There’s a hairpin turn for the cruise ships, but it’s never been a real issue for them. Not with the azopods.”

“You don’t do tours?”

“I only do them in the spring and fall,” he answered, flying a little lower so we could see the lakes that dotted the ground. “I let the townies handle the summer crowds. I have work I do with U Alaska that takes up a lot of the summers, and the research works with the spring and fall runs.”

“University of Alaska?”

“I have a master’s in biology and I work with the Alaska Native department and the anthropology department. My family is Russian and Tlingit-Tsimshan. I help all those students with their thesis and research, and it works since I have to go out in the plane if they need anything. I can grab samples from all of these ponds and islands. I’ve located several empty native villages for some of the anth students.”

I raised my eyebrows. “You’re native?”

“Very much. Dad’s chief.”

“And Garrett will be chief someday?”

“Yes.”

I didn’t realize he was native, but now that he said it, I could see all the hallmarks in his face and stance. He also had a lot of the Russian in him—

“Your mother’s name is Olga.”

“She’s half Russian.” He smiled. “And she knows the language and loves to yell at us in it. Garrett knows it fairly well. But our sister is good at it. She and Mom talk for hours.”

I smiled, but I felt the wistfulness of it. I couldn’t imagine halving a mother who would not only talk to me but talk to me in the language of her childhood.

“How about you?” Patrick cut through the drone of the engine.

“I went to Northeastern for Human Resource technology. I met these four dipsticks my first day in the dorms and we hit it off so hard that there was no stopping us.” I looked at my watch. “Elephantine should be getting the eviction notice in another few days.”

“Elephantine?” There was no denying his laugh.

“She was our sixth roommate. Delia got stuck sharing a room with her. By the time October rolled around, we knew she wasn’t going to last with us. She was horrible.”

“Well, okay, but Elephantine?”

He was more confused by her name, I realized. “Fantine. Her mother was fan of Les Miserables. She would go around trumpeting her commands to all of us. I forget who mumbled it first, but it stuck for all five years.”

He nodded. “This trip was a ruse to not be there when she got evicted?”

“No. This was Brandy’s chance to see the property she had to pay an arm and a leg for to get away from her cousin Harrison. She had the feeling he wasn’t taking care of it, and she wanted it to stay in the Yéil family.”

It was quiet again, and he steered the plane down to flit between the tall hills that dotted all the islands along the coast. I should have been terrified. This was the kind of flying that very few people ever got to experience—close, low, almost slow. Nearly brushing the water and the tops of trees.

But, with Patrick… it felt natural. He really did know this plane.

Until he slammed the yoke to the right and headed us due west.

“What the hell—”

“Whales. Whale pod,” he said, the glee clear in his voice. “Yes! Under your seat is a camera case with a camera and a telephoto lens. Can you use a DSLR camera?”

“Yes, actually I can.”

“Awesome. We’re going to buzz the pod and I need you to take some shots. I want to identify the pod. I hope it’s AN-10, but it’s probably AG.”

“What?” I asked. “No, wait. I have to unbuckle myself. Please don’t do any stunt flying.” I managed to finally grab the camera case and haul it out.

“So there’s two kinds of pods. Resident and Transient. Residents are easy to track. Transients are not. AG is a local resident pod. AN-10 used to be. I have a theory those suckers went rogue and changed to transient after the Exxon-Valdez spill in eighty-nine.” He dipped in close. “We lost a lot of whales after that.”

Tipping the plane up on its wing, Patrick gave me a clear shot. I could see the whales just below the water. I snapped a few, then zoomed in. I could get a lot of them as they crested out of the water to take a breath.

“How many do you think are down there?” he asked.

“Oh, at least twenty-five. I see two calves.”

“Excellent. Just get as many as you can and I’ll deal with ID’ing them later. If there are twenty-five, I’m pretty sure that it’s AG pod, which is fine.”

“For the bio department?” I clicked a few more shots, trying not get the same whales twice.

“Yup, and everyone else who monitors the waters along the coast.” He grinned. “Got them?”

“As many as I could.”

“Good, let’s go eat.”

Eat?

Turning the plane back, Patrick lifted us over the hills and seemed to be looking for something. It took him a moment to find it, but he did, and the plane dipped down over a hill.

Skimming the water, he paralleled a long lakeshore, craning his neck to check something. Rising in the air, Patrick turned the plane around and then brought it right back to the shore line and touched down on the water.

How was I so calm?

With the blades of the propeller still whirling, Patrick steered us to a little stone beach and pulled the plane up to the pebbles.

“Won’t that wreck the pontoons?” I asked, trying to see what was going on.

“Not at all. I installed small wheels on the front years ago to make sure that if and when I had to do this, the pontoon would never scrape. They’re on the back too, in case I have to back in.”

“That’s cool.” I was now enchanted by this insane flying machine.

He jumped out and stood on the float, slamming the door and popping open a small compartment. I saw him run out with a long coil of rope and wind it around a tree.

As he headed back, he waved me out. “Come on! She won’t go anywhere now!”

I climbed out and looked around.

A wave of awe tripped through me. I was standing on the pontoon of a floatplane, staring up at what was clearly just one part of a massive wall of a caldera, covered in pine forest. The sky was a blinding bright blue, and white puffy clouds mixed with low patches of mist. The water was dark, reflecting back the ripples the plane had made. It was cool, not quite still but a soul-deep calm that made everything…perfect.

I knew Patrick was behind me on the float by the way the plane wobbled a bit.

“You okay?”

“This place…”

“I come here sometimes to think. Others know about the lake and visit once in a while. Only by plane. But I love the calm here.”

“The green is so…deep. Late summer greens at home.” My voice hitched.

I hated home.

“Come on. Picnic dinner.”

I smiled and followed him off the pontoon, jumping off to the land we were anchored on.

He popped open the cooler and looked down into it. Pulling out some bottles, he handed me one. Spruce beer, local brew.

“You know me already!”

“Well, Garrett mentioned that Jess was angry you all had gone and enjoyed the spruce beer without her, so I figured I’d get some more.” He turned back to the cooler. “So, what would you like? I have turkey, ham, turkey ham…”

I stared straight at him. “Was…was that a South Park reference?”

Patrick cocked his head. “I don’t know how to handle this situation. One is to be embarrassed that I just got caught quoting South Park or two, be really fucking impressed that you knew such an obscure reference.”

I laughed. “Oklahoma has really, really long summers.”

* * *

Addison was from Oklahoma.

That was the first real thing I had learned about her outside of her going to school at Northwestern with her friends. It was like a happy little diamond in my brain.

“Is that when the wind—”

She held up a finger. “Don’t say it. Do not say it.” She stared at me. “That’s the springtime anyway. Tornados, you know?”

I laughed. “I guess you hear that all the time, eh?”

“Well, only when I got to college.”

Handing her a turkey sandwich and taking one for myself, we sat down on the patch of grass I had found. The rocky ground wouldn’t have worked well.

“Have you…” Addi started and stopped her question. She frowned at the sandwich, but the frown wasn’t for the sandwich. She was thinking about something.

I waited. I didn’t want to interrupt her. It was something serious—I could feel the eddies in her mind.

And that was new and interesting.

Finally, she moved the sandwich away from her mouth and stared at the plane for a moment. “Look, Patrick. This all is going to sound very strange to you right now, but I need to get it off my chest, before things go…wrong.”

I nodded and took a bite of my own lunch, chewing slowly.

“I have a lot of shit in my past. It’s not good shit, and it’s not easy to talk about, at all. But I like you, and you stir things up in me that… Well. I thought would never surface. I’ve had boyfriends, but nothing like what I’m feeling for you. It’s kind of weird for me to say that, and I’m sorry if that’s scary or overwhelming, but…therapy for the past ten years has taught me I have to face this shit as soon as it comes up.”

She paused and picked at the deli meat that had escaped the bread. “And at the same time, I have to ask you to be patient with me. One day I might be handsy and the next day I may cower in terror of the touch of skin.”

I was astonished at her honestly. I felt a constriction in my chest that wasn’t unpleasant but nervous. She was admitting her feelings for me.

“Can I ask...?”

“I can’t answer,” she said. “I’ve told the story too many times, and I can’t do it again.” She put her hand on mine. “That’s on me. It has nothing to do with you. What it is, what happened destroyed me. There wasn’t much left to save, and what is left is stitched together with the life I managed to scrape up with my friends and my brother.” She took her hand back. “And I want you to know. I just can’t be the one to tell you. If and when you think you’re ready, talk to Jess. She’s my designated story keeper. She’ll tell you what happened.”

This had gotten much heavier than I thought it would. But her trust and her honesty with me made me believe this was going to head in the direction we both wanted it to.

After long minutes, she looked up from the sandwich and found my eyes. “Can you be patient with me? Take this all slow?”

“I will take this all at the pace you dictate.” I smiled.

For my mate, I was willing to wait a lifetime.

“I’m warning you, it’s going to be a weird ride.”

I snorted. That was an understatement, and she had no idea that it wasn’t her who was the problem. We were going to be in for a wild ride on both sides of this one.

Keeping myself from outright staring at her, I took a few bites of my sandwich and caught what I could from the side of my vision.

She was gorgeous and perfect. And every right reason I had to burn that mattress. I wanted to know more about her, but I wasn’t sure what I could ask without upsetting her.

“You have a brother?” It seemed a safe question.

“I do. Winter. He’s awesome. Former Navy SEAL. He works out of Pearl Harbor Hickam as an underwater welder.”

“So he’s still in?”

“No. He didn’t reup this last time. He went into welding instead. He’s a private contractor to the Navy, but he also contracts out to other companies.” She smirked. “He’s not cheap. Underwater welding is unique and highly specialized.”

“Underwater? Isn’t that counterproductive?”

“You’d think so, but that’s why he gets paid what he does.”

“Older?”

“Oh, yeah. Ten years. I was an unhappy accident until Win came out of the closet. Then they disowned him, and I became everything.” She twitched her nose. “Well, not everything. But they stopped treating me like a mistake all the time.”

“What did you want to do with your degree?”

“General Human resources. In other words, I have a degree and no idea what I want to do with it. So here I am, in Alaska with my friends trying to figure it out and relax for a few months. Once in a lifetime chance, why not.”

Nodding, I chewed on my sandwich. “Sounds like a plan to me. Real life sucks.”

“It really does.”

I chewed on my sandwich a minute and smiled. “Well, how about you come with me on Monday? I have a flight planned into BC to do a bear count, and I’m always happy to have company.”

“Are you helping your brother?”

“Most of the time, but this is the cub count and he knows it’s important.”

She smiled shyly. “I’d love it. Do we get to land again? And check out the area?”

“I usually do.” I smiled back. I loved the cub count, but it was so long and tedious without someone there to at least talk to. “It’s an overnight. We have to do some hiking. We’ll sleep in the plane. Are you okay with all that?”

“Oh, yeah.” Her grin was genuine. “Definitely. Winter taught me a lot of survival skills. I’m not terrible in the great outdoors.” Addi smirked. “I just prefer being able to shower.”

“Me too, babe. Me too. Ripe is the best way to attract a bear.”

She glanced over the dark mirror of the lake. “Are you busy this weekend?”

Well, fuck.

Taking a deep breath, I nodded. “Yeah, actually I am. I have to go down to Vancouver this weekend. I leave Friday morning and get back on Monday afternoon.”

“Fly down?”

I grinned. “In my own plane, thank you very much.”

Her eyebrow rose. “You love that thing, don’t you?”

“She’s my baby. She’s worth a lot more than parts or the market value. I fly her every chance I get.”

That just happened to be twice a month down to Van to take care of business. I didn’t resent that fact, but now it was taking weekends away when I could be wooing my mate.

Could be worse. I guessed.

Chapter Six

I was finally able to find Jess on Friday morning. She was wrestling some contact paper into a cabinet, and I cleared my throat.

“Damn it, Zanna, no, I’m not done yet.”

“Definitely not Zanna.” I coughed.

She whipped her head around and found me there. “Oh, Patrick. Hi.” I watched as she turned bright pink and stuck her head in the cabinet.

Stifling a laugh, I leaned against the counter next to her. Folding my arms, I kept my voice low, so my words didn’t go beyond the two of us. “Jess. The Alpha effect is nothing to be ashamed of. We’ve all grown up around it, and it just is what it is.”

She huffed. “It turned me into a pure hussy and I let your brother shag me on the living room rug of your parents’ house.”

“And they were upstairs doing the exact same thing.”

Jess whimpered. “I know.”

“I love how regular humans react to shifters and our open nudity and casual sex.” I picked at a fingernail. “Thankfully, at least, we don’t believe in traumatizing our children with random, wanton acts.”

She groaned in distress and peered around the cabinet door. “Small favors, considering I heard everything.”

I grinned. “So did we.”

Her pink turned to bright red and she stuffed her head in the cabinet again. “I’m never coming out again.”

Laughing, I patted her knee. “You’re fine, Jess. Garrett is smiling and happier than I have seen him in years. You’re good for him, and for the whole family.”

“Don’t push it, dude.” She peered at me through the crack.

“Push what?” I fluttered my eyelashes.

She glanced back at the room behind her, and it was empty. “I just found out you shifters are a real thing and that Garrett’s all about calling me his mate. It’s a bit much right now. He was a summer fling, and I’m not ready for more yet.”

“We do come on strong, don’t we?”

If she’d been wearing glasses, she’d’ve peered over them at me, sternly. A moment later, she was back in the cabinet.

“What do you want, Patrick?” She zipped the box knife down the contact paper to cut it.

“Tell me about Addi.”

There was silence, and no movement for a long minute. I heard her put the knife down, and she backed out of the tiny space. Her lips were pursed, and she stared at me. “Did she tell you to ask me?”

“Yes.”

Her eyebrows rose a fraction. “Really? Well. I didn’t think that would happen. Does she know everything about you yet?” Jess stopped herself. “No. Let’s talk outside, away from prying ears and eyes.”

“There’s a pond about a quarter mile up the hill from here. That good? No one will be there this time of day.”

She hopped off the ladder. “This time of day?”

“Let’s walk,” I said.

I led her out of the house and across the field that abutted the structure.

“Yéil’s Pond. It’s been a favorite swimming hole for generations of St. Terese pups,” I explained. “Garrett and I were no exception. There’s a great rock there for sunning and the water is fed by a hot spring on one side and a cold spring on the other. It’s always about eighty degrees, though a little colder in the winter and spring when there’s heavy snow and melt.” I tossed a look at her. “It’s a great place to skinny dip. All year round.”

It was quiet a moment and then Jess glanced back to see how far we were from the house. Apparently, it was far enough for her. “Addi told you to ask me.”

“She did. She said you were her dedicated story keeper.”

Nodding, Jess stared down at her feet. “I am. And I’m shocked and delighted that this is where you two are. But, have you told her what else you are? Does she know about the wolves?”

“Not yet. I was going to try to tell her on Tuesday when we go out for the cub count.” Jess looked confused and I quickly explained what it was. “And Addi is going to come with me.”

“You might want to try a better approach than your brother. Break her in slowly.”

“What did my brother do?” I was almost afraid.

But Jess smirked. “Oh, he just flat out shifted. I hit him with a branch.”

“Please tell me you nailed him in the balls.”

A laugh escaped her. “No, no. Just the head on his shoulders.”

It was a relief to know that one of the Yéil Women—as everyone had started calling them—knew part of the deal. Having them all there, on shifter land, had been hard without them knowing what was going on.

Dad had a fit until Garrett turned up with Jess for dinner.

“I am going to try to do this delicately. But really? Hi, I’m Patrick, I’m a wolf shifter and your forever mate. Can I shag you stupid?” I shrugged. “It’s hard to be eloquent about that.”

Jess choked. “Please, for the love of all that’s holy, don’t do that.” Glancing at me quickly, she focused back on the path we were on. “You think she’s your mate?”

“Yes.”

There were no questions about that. I knew she was. I’d burned the mattress and started closing the connection to my dirty past.

“She must have it bad for you if she told you to talk to me.” Jess seemed to be saying it more to herself than to me. “It’s not a good past.”

“I need to know.”

“You do. Because you need to know why she’s going to run away from you more than just once.”

We broke through the cover of trees into the clearing on the edge of the pond. There was a low, flat rock that allowed someone to walk into the water, and the high plateau rock that allowed someone else to dive in. The water was deep. It had taken me getting the sonar from the school to find out how deep it actually was, and we were all shocked at the seventy foot reading that came back.

“The cold water is also from the same source as the well water for the cabin.” I pulled my shoes off and walked into the water at the low rock.

Jess perched herself on one of the boulders next to the pond and considered her feet. “So, did she tell you anything?”

“Just that this wasn’t good stuff.”

“Whatever you do, don’t bring up what I’m about to tell you, unless she engages you in conversation. Her brother, you know about him?”

“Winter, yes.”

She nodded sharply. “Her brother and I have gone to numerous therapy sessions with her about this, and how to handle it. I got to hear both her side and Winter’s side, and I became the designated storyteller because there was no way to ask her to tell the story ever again.”

I wiggled my toes in the water. “She hates home.”

Nodding, Jess picked at the rock she sat on. “She always has. Her parents were not good to her at all. She was an unhappy accident that left them with a second child. They’d only wanted Winter. For people who are so devout to God, they were pissed when God gave them another kid.

“I wouldn’t say they were abusive, but she was always second fiddle. All of Winter’s football games, band performances, birthdays, milestones were celebrated in ridiculous fashion. Addi would get a card and a cupcake after dinner. It hurt Winter to love her so much and have them act like that.

“He joined the Navy when she was eight. He got all the way to SEALs pretty damn fast. Big, brawny, smart, and clever. Winter is every woman’s fantasy, and Addi said her parents would talk constantly about the grandkids he’d give them and how they couldn’t wait to spoil them.

“So, when she was ten, they were destroyed, and I mean utterly and completely wrecked, when he came out as gay. Instantly disowned him. Kicked him out of their lives and joined a Baptist Mission to Uganda.”

“Holy crap,” I breathed. “Addi is blonde and blue-eyed and white. And they took her to Uganda?” It wasn’t a secret that white children were in demand for so many reasons. Human trafficking was ubiquitous, and by the time you took a blonde-haired, blue-eyed child into the heart of some of the worst areas of the world, it was a guarantee.

“They took her to Uganda. But you know, it was safe because they were up by Sudan and the Congo.”

I stared at Jess. “They stole her.”

She nodded ever so slightly. “After Winter begged them to let her stay with him on base. After numerous people warned them what they were taking her into, they still took her to Uganda. She was taken after just five days at the camp.”

I wanted to throw up. I had never ever felt like that before. “Five days.”

“She was traded and moved and raped and used for two years. From twelve until fourteen. She was a housekeeper, a good luck charm, a blessing, a curse, a cure for STDs. You name it, she was used for it. She was so disassociated from herself she has a different name for herself during those two years. Ghalyela. Not sure what language that is, but she says it means valuable.

“And she was. To the men and women who used her for whatever ends.”

“Tell me this has a happy ending.”

Jess gave a less than enthusiastic one-shoulder shrug. “Sort of? With her last owner, they were disgusted that she was still intact.”

I tripped backward out of the water and landed on my ass, not even caring that I looked like a fool. “Intact…”

Jess nodded. “She was beyond the age for the cut.”

Bile seared my throat.

“So, he had someone he knew who once saw a circumcision come to his house to give Addi one.”

Air was stuck in my lungs. I couldn’t believe I was hearing this.

Jess took a hard breath. “He fucked it up. Big time. And they left her to bleed to death in the bush.”

I gagged and puked a little into the grass. I got my stomach to settle a moment later and grabbed a handful of the pond water to scrub my mouth. “They cut her and left her to die.”

“They didn’t get the cut right. The guy who did it had no idea what he was doing. They didn’t understand female anatomy.” Jess paused and caught her breath. “They cut off one of her outer vulvar lips and scored deep across her clitoris. Just one, and that’s when her owner realized that this guy had no idea what he was doing. The two of them dragged her out of the house, bleeding and dying and shoved her under a bush.”

I felt sick again, but I held on to myself. Addi was at the house—something had to have happened to get her here, to Alaska.

“Winter had express permission from his CO to find her. And he did, just minutes after all this happened. They had located her and were just a few minutes too late to stop it. But he gathered her up and carried her back to the helicopter they had waiting. Those men…disappeared. They are probably dust and bones under that same bush in the Sudan.”

“Did Winter finish them off?”

“His squadmates. He was too worried about Addison to care. Pretty sure a lot of the people who touched his sister didn’t live much after those few days.”

“Good.”

Jess nodded in agreement. “Winter got her back to the hospital, and then back to the States. She had lost a lot of blood, but that was easily remedied. He tried to get custody of her because her parents were disgusted by her.”

“It was their fault—”

Holding up her hand, Jess motioned for me to tone it down. “I know it was. You know that. But they were disgusted that she was so…dirty and unclean. They wouldn’t surrender her to Winter, though. They spent four years praying over her, ritually bathing her after every period, baptizing her in the river at sunrise every fourth Sunday.”

I didn’t ever want to meet her parents.

Jess sighed. “She endured their bullshit while Winter paid for her real treatment—therapists, psychiatrists, social workers, doctors, surgeons. She had the best of everything. And she and Winter plotted her escape to college. Addi wound up in our dorm, and we took her under our wings.

“Once Winter realized he could trust us with her, he asked me to help with her recovery, and that’s how I wound up here with you today on this rock.”

I stared at the crystal clear blue water in front of me. There was so much to absorb about this. “I’m going to be rude about some of this, aren’t I?”

“That’s why I’m here. I’m the bumpers in the bowling lane of Addi’s life. Me and Winter. We want to see her happy and that means guiding the ball once in a while.”

“How…metaphorical.”

She chuckled. “I rather liked it. But you can ask me anything. I won’t break your fingers if you’re rude.”

I lined up some questions in my brain and tried to sort them a bit. “She’s had surgery?”

“Emergency on the base, reparative in Oklahoma. Eventually, restorative to some degree. There is still scaring and some lack of feeling on the lip itself and on the line that scored the clitoris.”

Deep breath and another question. “Psychological scars?”

“Many and deep. She has triggers, including any kind of sharp instruments. Most times, she’s okay. It only takes a deep breath to regain control. But occasionally… well, she went full on panic in bio lab when the TA pulled out a scalpel and stared slicing a pig open. That required Xanax and two of us restraining her in a special blanket.”

“A thundershirt?”

Jess started laughing. “If you call it that, she’ll slug you. It’s called weighted blanket for humans.”

“Well, now I have to buy her a thundershirt.”

“You’ll end up eating it, whole.”

We both chuckled a bit, the levity desperately needed at that moment.

I had more questions. “Therapist?”

“Several, though she’s down to just one now, who specializes in sexual trauma and sexual dysfunction.”

Shaking my head, I dropped it into my hands. “She’s…”

“Fully functional, but Patrick…she doesn’t feel sexual desire. Or, hadn’t until you. She swore she would never ask me to tell someone about all this until she felt desire. And she’s apparently doing much better than I thought because she didn’t run, she told you to come talk to me, and I didn’t have to find her weighted blanket to calm her down when the feeling hit.”

I nodded. “That’s why she asked me to be patient. That some days she’ll be handsy and other days she’ll run screaming.”

“Bingo. It’s just that with all this, adding your hairy problems to it, it’s going to be a bit to handle.”

“It will be, but I think I’m kind of determined to make this work with her. We only get one mate in life, and I want to find out more about her.”

“Things like her favorite color and food? Things not related to her previous life.”

“Exactly.” I nodded. “Thank you, Jess. Now I know, and now I know what I have to do.”

Jess gave me a smile. “I hope you get her to feel everything without fear again.”

Chapter Seven

It wasn’t sunrise when Patrick banged on the door.

That was way too early. The sun came up in Alaska at four a.m. this time of year. I was not a morning person.

“Come on, sleepyhead,” he chided through the door.

“Fuck you.”

He chuckled. “Come on, Addi. Up and at ’em, we have to get the plane prepped and ready to go.” He turned the knob and cracked the door open wide enough to look in.

I stuck my middle finger up from under the blankets.

“Don’t make me come in there.”

Hoisting my other hand, I offered the other middle finger. The sheets yanked back and I shrieked at the sudden cold air.

And the fact that I was wearing a T-shirt and panties.

“Patrick!” I groped for the bedding.

“Mmm. Ice cream.” He waggled his eyebrows at the little ice cream cones on my pink underwear.

Finally, I just settled for a pillow and pulled that over my lap. “Damn it, it’s cold and early and I’m not decent.”

“I don’t know about that.”

Grabbing the other pillow, I whaled him on the side of the head. He chuckled and grabbed it before it hit the bed.

“Come on. The count takes all day and I want to be back here by sundown. I hate trying to close up the plane in the dark.”

I sighed, then stared at him. “You can leave.”

“Do I have to?”

He was playing with me, and by God, I liked it. Flirting was fun.

Lifting the pillow, I gave him a long-suffering sigh. Then before he could say or do anything, I hit him in the face with it, knocking him back on the bed as I vaulted up and out of his reach.

Patrick was fast, though. He was in front of me a half a heartbeat later with one of the pillows. He hefted it in his hand, weighing it. “Hmm.”

“Let me get dressed. In private.”

He shrugged and stepped back, but there was mischief in his eyes. I took a step back and turned to grab some clothes out of my bag.

The pillow hit me square on the ass.

Insulted and shocked, I gasped and jumped. “Patrick!” I spun—

Only to find myself backed against the wall, bracketed by his arms, and his face just inches from mine. His eyes roamed every inch of my face, tracing my lips and cheeks and chin without even a featherlight touch.

“I like your panties.”

Jesus jumping crickets. I could feel myself knotting up with desire. Butterflies were hovering in my stomach, and they were the lusty ones, not the frightened ones.

“Do you now?” I asked softly.

“I’d like them more on the ground.”

My butterflies moved from hovering to ‘practicing gymnastics.’ “Would you?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“What happened to taking this slow?”

“If we weren’t, they’d already be on the ground and you’d be riding dirty, cowgirl.”

I wasn’t quite sure what sound my brain made and thought it was appropriate. But I was in agreement, hrrrnnnngggghh was about right.

His eyes were watching my lips. “I’m going to kiss you now, Addi.”

I gasped a little.

“I want you to know what I’m doing. I don’t want you to be scared.”

My voice was barely a whisper. “You talked to Jess.”

“I did. And I want to kiss you.”

I heaved the air in and out of my lungs. “Yes.”

Even though his hands were on either side of me, caging me in, I didn’t feel trapped at all. I felt…warm. Flush. Excited.

He lowered his head to mine and his lips were the softest touch on mine. Patrick sipped from me at first. Just the lightest, butterfly touch of skin on skin. Fluttering, sampling, tasting.

I was feeling brave, and I pressed forward a bit, making the kiss deeper, more severe. God, he tasted good. Raspberries and summer, fresh meadows and clean evening air.

His hand wrapped around the back of my neck, his fingers teasing my hair. And then he kissed me.

Warm lips teased mine open carefully and he stopped sipping and started drinking from me. I canted my head, and with more boldness than I had ever felt before, I touched his tongue playfully with mine.

He, however, was not shy. As soon as I pulled back, he followed me and twisted his taste around me. Each of his flavors found their way deep into the recesses of our kiss. I felt almost as though he were imprinting on me in some weird way. As deep as our kiss got, it was never hard, or harsh. Every demand was really a question, and I adored the feeling of his fingers in my hair. Twirling, petting, stroking—just simply touching me.

Feeling brave, I lifted my hand to the back of his neck and found the edge of his hair. I mirrored his motions and it elicited a little moan from him.

Pulling back a bit, he dusted small kisses over me for a moment and rested his forehead on mine.

“Damn, babe. We gotta stop. You don’t have enough clothes on for this.”

I laughed. “Maybe I have too many.”

Patrick grunted. “Mmm. No. I’m going to stop. I like you too much to push that far. Please put on pants and meet me in the kitchen?”

“Never thought you’d tell a girl to put her pants on, eh?”

“Never thought I would meet anyone like you.”

I melted a little and kissed him again, softly.

He groaned and shook his head, pulling back a moment before we were going to start really making out. “No, no. We have all day to steal kisses. Let’s get this show on the road.”

Backing up, he trailed his hand down my neck, over my collar, and down my chest, pulling away just before he reached the swell of my breast. “You’re going to kill me.”

Grinning, I lowered my lids and did my best to give a look of shy desire. “But won’t that be the best way to die?”

He coughed, and his hand rubbed over the clear erection in his pants. “Meet me in the kitchen. I’ll be there in five.”

“That’s fast.”

“I’m ready to come in my pants right here.” He turned on his heel and marched out as I let my laugh out.

This was going to be fun. I never thought I would have fun flirting and being dirty. I really hoped the PTSD didn’t decide to rear its ugly head.

After I pulled on my clothes and packed a small backpack, I grabbed my Xanax just in case. I liked the way I felt at that moment—I wanted to feel like that always.

* * *

Despite having offed the hard-on just a few hours before—and thirteen-year-old boy quick at that—there was a constant threat of a new one the whole time.

When she had let me kiss her, I wanted to be greedy and take so much more. She’d tasted like Turkish Delight: sweet roses that melted in your mouth. She smelled like a garden in spring, fresh and new and hopeful. There was just a touch, the tiniest taste, of fear, but she seemed to be so caught up in the decadence of the moment that she didn’t pay attention to it.

It took everything I had to walk away from her. She was offering more than I thought she was ready to give.

My dick, on the other hand, was ready, willing, and able. Again.

I pulled the yoke back and pushed the little plane into the sky. As usual, she purred and spun her merry props, pulling us up into the blue sky. It was a good day for this cub count. The clouds weren’t out yet, but the way the air felt and looked, there would be a thin veil of cirrus later, giving us enough sun without blinding us.

My count territory was along the US-Canada border, up toward the south end of the St. Elias Range all the way down to Ketchikan. It was only about fifty miles wide, but there were prime den spots I knew about.

Thanks to Amos and his clan.

It was a fantastic help to have a bear shifter who could find the dens and pass the information along. He and two other Alphas had the whole area covered and were happy to help. They had a great affinity for the resident black, brown, and grizzlies that shared the territory.

A lot of times, Amos, Headly, and Luther sent out a few of their clan to find and disarm bear traps. There were always unsavory hunters and with a lot of territory being lost to encroaching humans, the traps were not only dangerous to them, but to unwary travelers.

Idiot tourists, really.

There was more than once I had been called out on the plane at three in the morning for an emergency extraction for some tourist that had gotten all turned around in the woods.

I usually wanted to beat them with their fancy assed, good for nothing, hiking boots and pole.

Heading south, I took the plane high at first. “We’re going to wind back and forth up toward the coastal range. I’m going to be really low, just a few dozen feet off the top of the trees.”

“That low?” Addi asked through the headset.

“Yup. We just have to check the meadows for the bears. They’ll be out during the day, trying to find berries and small game. But bears are lazy hunters. They’ll only hunt easy stuff.”

“Like salmon upstream.”

“En masse. If there aren’t enough they won’t even try, but yes. Like that.”

“How long does this usually take?”

“By myself? Twelve hours. We’ll both be looking, so it should take a lot less. We’ll set down for lunch just on the other side of Mendenhall and continue after. We should be back for dinner.”

“Sounds like a plan.” I could hear the smile in her voice.

“If you see a bear, call it out and see if there are cubs. Don’t wait for me to confirm anything before you start taking notes. We get only one pass. We don’t like to scare these guys by flying over and over.”

“Got it.” She patted her notepad.

We chatted idly as we made our way to Ketchikan, and then the words disappeared as we concentrated on counting bears and cubs. I knew that Addi couldn’t tell, but I was following from location to location that Amos had passed along, as well as a few I knew of myself.

The count, by the halfway point, was looking healthy. Lots of twins and more than a smattering of triplets. The chances that all of them would make it was small, but it was good to see the large numbers.

I set the plane down just opposite Juneau in British Columbia. The government knew we were doing the flight today, so it was not an issue or a secret.

The Taku River ran from the glaciers out to the Inside Passage near Juneau and eventually to the Pacific. This time of year, it ran high and fast and I was able to plop the plane down on the water. We were half swept down the river, and half motored to the bank.

Jumping out, I found some nice solid gravel and trees on what was usually a very silty, soft bank and tied us up. Out came the picnic basket and we plunked down on a fallen trunk.

The first little while we compared notes, and I was surprised to find hers not only extremely detailed, but clearly a separate set of data from the ones I had collected.

“I need to bring a second set of eyes more often. We only have about three overlapping bears.”

“It was easy once I got the hang of telling the difference between a boulder and a larger brown furry creature.”

I gave her a look. “What was it?”

“The boulders are gray. The bears are not. Also, boulders don’t generally lumber through a meadow.”

Tossing my head back, I let out a laugh. “That’s true. If the boulders were walking I’d worry about what kind of mushrooms my pizza had last night.”

Addi’s easy smile was the best thing in the world. I wanted to keep that smile on her face always, and I really hoped I was doing everything the right way. I had just about ten weeks to convince her to stay.

My wolf whined and reminded me immediately that we had some serious explaining to do.

“So, disastrous housing situation aside, how do you like Alaska so far?”

Lame.

“It’s gorgeous up here. I mean, for a place that has a rep as being cold and bleak, it’s not. There’s some real greenery going on. And those lakes! The one we flew over the Tutsamine? I’ve never seen blue like that before.”

“I’m going to have to fly you over a few of the glacial lakes. They get even more blue. Bright almost white blue. They’re gorgeous. And the mountains are something else. There’s still snow on the peaks.”

“Glaciers.” I looked up at the mountains between us and the ocean. “They’re dying, though. Almost all of them. The retreat has been astounding, and even I can see how far they’ve gone. It hurts the land and the animals and the people.”

“Your dad is actually chief of the compound…” Addi pulled out a drink from the picnic basket.

“Dad is chief of the Tlingit people in the compound,” I answered. “Not everyone is native. Not everyone is Tlingit. There are a few Tsimshian, a few Athabaskans, and a Tagish family who…well.”

She wasn’t ready for the shifter part of that just now.

“So, Garrett will be chief someday?”

“In… a manner of speaking. Darius is actually the oldest, and it’s his right to claim it if he wants. But…”

“But?”

“Well, there’s more to being the chief than just being born to the chief. Darius doesn’t have the abilities.”

Addi’s eyebrows went up. “Abilities. Like sight? Or like negotiations?”

“More than that,” I said. “It’s kind of hard to explain really. It’s a little weird. I mean, not to us, but to everyone else outside it is.” Jumping Jesus on a pogo stick, this was hard. “We have a lot of traditions that don’t make sense to people, but they are important.”

“I get that. There’s lots of native traditions that non-natives don’t understand. Nor do we need to. We just need to respect what they are not force the kids to go to English schools and forget their traditions.”

“That was insightful.”

She grinned. “I grew up in Oklahoma. The Cherokee people have been wonderful to the non-natives in the area. They’ve taught us how to share and be kind. I used to go to one of their powwows every year, and a couple of my friends in school were Cherokee. Like a lot Cherokee. My best friend in second grade was named Blue-That-Thunders.”

I wanted to have this conversation with her. I was proud of my Tlingit heritage, but it wasn’t the direction I needed at that moment. Taking a moment, I tried again.

“Do the Cherokee have tattoos?”

“Absolutely, they have a set of specific tattoos that mean different things on different parts of the body. Blue got a turtle on her back at eighteen. Her mother paid for it.”

Now I wanted to know more, but that was another distraction. “We get them at twenty-two.” I lifted up the back of my shirt and twisted so she could see the tattoo of the St. Terese-Mendenhall pack.

She traced her fingers over the shoulder and I knew this hadn’t been my best idea. Her fingers were soft and careful as they outlined the tattoo. Antlers for the elk, a wolf head for us, two paws for the bear, wings for the eagles, and a raven’s feather, for the long-gone raven shifters that had been part of our pack once.

I didn’t want her to take her fingers away. My wolf was in agreement, but also wanted me to get on with it so he could show off.

“Everyone gets these?”

“Most everyone. The Moonborn usually choose not to.”

“Moonborn?”

I swallowed. “Those without the ability to…”

She gasped. “You’re a seer?”

“No, no, ha. No way. I’m not.”

“You’re trying very hard to tell me something here, Patrick. I get that.” She took my hand. “Go ahead. I promise I won’t run screaming.”

That didn’t help me at all. “All right. So…” I stopped and glanced behind her.

…crunch…

My wolf’s ears perked up. The sound had been soft and a little distant. It was the crunch of a patch of pine under a padded paw.

“What—”

I put a finger over her lips and shook my head. A few more soft, nearly inaudible shushes of padded paws walked toward us. I leaned into her and kept my voice to a whisper. “I need you to get into the plane, quickly. Close the door and stay down.”

“What’s going on?” she breathed.

I looked at the brush behind her.

Too late.

“Coyotes.”

The fuckers had walked all the way out here from the Yéil lands? Or were they haunting the Taku river outside their old pack as well? This wasn’t good, in any case. Fergus was going to have to do something about them, soon.

I locked eyes with Carson, the pack Beta, and he snarled at me.

It was a distraction so the other two in the brush to the sides could charge us.

“Get in the plane!” Grabbing her arm, I practically threw her at the pontoon. “Get in! Get in!”

Scrambling as fast as she could, Addi managed to get out onto the pontoon and tried to pull the door open. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the coyote jump up on the pontoon with her.

I didn’t have a chance to do anything. Carson launched at me and I had no choice.

Chapter Eight

The door was stuck, and no amount of yanking was able to get it unstuck.

I was panicking and that wasn’t good. I knew there was a hunting rifle in the plane—I’d seen it earlier—but it did me no good at that moment.

The coyote leapt onto the pontoon with me and growled at me. He started walking toward me, one filthy paw at a time, backing me away from the door to the cabin.

Keeping a hand on the plane, I backed up. I knew the pontoon wasn’t that much longer and the water was moving fast just a few feet off the stern of the plane.

“Nice coyote,” I managed. “Please stop. I didn’t know this was your territory.”

He growled again, never halting his advance.

A quick glance told me I had only about six steps until I was in the water. Shit. Could coyotes swim?

“Come on, boy. Stop. I didn’t know.” Why was I trying to reason with a wild animal? There was no way he could understand me.

I was now at the edge of the pontoon, standing on one of the ropes that Patrick had coiled there in case he needed it. That was handy.

I didn’t know if coyotes could swim, but I knew I could, and I knew that if I jumped in the river, I would be swept away and die from hypothermia in about fifteen minutes. The whole thing was racing because of glacial meltwater. My arms and legs would seize up PDQ once I was in that water.

The coyote walked forward again, and I had no choice. I reached down, grabbed the end of the rope, and wound it around my hand and wrist.

I stepped off the back of the pontoon.

Holy fuck, I was wrong. The water was just above freezing. I’d be dead in five minutes.

It closed over my head and dragged me downstream. I couldn’t feel my legs already, but I forced them to kick me back to the surface. Breaking through, I took a huge gulp of air and felt the rope yank tight, stopping me from being swept out to sea.

I had to get out of the water, now.

The wet head of the coyote sped toward me, snarling. Forcing my feet up again, I kicked his chest and sent him out into the current and gave myself a boost back to the shoreline.

The muddy bottom of the river succeeded in sucking off one of my boots, but I was able to crawl to a patch of rocks and make my way back up out of the water and belly flop onto the shore.

I couldn’t believe what I was seeing in front of me.

A giant brown and red wolf, one of the biggest I’d ever seen, was snarling at four more coyotes, with two on the ground, either dead or knocked out. He was trying to fend them off, keep them away from the plane and—

Where was Patrick?

I didn’t have time to try to answer my own question because three more coyotes came out of the bushes behind the wolf and were clearly planning an attack from the rear.

Wild fucking Kingdom, live. Get your tickets now. You get the whole seat, but you’ll only need the edge.

I forced my still numb arms and legs to haul me toward the plane. I had to get that rifle. I didn’t want the wolf to get hurt either. With an unbelievable amount of pain, I hoisted my numb, wet body onto the pontoon and tried to stand.

Didn’t work out well. I fell back onto my ass.

“Watch out!” I finally screamed at the wolf as the other coyotes tried to close in.

One of those turned and snarled at me. It chuffed at its packmates and cut away from them, heading for me.

I couldn’t survive another swim.

An earth-shaking roar came from the forest on my left. There was the sound of breaking branches and crushed underbrush, accompanied by a chuff-pant that was unique to just one animal in the world.

A grizzly bear.

A second later, the biggest damn bear I had ever seen broke through the trees and headed straight for me.

I was convinced I was dead.

Instead of attacking me, he skidded to a halt in front of me and roared. The coyote stopped and looked pissed off. The bear chuff-panted again and gave an odd bark. The mangy animal sidestepped, and the bear moved to keep him from me.

The bear was on my side?

Apparently tired of dealing with the massive grizzly, the coyote charged him. Stupid move. The huge brown-furred bear merely swiped his paw through the air and tossed the coyote at a tree.

There was a thud, and the coyote hit the ground, unmoving.

The grizzly turned and chuffed at me, taking a few steps toward me. I raised my eyebrows and couldn’t help thinking that he hadn’t saved me in an altruistic sense, but in a damn I’m hungry sense.

And I was still a lunch snack. Just for a bear now.

He stuck his giant muzzle right in my hair and snuffled about for a moment. Then he went to my neck and snuffled there. Another soft puff of breath, and he was gone, chasing after the wolf and the other coyotes.

How I hadn’t crapped my pants by now was a mystery best left unsolved.

Forcing myself to my feet, I hopped up on the pontoon and managed to scoot myself down to the ladder. Pulling myself up, I hung on the door and turned the knob. The damn thing finally opened, and I was able to crawl in.

There were two guns, not one. One was a tranquilizer gun and one was a regular rifle. I had a choice! I didn’t have to kill anyone or anything.

I grabbed the tranq gun and sat on the edge of the plane’s ladder. The wolf and the bear were making neat work of the coyotes—there was a pile of them on the right, and only two still left standing.

Three. I spied the third deep in the woods, watching.

I lifted the gun and spied through the scope.

He was watching calmly, with thoroughly human eyes and a dangerously intelligent spark in them. Turning just a bit, he looked straight at me. Not through, not at my forehead or the plane. At me.

He scared me.

I released the safety and shot the tranq dart at his shoulder.

He moved fast and was gone into the trees. The dart imbedded in the trunk there.

“Shit.”

“Addi!”

Patrick was jogging at me. There were no more coyotes standing upright, and he was covered in mud and completely naked.

What the hell had I missed?

“Why are you wet?”

“Why are you naked?”

He stopped and realized his junk was just hanging in the breeze. With a yelp, he grabbed what looked like part of his shirt and two sleeves. He tied it around his waist, covering his manhood.

I had to bite back my smirk. It had been an impressive manhood.

Yessiree.

I coughed. Yipes. Survival stupidity, Winter had called it. Inappropriate thoughts brought on by the adrenalin the situation had summoned up in the body.

Patrick marched toward me again. “Why are you wet?”

“I had to get away from the coyote on the pontoon. Oh my God, look out!”

The bear was lumbering quickly toward me from the left. It reared up with another air-trembling roar and stood nearly ten feet on his hind legs. I lifted my gun and aimed for the joint of his leg and shoulder.

“No!” Patrick was screaming and running toward the bear. “No! No! Don’t do it!”

The bear shrank, and the fur fell away.

A man stood there instead.

What. The actual. Fuck.

* * *

Amos couldn’t be held at fault, really. I hadn’t had a chance to tell him that Addi didn’t know. I charged at him, hoping she thought I was yelling at her to not dart the damn grizzly shifter.

“No! Don’t do it! Don’t—”

But I was too late. He shrank down to his normal six-foot-six from his massive ten-foot bear and lost his fur. He shook off for a moment and grinned at me.

“Good fight, Patrick.”

“What the fuck?” Addi lowered the gun and looked horrified and confused. She yelped and scooted back in the plane.

“Shit.” I ran a hand through my hair.

Amos looked terrified. “Did she not know?”

“I was trying to tell her.”

“Oh, dude. Man, I’m sorry.”

I shook my head and ran to the plane, leaping up the ladder. Addi had pushed herself to the other side and was shaking her head.

“What…what did I just see? Oh, God, don’t let this be the PTSD…”

“No, Addison. No. It’s not you.”

“That bear just turned into a man.”

“Hi.”

Without thinking, I punched Amos in the face and sent him backward from the plane. I was barely able to grab his arm before he fell in the water. “You’re not helping me! She’s scared shitless. Goddamn it, Amos.”

“Sorry. I thought I would just relieve some of the tension.” He looked sheepish, which was a feat for a massive grizzly shifter.

Addi whimpered from inside the plane. “You are a bear.”

“Amos Jagger, at your service.” If the man had a hat, he would have tipped it. “Alpha of the Taku River Bear Clan.”

“You’re a bear?”

“Grizzly shifter, ma’am.”

“Shifter…”

I slapped my hand over Amos’s mouth. He was a great guy, but this was my job. “Shifters are people who can literally shift into another creature. Amos is a grizzly.”

Her lips trembled, and I could see tears pooled in the corners of her eyes. “And you?”

“I’m a wolf.”

She put her hand over her mouth. “The coyotes?”

“Shifters. Exiled, for a crime years ago. An unforgivable one.”

“They should have been executed, not exiled.” Amos’s voice was low and threatening. And his opinion was shared by most of the Juneau Packs.

“Did you kill them?” Addi was terrified.

“No, they’re all just unconscious.” I wished I could kill them. They all deserved it.

“Even the mutt you kicked downriver is fine,” Amos said.

My eyes went wide and stared at Addi. “What happened?”

“He was trying to eat me or kill me or something,” she said. “I jumped in the river and he followed. I kicked him off to get to the shore.”

Amos slapped my shoulder. “It was a good kick, too. But he managed to swim to the other shore about five hundred feet down. Good woman, Pauler. I’m going to head out and do some more patrolling. Good luck.”

Amos backed off the pontoon and Addi crawled at me and the door. As Amos picked up speed, he leapt in the air, and by the time he hit the ground again, he was in full bear and lopping off into the trees.

“He’s a bear.” Addi looked at me. “And you’re really a wolf?” She let out a little gasp. “You were the brown and red wolf!”

“I am.” I nodded. “I was trying to be more delicate about telling you.”

“Before…”

“Yeah, before. When the coyotes attacked. I was trying to explain this. I wanted you to know what was going on.”

She bit her lip and readjusted the way she was sitting. Her feet dangled out of the plane, and I realized she was still soaking wet.

“Christ, let me get you the thermal wrap.” I started to climb into the plane.

She grabbed my arm. “Show me.”

“The blanket? Sure, it’s—”

“No. Show me the wolf. Your wolf. Your shift.”

I stopped. “What?”

“I saw Amos shift. I didn’t see you.”

“You weren’t supposed to,” I admitted. “I hadn’t actually told you, so I was trying to—”

“I know now. Please show me.”

She was honest, and eager, to see my wolf. The bastard stood a little taller.

“Addi. There’s more. This isn’t just…me showing you. I wasn’t just going to tell you, because we don’t just tell people that we can do this. That we are these animals. There’s much more to it.”

She wrinkled her nose. “What do you mean?”

I picked her up a bit and scooted her to the side of the door, hopping up in my ridiculous ripped shirt-apron. But I wasn’t going to put this off.

“We don’t tell people about our ability to shift. It’s dangerous. We’d end up in government labs or shunned from the rest of humanity.”

Addi was shivering. I leaned forward in the plane and pulled out the emergency kit, jerking it open and grabbing the metallic thermal wrap inside. After unfolding it, I wrapped it around her and pulled her close, wrapping it around me as well. I knew I ran warm.

“So why are you telling me this?” Her question was from between chattering teeth.

“Because there’s something else that shifters have that regular humans don’t. A mate. A perfect companion. A biologically, psychologically, sociologically, sexually perfect mate.”

Despite being damn frozen, Addi’s entire body went still. “And?”

“And my wolf says you’re it for me.”

She stared at me for a moment, then out at the woods, and then down at the ground and water below the plane. “That’s a goddamn tall order, Patrick Pauler.”

“I know. That’s why I tried to do this carefully. Slowly. After Jess and I talked the other day, it was important to me to tell you the whole truth, about shifters and why…well. Why I would wait for an eternity for you to be ready.”

“Eternity?”

“We only get one mate, Addi. One chance in our lives to find and keep that perfect person. If it took me a lifetime to convince you, I would do it.”

“If I say no?”

My heart sank. “Then I let you go. I’ll find someone someday, but it won’t be the same. It would only be a convenient love, not a soul deep connection.”

“I can’t say yes—”

I grabbed her hand. “I don’t need you to say yes right here, right now. I needed you to know. I need you to do whatever it is you need to do with life but know I’m here. Waiting. No secrets. No other lives.”

“Will you show me? Your wolf, I mean?”

“Of course.” I rolled my eyes. “The bastard has been prancing around, waiting to show off for at least a week now.”

She chuckled lightly, and I hopped down onto the pontoon. Offering my hand, I helped Addi off the ladder and we walked to the beach.

“Do…do you have spare clothes?” she asked.

“Always, we all keep them everywhere.” I pulled the wrinkly metallic fiber tighter around her and smiled. “Keep covered. You’ll start to feel better in a few minutes.”

I walked a few steps away and turned my back to her, untying the remains of the shirt from my waist. Before it hit the ground, I let the wolf erupt out of me.

He took his time so she could see all of us, the whole change. It didn’t hurt, it never did, but it was an exhausting process this way because it was so slow.

My feet hit the ground as paws nearly a minute later, and I could see her through my wolf’s eyes.

Shocked at first, Addi stood stock-still. But a moment more, and she dropped to her knees and reached out a hand. I trotted over, and she dug her fingers into the deep fur around my neck.

“God, you’re beautiful,” she whispered.

I licked her cheek, just a little. She giggled, and I took the opportunity to really get a good sniffing session in. I hadn’t been able to, and the sensation of drawing her scent into me, searing her forever into my mind, was pure ecstasy.

Walking around her, I sniffed everything. Her hair, her neck, her back, her arms. She giggled while my puffs of breath tickled her in all different places. She still had just a hint of the spice of fear, but it was fading.

“You’re tickling me, Patrick.”

Woof. I certainly was. I loved listening to her giggle.

“Shift back, please?”

I plopped my furry butt right next to her and shifted back. She was grinning. “That’s amazing.”

I grabbed the remains of the shirt and stuffed it on my lap. I didn’t want to make Addi uncomfortable with my dick flopping in the mud. “I’m sorry I couldn’t get the words out fast enough before. I knew I needed to tell you so we didn’t run into a problem. Like Garrett.”

She gasped. “Your brother!”

“And my sister, and both my parents. Cousins. Friends. There are very few on St. Terese who aren’t shifter, and everyone knows. It’s one of the few places we can just be who we are.”

“What happened with Garrett?”

I chuckled. “He shifted to protect Jess and got whaled with a branch in the head for scaring her. I think she also threw hot coffee at him.”

Addi’s laugh was infectious. “I would have paid money to see that!”

“Jess was the one who suggested I tell you before we had an incident like that.” I took her hand and held it loosely in mine. “I didn’t want you to be scared. But, Addi, you held your own.”

“Of course I did. My brother is a former Navy SEAL. You think that he didn’t teach his little sister how to fend for herself? I knew how long I had in that water.” She paused. “Which I quickly amended once I actually jumped in.”

“I’m sorry you had to.”

“Hey, whatever. We got the job done.”

I studied her a moment. “That we did.”

She smirked. “This is the part where you kiss me.”

“Oh, is it?”

“Damn skippy.”

I was more than happy to oblige.

Chapter Nine

The backyard still stank like the mattress Patrick had burned. I stared at the smoldering pile of chemicals and springs and shook my head.

“What the hell made you do that anyway?”

Standing up from picking the strawberries off the low bushes, Patrick glanced at me. He rubbed the back of his neck and looked really, really uncomfortable. I lifted an eyebrow.

“No lies.”

He coughed. “Right. No lies.” He bent to continue picking the strawberries. “When Garrett called that first night and told us we had to get you all away from the coyotes, I had a…nighttime guest.”

A pang of jealousy shot through me. That was interesting. “So just for that?”

“She was not the first. It was not the first time she was there either.” He sighed. “I’ve been a bit of a playboy for a while and the thought of…”

Now, I was interested. “Of what?”

“I knew you were my mate the instant I saw you at the cabin that night. Everything else fell away. I was…I am ashamed of how I’ve been acting for the past ten years, and the thought of having you in that bed made my wolf—and me—freak out.” He stood and dropped a few berries in the basket I was holding. “So, on impulse, I yanked the thing out of the bedroom, chainsawed it, and set it on fire.”

I smirked. “Dramatic much?”

It was his turn to raise an eyebrow. “I’ve never really been good with the whole what to do when you find your mate thing, so I went with it.”

“Where did you sleep until they delivered the new one?”

He swallowed. “Do not tell Jason this. I slept in Delia’s room. She wasn’t there. Most nights. It was easier when she found out about Jason. I just shifted and slept in the closet.”

I was trying not to laugh. “What about when she was there, and she didn’t know?”

He cleared his throat. “I slept in the closet. Same spot, less fur.”

“Did she know?”

He coughed. “When she opened the door the first time and found me there, yes.”

“You-you. Not wolf you.”

Patrick nodded.

That was the end of me. I cracked up laughing, long and hard. “You were sleeping in a closet! Because you impulsively burned your mattress before buying a new one!”

“Don’t tell my brother.”

I guffawed a little more. “Oh, you don’t have to worry about that. I have no intention of letting you forget this.”

His big brown eyes stared at me, rounded in disbelief. “You’re not mad about the…manwhoring?”

“Oh, please. Lots of people sleep around. It’s not that big of a deal. I saw it in college all the time. As long as every single of them was consensual, whatever. Get you some.”

“Never anything but consensual, there’s no fun in non-con. Even asking permission can be dirty fun.” Patrick smirked. “But I have no interest in that now. My wolf kinda really likes you.”

“So…wait. Hang on. For the past ten years? How… how old are you?”

“Thirty-seven.”

My mouth dropped open and I almost spilled the strawberries. “You’re what?”

“Thirty-seven. We don’t age like regular humans. How old do you think Garrett is?”

“God, I was thinking you were like twenty-six. So, I guess my twenty-nine for him is way the hell off.”

“Way-way. He’s a hundred nineteen.”

“What?” I gaped at him.

“My older brother Darius is a hundred fifty-three. Our parents are a hundred and seventy or so.”

“Holy shit,” I breathed. “Tatianna?”

“She’s fifty. Honest. Pretty sure Mom and Dad will have another after she’s ready to fly the coop.”

“Whoa. Hold on. How long do you all live?”

“About two hundred-fifty unmated, five to seven hundred if you’re lucky enough to find your mate.”

My jaw hit the ground. “You’re serious?”

He smirked and nodded. “Absolutely.”

That was nuts. Insanity. Living half a millennium? It was unbelievable. But then again, I was talking to a wolf shifter who claimed I was his mate. What the hell did I know about real life anymore?

“How did you get these strawberries to grow like this? I thought Alaska was pretty much shit for farming.”

“This isn’t farming, it’s gardening. I have a hot house downstairs I start a lot of the fruits and veggies in. It’s got tons of beds and I’m kinda known for my amazing cucumbers and tomatoes.” He pointed to two massive gardens to our right. “I get so many I sell to some of the restaurants and offer to share with most of the people on St. Terese.”

“You are just full of surprises, Mister Pauler.” I smiled. “I would have never pegged you for a farmer—sorry. Gardener.”

“We have long months of terrible cold and a lot of snow. I do what I can. We’ve been lucky so far. You all have seen nothing but blue sky and sun. The rain will be back in a few days.”

“How much does it rain here?” I looked up at the crystal blue sky.

“There are three hundred sixty-five days in a year, right? We get precipitation three hundred of those. Only Ketchikan has us beat by sheer volume.”

I snorted. “I’m shocked people don’t have more kids then.” Oh, damn it.

He tossed his head back and laughed. “Right? You’d think they would. But, no. We can’t just pop kids out like that. There’s only certain times of the month and year we can actually get pregnant.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

“Certain specific rituals have to be done under a certain phase of the moon. We may not be moonbound by our shift, but we are moon-bound by rituals.”

“So, you don’t even really need condoms?”

“That’s a strange question, but no. We don’t get STDs and we can’t really accidentally get pregnant. Most of the time.”

“Most of the time?” I dropped the hopeful note out of my voice.

“There are accidents sometimes. Weird alignments that allow it to happen when no specific ritual was performed. Mostly under a new moon in the fall.”

“That specific?”

“Yes. But…why did you ask about the condoms?”

“I’m allergic to latex and some of the lubricants. I uh…got really close with a boy in college and I had a massive reaction to it. We didn’t even have the chance to do it and he had to rush me to the hospital.”

God, that was embarrassing. Both the incident and the admission of it. It had set me back at least another six months in therapy. More. I hadn’t been able to even look at him after that, even though I knew it was neither of our faults.

I sighed. “I’m so fucked up.”

“Latex is actually a normal allergy, Addi.” He smiled. “Lots of people are allergic to it and that’s why they make natural rubber ones.”

“Yeah, and those are usually safe with the water-based lube.”

My face shot to bright red, I could feel it. I was discussing lubes and condoms. With…

What were we? Were we dating? I didn’t know how this worked with shifters. I frowned and stared at the berries in the basket.

Patrick’s head cocked to the side and he watched me. “What did those berries do to you?”

I shot my gaze to his. “Sorry. I…”

My words died. He was staring at me like I was a tempting little snack. Wrapping his hands around the edges of the basket, he moved it to the side, then slid one of his hands around my waist, drawing me in close.

“Addi.” My name was a spoken prayer on his lips, and it washed through me, heating every nerve in my body. “You’re just about the most beautiful thing on this earth.”

“Just about?” I teased quietly.

“You give the sun and the moon a real run for their money.”

I couldn’t tease him again. His lips covered mine and he sought my tongue a heartbeat later. Flavors that made up most of Patrick flooded me again. We had spent more than a few hours making out in the past few days, but this…this felt different. Deeper. More connected. More.

A whole lot more.

Stepping back, he took my hand and walked me out of the gardens. He put the basket in the wheelbarrow as we walked by and he led me up into the house.

Oh. God, yes.

He led me into his room—the master suite, because there was nothing ‘bedroom’ about it—and into the bathroom.

His eyes roamed my face, and there was a burning hunger there. “I want you to tell me to stop the instant you feel anything other than pleasure.” The words were as soft and nebulous as the simple heat of his hands as he wrapped them around my waist.

Lost for words, I just nodded.

He slammed on the water in the shower and adjusted it, then turned back to me. His fingers were sure and firm on the buttons of my shirt, and he carefully plucked each one open. My shirt fluttered to either side, and his hands cupped my breast, weighing them, squeezing them gently inside the bra.

Running his hand up and over, he slipped the shoulders of the shirt off me, and I adjusted my arms so it could fall to the ground behind me. He made a grunt of satisfaction.

Before he could bring his hands back to work on my pants, I lifted my own and found the bottom edge of his shirt. I pulled it up, revealing an amazing set of abs, and an expansive vista of creamy, lickable skin. His hands were up, complying with my unspoken direction—get this shirt off.

A spike of desire shot through me. It was a wonderful, amazing feeling that I knew was all Patrick’s fault.

“We’re going to play a game,” he breathed against my skin. “No touching. We have to shower because we’re covered in garden dirt. You can only touch with a washcloth.”

“That’s torture.”

“That’s the fun part.” His grin was positively devilish.

My legs were shaking. I wasn’t going to make it, but I was going to try.

We’d managed shirts, and now there were pants.

Oh, yes, there were pants.

But before he let me strip his off, Patrick found the button on mine and popped it open. He carefully pulled the zipper tab down and peeled the pants to the side. The heat in his eyes clearly said he was really struggling with not touching me.

I laughed a little. “Regretting your own game, Patrick?”

He grunted and shimmied the pants over my ass.

Truth was, I was having trouble with his game as well. I wanted his hands on me.

I felt a little bit of fear creep through me.

“Patrick, stop.”

He instantly straightened, letting go of my clothes. “What’s wrong?” His voice was laced with honest concern.

“I need you to touch me,” I whispered. “I can’t do this without it.”

He kissed me, softly for only a moment and then deeper, even more possessively. The little bit of fear that crept in was swept away by the touch of his tongue to mine. His hand rested on my hip and he pulled me in close, not breaking the kiss.

“Better?”

“Much.” I smiled.

“Mmm. Same here. The hell with this. Get naked. I want you in the shower, so I can clean you up the right way.”

This time, I balked and cringed.

His hand was gentle on my face. “Addison?”

“It’s the naked part. I’m not…”

He smiled carefully. “I know. Want to leave those panties on for now? I’ll step back when it’s time to wash…”

Did I? Was I always going to fear the mutilation visited on me? He knew. He knew what the problem was. Patrick was willing to back off, let me deal with myself. Let me keep my secret.

The cuts had been shocking before plastic surgery. I had made myself look. After they were still ugly. I hated the mess.

But Patrick knew. He still wanted me naked—he still wanted to touch me.

“No.” I stepped back just a bit and pulled everything down my legs at once. “I want to feel you skin to skin.”

His breath stuttered out, and he ran his hand over my stomach, around my side. He trailed his fingers back and in a flash decision, he had his pants down and off.

Oh.

Well, this was worth fighting through.

I reached a tentative hand out to touch the large, proud cock that stood from the dark curls at its base. He twitched just a little when I wrapped my hand around him.

Oh. My.

“Addi…” It was a warning and welcome.

“Shower,” I breathed.

“Bra.” He slipped his arms around me and unfastened the last piece of clothing between us. He stole a kiss as he figured out how the damn thing worked and backed up as he drew it down my arms.

He wrapped a hand around the soft mound of flesh, marveling at it. Smoothing a hand over me, he almost seemed to weigh it, plump it, and then softly teased the peak.

“Patrick. Shower. Please. We’re both going to explode.”

He dropped kisses on my cheeks and forehead, and slowly led me into the warm water, in what my brain vaguely registered as a massive and ridiculous shower with a rainshower showerhead, and sprayer bars on either side.

Moving me a little at a time, he put me right under the cascade of the rainshower and stepped back just a bit. I lifted my head to let the water run over me and soak my hair.

“Jesus…” he whispered.

* * *

The water ran down her perfect body, highlighting curves and dips. The tips of her breasts were like high waterfalls, spilling the water over their generous shape.

Her hair glimmered and shone, gathering the water to run in rivulets down her arms, her hips, her legs.

“Oh, God, please turn around,” I whispered, fisting my cock in my hand. This was my own private show, and shit, I was going to be lucky if I didn’t come right there.

She smiled, her eyes lazy with the haze of sexual heat. Slowly, lifting her arms, she turned and ran her hands over her hair, sluicing the water out, down her back and over her pert, generous, pale, soft ass.

I couldn’t help myself. I dropped to my knees behind her and nibbled. Carefully, softly, I nipped at the round globes, brushing my hands up and down her outer thighs, feeling the satin of her skin in the water.

“Oh, God.” She moaned and pressed her hands to the tiles there. “Holy shit, Patrick…”

I adored how she never tried to shorten my name. It sounded amazing from her lips. Between nibbles, I grinned. “Someone likes this…”

“I didn’t know…”

Pressing a soft kiss just at the top of her ass, I stood and slid my hands up and over her breasts. There was absolutely nothing about this woman I didn’t find attractive.

Leaning out and grabbing a washcloth, I squirted a dollop of soap on it and started at her neck, slowly washing and lathering her from there down. She tried to turn, but I wouldn’t let her.

She nestled back against me, and my hard-as-a-rock dick settled between the cheeks of the backside. “Patrick…” Addi was enjoying it there.

So was I.

The cloth skimmed over her breasts, and I lifted one and cleaned it carefully, following in kind with the other. I ran the cloth up her arms and down her sides, over the soft skin of her stomach. I trailed over her hips to the swell of her ass, and straight up her spine. I caressed my way down one side, then the other.

I maneuvered my body so I wouldn’t have to move my cock from its cozy position and soaped the right side of her, then switched and soaped the left side.

With no choice, I slipped back to my knees behind her, and she whimpered with the loss. The cloth continued lathering, down her legs, down to her feet. I picked each one up, one at a time, and cleaned each toe delicately.

Finally, as I stood, I turned her to look into her eyes.

They were fever bright with desire.

With a little more soap, there was only one place left to clean. Circling her navel once, I skimmed the distance from there to her mound.

Addi let out a breath and leaned her forehead on mine. Christ, if we were mated I would have no fear of this, no fear of pushing too far, scaring her. But we weren’t. I had to trust her to tell me when something wasn’t good.

I trailed the cloth to one side and dipped into the crease of her leg. She swallowed and sighed. “It’s good,” she whispered.

I brushed over the deeper part of her vulva and she shuddered. I put a hand on her hip and pulled her a little closer.

Two fingers, hidden in the cloth, brushed over her entrance and she inhaled sharply, but there was no discomfort in her gasp. I dragged them forward, slowly, slowly.

The breath she had been holding hissed out quietly. “Oh, God, yes…”

Well, she was wound tighter than a drum. I had to get rid of some of her tension and what better than with an orgasm, on my hand, in my shower, and in my arms?

Nothing.

With the lightest touch I could manage, I brought my hand forward, and the cloth hit the most tender parts of her. She groaned and pressed down a little onto the cloth.

“Put your arms around me, Addi. I’ll take care of you.”

She threw her arms around my neck, and once my other arm was around her waist, I started to move the cloth with more purpose, pressing against all of her sex. I found her clit easily despite the cloth—she yelped just a little when she rode over it.

Circles and lines front to back, side to side, I kept moving the soapy cloth over her clit. She was gasping in no time flat and a minute later, she moaned and drew a hard breath.

“Oh, shit yes!” Her body went rigid against me, then let out a shriek as her synapses started firing again. She panted and heaved and dropped her head to my shoulder, pushing her whole, soapy body against me.

I gentled her down, moving us under the spray so the soap I had lathered her with washed off and away. It kept her warm, and I was able to indulge in a few of her soft, sated sighs.

“Okay?” I whispered.

“Yes.” The word was soft. “That’s the first time...”

I wrinkled my forehead for a moment and then realized exactly what she meant. “And you gave it to me. Thank you.”

She chuckled. “Well, that wasn’t so much as a giving as a convincing…”

“I’d like the chance to convince you several times this afternoon and perhaps have a lengthy discussion about how else I can convince you.”

“Lengthy.” She giggled and pulled her head up from my shoulder. “My turn?”

“If you’d like. I know I’d like, but it’s your call.”

She was exhausted. She, and I really, needed a nap. I watched as she pursed her lips and thought a moment. “I want to, but…”

Turning us to the far-left wall, I helped her sit on the warmed slate bench there. “How about I wash myself and we take a nap?”

Her eyes glinted mischievously. “I want to see you come, Patrick.”

My cock liked that idea. “Hmm?”

She leaned forward a bit and grabbed my hand, pulling me toward her. She ran a finger down my length and a magnificent sexual chill went up my spine.

Wrapping her hand around me, she moved it slowly. “When I finally started to get better, one of the things I had to work on was fantasizing. I wasn’t good at it. But one of the things that kept appearing when I tried was watching a man come. I’ve never had the chance and the more I thought about it, the more elaborate the fantasy became.”

I wrapped my hand over hers and carefully repositioned her palm and fingers. Guiding her a bit, I showed her exactly how I enjoyed being handled. “I’m more than happy to help…”

“I can see that,” she said. Her hand never stopped moving, but she peered up at me through her eyelashes. “You’re okay with this? It’s not weird?”

Resting my hands on her shoulder, I shook my head. “Oh, no. This isn’t even remotely uncomfortable. This is a man’s fantasy too… To have a sexy woman with her tight fist moving over his hard cock? And the only goal is to come? Yeah, this is just fine.”

She smiled and looked back at my erection. “I want to touch your…”

“Balls? Sac? Scrotum? You go right ahead and do that, Addi. It’s all wonderful.”

She reached back with her other hand and carefully cupped me. I was melting in this woman’s hands. She was careful and curious but determined. I wasn’t going to last long in her fingers.

She looked up at me again. “Can I…?”

I realized what was going on. “Baby, do what you need to do. I will tell you if it’s wrong or I need you to stop. You have my permission to do whatever you like to my cock, my balls, my body.”

Once more, she dropped her gaze to my erection. I watched her studying me as her hand moved over me. There was something so damn erotic about her gaze—and then her tongue darted out and she licked the pre-cum off the tip.

“Oh, fuck…” I breathed.

She gasped and looked at me.

“No, baby, no. Keep going. It feels good.”

She held my gaze and licked again.

Shit.

“Move your hand a little faster, Addi. I’m going to come for you. You tell me where you want me to.” I wanted to come for her. I was hers to command.

She moved her hand faster, up and down, while her other hand found each of the painfully ripe balls and rolled them gently. The look of genuine curiosity and wonder on her face, laced with the heat of desire, was what I needed.

I pressed my hands to the shower wall above her, just for extra support. This was happening now.

“Where, Addi?” I managed to breathe. “Where…?”

“On my tits—Oh!”

There was no stopping my climax once the word tits left those pert lips of hers. Her hand coaxed the pleasure out of me, directing me where she wanted me. The delight on her face as she controlled me, realized she was the one who made me come, was exquisite. She rung each drop of my cum from my cock, letting her hit her fresh, clean skin, and marveling at what she had done.

I pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Now we have to wash you again.”

She grinned. “Yes, please.”

I’d always been afraid that I would feel trapped by a mate. Instead, I felt free. I felt wild. This was what shifters sought their whole lives.

She smiled and unchained me from my past.

Chapter Ten

Patrick kept looking out the window, and even managed to get so distracted by…something, he hit his finger with the hammer.

“Ow, fuck,” he mumbled.

“Stop looking out the window,” I groused. “There are trees and a few squirrels and that’s about it.”

He twitched his nose, which was his new way to tell me that his wolf didn’t like something out there. I walked over to the living room window and unabashedly pulled the sheet to the side and looked.

I screamed and jumped back.

Garrett was standing there, mooning me. I raced to the door and yanked it open.

“You giant jackass! What is wrong with you?”

He couldn’t stop laughing and tripped over his pants as he tried to pull them up. Landing on his side, he finally managed to get them up and tried to stop laughing.

“You’re an asshole, Bro,” Patrick said from behind me.

“I heard her yell at you and I was hoping that one of you would look out the window.”

“What happened?” Zanna skidded around the corner and pulled up sharply, Delia slamming into her.

“He scared me!” My finger shot out accusingly at Garrett. “I pulled the sheet back and he’d slammed his ass against the glass.”

Delia and Zanna snorted and started laughing as well.

It was kind of funny, really.

Jess walked out the front door and quirked an eyebrow at Garrett, who was climbing back to his feet. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Mooning your friend,” he admitted.

I gave him the middle finger and walked back into the house. I needed a drink after that, and not even an alcoholic one. Just something to calm my throat down from the scream I had let out.

“What are you doing?” Garrett’s voice cut through the air.

It was the strangest sensation. Everything and everyone just snapped to attention. It was like a drill sergeant had called everyone to attention, and we all just obeyed without thought.

I also didn’t like the tension in the air. I ran back with the bottle of water in my hand and stood next to Jess on the porch.

Garrett stood on the bottom step, and Patrick a step up behind him. They had their arms crossed, and I saw Delia and Zanna fleeing the scene.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Garrett demanded again. Two men, being held by several of the other workers on site, were sucking air and not saying anything, but they were fighting the pull we all felt in the air.

He unfolded his arms and marched right up to the taller of the two men. Patrick replaced him on the bottom step, arms still folded.

“I asked you a question.” His tone brokered no argument at all.

I heard Jess swallow, and I couldn’t blame her. This was a side I had never seen of Garrett—or Patrick. They were no one to be fucked with in that moment.

The men were suddenly cowering, and there was no doubt they were about to wet themselves in fear. The shorter one spoke up.

“We were told there were some interlopers up here.” There was no mistaking the fact he glanced at me and Jess with disgust.

“And who told you that?” Garrett got right in his face.

“Who do you think?”

“Say it.” Garrett growled, and Jess tossed me a quick look. I had the feeling she was wondering if I knew about her boyfriend.

“Walls. Rubin. Lichten.” The names were spat out, clearly pulled out against their will.

“Are you really stupid enough to listen to them?”

“They’re paying,” he ground out.

“Paying you with what? Money?” Patrick was just as angry Garrett. “They’re exiles. No one in their right damn minds would ever give them a penny to spend. Their fortunes were stripped on judgement.”

“I ain’t sayin’ I know where they get their money. I’m just saying I know they’re paying us. I’ve seen the money. And money is money.”

The taller one nodded.

“So, what the hell were you doing under the house?” Garrett lifted an eyebrow.

“Pfft. Ain’t tellin’.”

There was a crackle in the air, and Garrett poked him in the chest. “I am the Beta of the St. Terese pack, and you are going to tell me what you were doing under my mate’s friend’s house, or you’re not going to get the simple exile of the assholes who hired you.”

The guy clearly didn’t want to tell him, but that spark in the air left no doubt that he was about to open his mouth and spill the beans.

“We were told to make the whole thing go away. To make sure the Yéil family couldn’t live here and wouldn’t live past the summer. I was unscrewing the propane tank. Was gonna set a spark timer, you fucking son of a bitch.”

He was wrestling against the other men and Garrett clearly wanted to rip him apart from mouth to asshole. Not that I could blame him.

It was quiet for a minute, and Garrett looked at his brother. “Take care of this scumbag before I kill him. I’m going to talk to the contractors and see what we have to do to secure this place.”

“It’s not going to help! They’re going to kill her! They’ll do anything to kill her!”

Garrett kept walking.

Patrick looked at Jess. “Please go after him.”

She nodded, squeezed my arm, and ran after him. I stepped up next to Patrick and grabbed his hand—it felt like the right thing to do.

“Hardy, you and your men can take these two down to the lockup on the compound. Call the sheriff’s office and have them send Roberts to deal with this. Make sure Roberts knows exactly what they said, and about whom.”

“Yes, sir,” Hardy said and jerked his head toward the van. The men pulled the two interlopers down the walk to the driveway.

“They’re all going to die and you know it!”

Patrick didn’t say a word, but his hard look was all they needed to see to know what he really wanted to say.

Hardy hung back a moment. “Patrick, you know he’s right. They aren’t going to stop until they kill her.”

“I know.” Patrick nodded. “We’re working on that. My father and Garrett and the other Alphas.”

“It would be a boon if she could return.”

Patrick pursed his lips. “Yes. That’s why we’re on this. Trust us.”

“Of course, sir.” Hardy nodded and headed off to help the others with the prisoners.

Patrick waited with his arms folded until they had loaded the men up and locked the van. Someone had tied them up before shoving them in the back.

I had questions, but he took my hand and led me into the house. A hot rush of desire washed over me, and I gasped, losing all the questions out of my head.

Patrick’s step hitched, and his eyes bugged out a bit. He glanced at me. “Are you kidding?” he whispered. Running to the window in the living room, he peeked out into the woods. I followed, and we both saw Garrett’s truck…

“Is the truck thrusting?” I whispered.

“No, it’s reacting to the occupants.”

“Jesus… Patrick, what is going on here? Why do I feel so…hot?”

“And bothered?”

“Fuck yes.”

He cursed softly. “Alpha effect.” He put a finger to his lips and led me through the house to a bedroom and shut the door.

“When an Alpha, like Garret, has to pull out that quality, it affects his Beta and his enforcers if they are nearby.”

I was absently scratching my arm to distract myself from the burning need that had flared up between my legs. “What do you mean affect? Garrett’s not the Alpha. Not yet.”

“He’s going to be and it’s hard to keep that shit under wraps. You saw him just now.”

“And you. You weren’t pulling punches either.”

“I’m going to be his Beta. I don’t pull punches. The only people I have to listen to are Dad and Garrett. I’m pretty damn powerful myself.”

“So, what’s the effect you’re talking about?”

He cleared his throat. “If there is no mate around, you just need to shift and run like hell. If there is, well…”

“Oh.” I glanced at the window. “So, the truck’s occupants were thrusting.”

“Addi…” Patrick’s words were strained.

This wasn’t just me. This was some kind of shifter thing that I was a subject to now. “This has to do with me being your mate.”

“Yes. I’ve never experienced this before. Jess knew what was going on, which was why she took after him. It happened the other day.” Now, instead of his voice being strained, his pants were. He took a deep breath. “I’ll run this off if you’re not—”

I thought I was going to die from the lust. “Yes,” I breathed. “God, yes, please.”

He grabbed me and spun me against the wall. “Addi, this is driving me…”

“Then drive into me,” I managed before his mouth hit mine with the heat of a thousand suns.

His lips were controlling, and his tongue demanding. I drove my hands into his hair and pulled his whole body even closer. He held me tight against him with one hand and palmed my breast with the other. “Tell me to stop if—”

“Shut up and fuck me, Patrick,” I bit into his words, letting go of his head so I could shove my pants down and off my legs.

They didn’t make it all the way off, but one leg was free and that was enough. He wasn’t letting go of me, so I moved to his fastener and shoved his jeans down just far enough to pull his erection free.

He was hot and hard, even harder than the other day when we weren’t able to get out of the bed for the whole day. I’d loved how sweet and tender he was with me then, allowing me to explore and stop and start.

He’d even gone down on me and said absolutely nothing about the mangled mess my sex was. Instead, he’d made me come on the tip of his tongue at least four times that day—as if he couldn’t get enough of me.

This time, holding his hard cock in my hand, I knew there was no way for him to be gentle or soft. He was being driven by a primal urge to mate.

And I was totally here for it.

Running his hand down my ass, to my knee, he lifted my leg and wrapped it around his waist. “Show me where I go, baby, let me feel you around me.”

I nudged him right against my entrance, and we both groaned as he slid right inside. I could barely believe I was this wet and ready for him, but he wasn’t waiting.

Moving his hips, he started stroking in and out of me. It wasn’t rough, but it was hard, determined.

“Addi…” he managed to barely mumble.

This was still amazing to me. Sex with someone who understood, a connection that went deeper than just his cock inside me. He needed me at that moment, needed to let his wolf ride me, and I wasn’t even remotely frightened. Because his wolf wanted to protect me too.

He slammed his hand on the wall next to me. “Fuck.”

“Go,” I whispered. “As hard as you want.” I nipped his earlobe, and then let my lips find his neck. I licked and nibbled for just a moment before he grabbed my other leg and pressed me up against the wall.

Each slam of his body against mine hit my clit, and I had to bite my lip from yelping in ecstasy. His body fit mine, he knew it already, and he knew the ins and outs of what made me come.

Specifically, his in and out.

I leaned into his ear, panting, and whispered, “Fuck me, Patrick. Ride me hard.”

“Oh, God, baby,” he bit out. “Touch yourself. Help me out—I need you to come first.”

My fingers found their way down to where he slid over me, into me. There was so much heat and wetness between us. I was glad for the wetness—much more heat and we’d both explode.

The pressure of his erection pushed my finger against me even more.

The door opened. I caught a brief glimpse of Jess, her eyes going wide, then the door slammed.

Patrick tried to care. “What…”

I laughed. “Don’t stop! Don’t you stop! I’m almost there!”

“Who was—Mmph!”

I slammed my mouth over his and pushed my hips into him. It didn’t matter if we were caught, I just want to come.

He grunted, and with a twist of his hip, he forced my finger to a new spot, one of the highly sensitive ones, and that was the end of me.

Biting down on his shoulder, I managed not to scream. He slammed into me a few more times, and I felt him come deep inside me. I thumped my head against the wall as he pressed me back a few more times, wringing the last of the pleasure from our bodies.

“Holy shit,” he breathed. His eyes snapped to mine. “Addi, are you all right?”

“Oh, hell yes, I’m all right,” I breathed. “Jesus Christmas and a candy cane, am I all right.”

A chuckle slipped out of him, and then a smile. “Good for you?”

I put a hand on his cheek. “Great for me.”

He backed away, slipping out of me. We both whimpered with the loss, then laughed.

“Well. I’d like to try that again, not against a wall,” he said.

“I liked the wall.”

He laughed. “Who came in?”

“Jess,” I answered. “She was looking for the tool belt on the bed. It’s Garrett’s.”

He patted me on the ass. “I’ll go pretend I’m pissed at them. It’ll get Garrett all worked up again. Maybe we can walk by the van and laugh loudly.”

That had me laughing. “You’re evil!”

“Back in a minute.” He grabbed the tool belt and headed out of the room.

I pulled my pants back up, and there was a little nip of pain on my lower back. Putting a hand on it, I giggled. Wall rash.

Good for me.

* * *

The food was sitting in my stomach like a lead weight. Coffee was the absolute last thing I should be drinking, but I couldn’t not have some after I made it.

Pouring in some creamer, I looked around at the tension in the air between my friends. “It’s kind of crazy. We came up here to hang out and we’ve been so busy.”

Delia seemed thrilled to have something to talk about. “Right? I had no idea this was going to be this insane.” She dumped way too much sugar in her cup.

Zanna leaned forward. Her smile telegraphed terrible things. “So. Jess. Did we help you forget your miscarriage?”

Brandy slammed her hand on the table. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

I didn’t have a lick of psychic ability, but there was no question the room flashed to red anger from Jess. She leaned forward and snarled.

“Oh, you mean the miscarriage of the child I shouldn’t have been pregnant with? The one I wasn’t ready for? The one I thought my cheating fiancé wanted, because I thought that keeping him happy instead of me was more important. The fiancé who tricked me into getting pregnant? The fiancé I found dick-deep in Lily when I got home from the D-and-C I had to have? Yeah, you did a great job, Zanna. Just wonderful.”

Well, there went the truce. I put a hand on my head.

“Did I miss something?” Delia asked quietly.

“You’ve missed everything!” Zanna roared. “You’re never there. You come, you cook, you leave!”

She spun on me. “You’re never here either. And if you are, Patrick is either banging on the walls or banging you on the walls.”

Then, it was Jess’s turn. “You’ve just moved out with your fuck toy.” She threw her hands in the air. “So you can all suck on your ‘everything is fine!’ dinner. This was supposed to be a summer for us. To drink, to relax, and to just be girls. And you know what it is now? The Brandy and Zanna show!”

The three of us started in, “Zanna—”

“Can it!” She mocked us with her tone. “Zanna, this is more complicated than that. Well, I don’t care. I don’t. Not even a little. You’ve left me and Brandy in a cabin alone with those psychotic coyotes that can get into the house. Of course who knows? Jess was the only one there, so maybe she lied because she left the door open.”

“Patrick—”

“Don’t care. Do. Not. Unsubscribe.” She balled up her napkin and threw it on the table. “There’s a bar down the street. I’m going to get shitfaced. Maybe fuck a rando. Have fun. Don’t follow me.”

She walked out of the restaurant, and the four of us just sat, staring at each other.

Delia blinked a few times. “What…what just happened?”

“Well, Zanna’s pissed.” I grabbed my spoon and stirred the coffee.

“Thank you, Captian Obvious,” Jess mumbled. “Where did that come from? I didn’t realize you all were shacking up with your men all this time. I thought it was just me.”

Delia and I just looked at each other.

“It’s my fault,” Brandy said, grabbing the small pitcher of creamer. She swirled the coffee with a spoon, then stared at the rim of the mug, not saying a thing.

Jess gasped. “Brandy. You didn’t.”

“I didn’t mean for it to happen. I was good with unrequited. And, I’d go back if she’d quit being such a goddamn bitch to me.”

“How is any of that”—I flapped my hand in the air—“your fault?”

“She ran out of books to read the one day the Internet went out and I lent her my fav lesbian romance. She started asking real questions, and when she asked what it was like to kiss another woman…” She shrugged.

Delia sucked her teeth, and Jess and I put our hands to our head.

“You kissed her.” Jess was shaking her head.

“Oh, it was more than that,” Brandy said, running her finger on the lip of the mug. “And the next morning she was like this. I want to ring her fucking neck.” Her finger stabbed the table top. “At any point she could have said no. She could have said stop.”

“She didn’t?” I asked.

Brandy made a sour face. “There were a whole lot of yeses while my head was in her—”

“Gotcha,” Delia bit off, holding up her hand.

Brandy’s head dropped onto her fist, clearly exhausted. “I need her to stop making this so absolutely uncomfortable for both of us. I need her away from me for just a little while a week. So we can both cool off, I can collect myself and go back to unrequited status, and just get on with my life.”

Jess looked terribly guilty. “I just kind of abandoned you all…”

“I did too,” Delia said. “This trip has been nothing like we planned.”

“Not even close,” I grumbled.

Jess peered over at Delia. “Where have you been, D? We all know I’m with Garrett, and Addi’s been working on therapy with Patrick.”

I scratched my nose with my middle finger.

“It’s a dude.” Brandy sighed.

“It’s a dude,” Delia agreed. “The guide who took me hiking. There was a lot to see at the top of the trail. A. Lot. He’s amazing.”

“I’ll have to check out that trail.” I snickered.

“There’s this one spot, at the top with a rock. After the sun’s been up for like ten hours, your butt is actually warm—”

“Got it,” Brandy said, mocking her with her a hand raise.

“Look, Brandy, I’m sorry we abandoned you. We all know you’ve held a torch for Zanna forever, and it was stupid not to have that bumper.”

“Wait, you all knew I was hot for her?” Brandy looked around.

“Please,” Delia said. “The sexual tension in the air when the two of you were close was so thick I could cut it with a knife.”

“Did she know?”

“She’d’ve been dead not to,” I answered with a shrug.

“Damn. I thought I was hiding it.”

Jess clapped her on the back. “You’ll find someone who loves you back, Bran. Just give it time.”

Brandy ran her eyes up and down Jess. “You interested?”

“Oh, I am in way too deep with one of the opposite sex. You don’t want to get tangled in that mess.”

“No, you’re right. I just want to get tangled in the sheets.”

There was a silent moment and then we all burst out laughing. There was no way we could keep that in. After we all settled a minute, Jess turned to me.

“And you, how are you doing?”

“I’m…fine?” I was suspicious.

She waggled her finger at me. “No, no. How are you doing? We all know I caught you buffing the wall the other day with Patrick. How are you handling that?”

A smirk crept onto my lips. “Really well, actually. He’s very patient with me. I flipped out twice and he was totally a gentleman and backed off, letting me center myself. He doesn’t push, he always waits for me to give him the okay. It’s just…”

Delia grunted. “She looks all dreamy and sexually satisfied.”

“Because I am?”

“Gag.”

Jess laughed. “D, don’t think it’s all sunshine and roses. I caught her pants down against the wall, Patrick having his way with her. I just want to make sure he’s not overstepping.”

“Not at all. Not even close. I feel…”

What did I feel? Happy? Content? Loved? All of them?

“Complete,” Delia whispered.

I glanced at her and I saw that same feeling on her face as well. She was complete, with her new-found man. And we all knew Jess was doing just fine with hers.

Which left Brandy. We needed to find her some fine women to choose from. Not the kind who got pissed and went to the bar after having sex with her.

Jess seemed to read my mind and pulled out her phone. She tapped on a few moments and grunted. “You’re in luck. There are two girl bars in walking distance, and one more just driving.” She turned the screen around to show Brandy. “Interested?”

Brandy looked at each of us. “Do you think any of them are into the exotic mocha-skinned beauty I can bring to their bed?”

“Hell yes!” Delia cawed, and then slapped her hand over her mouth to tune herself down. “Sorry. Hell yes. Of course, yes. You’re gorgeous, girl, and I am sure there is a fine woman out there who will appreciate the sexual queen you are.”

She leaned down and grabbed her purse. “You can all fit in the Range Rover, right?”

“There’s three of us. We could take the Subbie if you want the Rover,” I offered.

“Nope. Subaru is the perfect size.” She swung her purse up and smiled at us. “See you ladies later.”

“A lot later, hopefully,” Jess said, waving her fingers at her. Brandy sashayed out of the restaurant.

“Good move, Jess. That was the way to go,” Delia said.

“I know. She really does need to start finding her way away from Zanna. Zanna doesn’t know what the hell to do with herself, and maybe I need to have a talk with her.”

“Maybe we all should. Better from the three of us than one of us. That way she can’t hate us all.” I looked between them. “Can she?”

Chapter Eleven

She could.

She totally could. I never saw Zanna as pissed as she was when she went tearing out the front door the next afternoon.

“That could have gone better.” I sighed.

“That’s probably an understatement,” Jess agreed.

“Are you guys doing anything this weekend?” Delia asked.

Jess, Brandy, and I turned and stared at her.

“What?” She was confused. “Honest question.”

“You’re not disturbed by the fact that one of your best friends just called all of us motherfucking, cocksucking, twatwaffled assholes?” Jess blinked a few times.

“Not really. She’s pissed and when she’s pissed she swears like a sailor. Whatever, she’ll come back. She’s pissed because she knows we’re right.” She glanced at each of us. “So? Are you busy? Jason wants to take us all kayaking and it seems like a perfect chance.”

“Are you inviting Zanna?” Brandy asked.

“Of course. I’ll text her later.”

I shrugged. “I’m not busy. Patrick has some class he has to teach on Saturday, so I’m free most of the day.”

“I’m good, too,” Brandy said. “None of my booty calls have called, so that’s that.”

“Garrett has some stuff he and his father have to take care of with regards to the compound and his being the Al—chief, so I don’t think I’m invited to that. I’ll be there.”

“Good, cool,” Delia said. “I’ll tell him we need five kayaks for the whole day.”

“Won’t that take away from his income?”

“Nope.” She shook her head. “He doesn’t have a lot of weekend business in the summer. He runs a lot of the cruise ship stuff. Plus, I can always write Cora a check.”

“Cora?” I asked.

“His sister. She’s cool. I like her. Hey.” She cocked her head. “Why don’t we ask her along?”

“Well, we could ask Tati along too,” Jess said. “It could be a cool girls’ day out, but with a guide.” She stuck her finger out at Delia. “No sneaking off for a quickie behind a tree.”

“Ruin my fun,” Delia huffed. “Deal, though. Let’s do it.”

“Perfect,” I agreed.

“I do need to get back down the hill,” Jess said. “There’s a dinner tonight and I need to be there.”

Well, shit. So did I.

Delia scratched her head.

“Brandy, you gonna be okay if we all head down to St. Terese?” Jess asked. “I don’t want to necessarily abandon you here…”

“Nah, I’m good. I got books and bad movies. And you’re right. Zanna will be back as soon as she cools off. I’m fine.”

She really seemed to be okay, from what I could tell of her. I didn’t feel too bad leaving the cabin.

“Lock the doors,” Jess called.

“And hope they don’t have blasters,” Delia added.

“You ass.” I laughed. “Don’t let the big bad wolves in, how about that?” I pulled the door closed.

“Yeah, because you wouldn’t swing that fucker right the hell open for your big bad wolf,” Delia grumbled teasingly under her breath.

I fell down the stairs. The whole four stairs of the porch to the ground. “What did you say?”

Delia and Jess jumped down the stairs to help me to my feet. “Are you okay?” was the best I could make out of their flurry of questions.

“I’m fine,” I snapped, brushing off my jeans.

“What did you say?” Jess asked her.

“Don’t let the big bad wolf in. You know? He’ll huff and he’ll puff and you’ll pull your pants down.”

I couldn’t stop laughing. I couldn’t be 100 percent sure, but I was pretty confident Delia had just told us that she knew Patrick and Garrett were wolves, and I should have been pissed, but all I was doing was laughing my ass off.

God, I loved that woman.

She dropped us off at the Paulers’ house for dinner and drove off to Jason’s house. I was glad Delia had found someone as well. Of all of us, she had the best and happiest home life and I was thrilled to see her still happy.

Garrett walked up to Jess and wrapped his arms around her, giving her the biggest hug and kiss to welcome her. She was glowing.

Patrick walked up to me and touched his shoes to mine. He smiled and leaned in for a quick little kiss. He’d started that because he didn’t want to intimidate me, but I really liked the little peck so he could gauge my mood. “Hello, my baby.”

“Hello, my honey.” I laughed. “Do I need a top hat and cane for the rest of this?”

“We can do the song and dance later.” His grin was infectious.

I was in so much trouble with this guy.

The phone rang in his pocket and he glanced at his smartwatch. Looking confused, he pulled the phone out and answered it.

“Hello. Whoa! Slow down—what?” His eyes snapped to steel pools of fear and anger. “No. Yes. I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

He cut the call off and took a deep breath. “I gotta go to Vancouver. Right now.”

“Right now?” I asked, while Olga plowed over his words. “You were just there this weekend.”

“Right now. I have to file an emergency flight plan and get down there. I’m sorry, this can’t wait.” Patrick stepped around me and walked straight into his father.

Martin wasn’t playing. He had his arms crossed and stared down his son. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why are you going to Vancouver in the middle of the week? This isn’t normal, and you look like the dead right now. Cold, clammy…”

“Dad, I—”

“Do not make me use my Alpha on my own son.” I could feel the Alpha power was hovering in the air, waiting to be snatched in by Martin. He was serious about using it on Patrick. He stared at his son. “Every other weekend for years, and I mean years, Patrick, and now you’re running down there on a whim in the middle of the week. What’s going on?”

“I don’t have time for this.”

“Make it,” Garrett snapped.

He stared directly at me, and I could see the apology all over his face. “My daughter was in an accident. She’s comatose and has a broken leg.”

* * *

I had fucked up.

It was the biggest fuck-up in the history of fuck-ups.

I could see, just see, Addi closing up as the words came out of my mouth. The ice in the room filled every corner, and it wasn’t just her.

Garrett, Dad, Mom, Tatianna all added their cold hate to the room.

I had to go. Cassie was in the hospital and had nearly shifted in the ambulance on the way there. Her first shift after Leighann and I had been so sure she had been moonborn.

There were not enough swear words in the world in any language to properly encompass what I was feeling.

“Martin, would you be so kind as to drive me to the cabin?” Addi asked, not breaking her stare at me.

“Let me get my keys.” His voice sliced the cold.

“I’ll be outside in the car.”

She turned on her heel and marched out of the house. I wanted to run after her, but I had to go. I grabbed my messenger bag with all my flight gear in it and headed to the back of the house to avoid the whole mess.

“I’m coming with you,” Tati snapped, grabbing her purse.

“You’re not.”

“Oh, yes, I fucking am. Make no mistake about that. You’re going to deal with your daughter’s accident and one, no one knew you even had a kid, two, you’re not going to be in the right frame of mind, and three, you’re not going to lie to us about this anymore. I’m going with you.”

“She’s going with you,” our father snapped as he walked out the door and slammed it behind himself.

Fuck.

“You’re done, dude,” Tati whispered and walked out the back door. “We’ll take my car to the airport.” She slammed the door behind her.

“Patrick.” My mother’s voice froze me in the kitchen on the way out. She walked in and I knew how much I had screwed up without a word from her. “Tell me, quickly. You do have to go.”

“Her name is Cassandra Pauler. She’s twelve. She lives with her mother Leighann and stepfather Uriah outside Vancouver in Langley.”

“She’s twelve?”

“She is.”

“You’ve kept her hidden for twelve years?”

I didn’t say a word.

“Go. She needs you.”

And with that simple dismissal, I knew I had broken all of their trust, lost their love, their support, and damned near everything that mattered to me.

* * *

Tati and I were in the plane less than twenty minutes later. She’d driven at breakneck speed down the highway to the parking lot at the airport.

We went through the check list in less than ten minutes between the two of us and were filed and approved in just five more minutes after that.

I was grateful for the drone of the plane as we flew at the limit of the single engine plane. It would still take nearly ninety minutes to get from Juneau to Vancouver, but I also knew I could land right on the Fraser River near Leighann’s house.

Tatianna cleared her throat. “Did you get the name of the hospital?”

“Langley Memorial. It’s Canada. They aren’t necessarily inventive at this end of the country.”

“It works.” She pulled out her phone. “How are we getting there?”

“Taxi, Uber, Lyft, whatever I can get fast.”

She picked at the front of the phone. “I have an Uber waiting for us at the dock.”

“Thanks, Sis.”

“Don’t ‘thanks, Sis’ me, you lying knob.”

“I’m not lying.”

“How old is my niece that I didn’t know about until just over an hour ago?”

I glanced over, and she was giving me the patented ‘don’t bullshit me’ look. I sighed. “She’s twelve. Her name is Cassandra Amelia Pauler.”

“Did you love her mother?”

“For the six months we dated in college, yes.”

“This is why you’ve been going down to Vancouver every other weekend for past ten years. This is why you always take a ski vacation in Whistler and a summer vacation on Victoria.”

I nodded. I couldn’t lie or deny this anymore.

God, my baby girl was hurt. I didn’t have time to ask Leighann all the right questions, and I was flying into a situation I knew nothing about.

“Call her,” Tati said and put her hands on the yoke. “Call her, Patrick. You’re fucking all this up, and you need more information.”

“How did you know?”

“Your whole body is trembling. She’s your kid, call her mother. I can handle the plane with the autopilot.”

I pulled my phone out and dialed Leighann’s phone. She answered by the second ring.

“Patrick.”

“What’s going on? I’m about an hour out right now.”

“She was on her bike, just riding with her friends. Next thing any of them knew, she and two of the other girls were under a car and blocked in by a flipped vehicle and everything was smashed and destroyed.”

“Who was with her?”

“Danielle and her sister, Bebe and her two brothers. All with helmets, all on the right side of the road, all obeying the traffic laws. The police have ways of scaring kids if they aren’t quite telling the truth, but all of them were so terrified of what happened…”

“What is her condition?”

“She’s comatose. The helmet cracked. She—”

“The helmet cracked? How goddamn hard was she hit?”

“She was hit by the engine block of the car. After the hood was ripped off and tossed into the air, she and the engine collided on the way down. There were so many little wounds they had to shave her hair off.”

That was when she broke down. I heard the phone clatter to the floor, and she was out and out sobbing.

The phone clattered again. “Patrick, that you, man?” Uriah’s voice was wobbly as well.

“Yeah, it’s me. I’m on my way, man. I can only get the plane to go so fast.”

“Cassie is in good hands, but we’re working with the police. The accident was massive and bizarre.” He made noises at Leighann, and I heard him hand her off to her mother. There were some footsteps, and he spoke again. “Leighann doesn’t know this. I’ll trust you not to tell her. When Cassie’s wolf tried to come out in the ambulance, I had the tech knock her out. The tech was a cat shifter, so we were able to contain that. I’ve asked the doctor to keep her sedated until you get here.”

“Fuck, man, she’s early.”

“Six years, Patrick. Whatever this accident was, it scared her, bad. The doctor and I made up a little song and dance about her needing to be sedated for the pain in her leg, but…”

“We’ll work this out. Take care of Leighann, please.”

“Always do, man. Get here.”

“Done.”

We both hung up, and I shoved the phone back in my pocket. I stared out the window.

Leighann and Cassie had girls’ nights about every six weeks where they did the whole mani-pedi-haircut thing. It was a fun thing for both of them, and I’d felt that as Cassie’s hormones started rising as a preteen, had helped her and her mother be nicer to each other.

Cassie’s vanity lay all in her hair. Expensive shampoos, conditioners, treatments, haircuts. She adored her long, wavy chestnut hair, and loved new and interesting hairdos.

This accident had made them shave the one thing my daughter was vain about. She was going to be so upset, so utterly miserable. I didn’t even know where to start to make her feel better about this.

“So?” Tatianna asked quietly.

“She’s pretty banged up, and there’s something not right about what happened,” I managed. “She tried to shift.”

“What? You said she’s twelve.”

“She is.”

Tatianna stared at me across the tiny cockpit. “That’s…”

“Virtually unheard of, I know.”

“She has to shift,” Tati whispered. “You can’t keep her sedated. That’s really bad.”

“I know.” I let out a sigh. “I know.”

Chapter Twelve

My little girl’s face was covered in bruises. Sporting a black eye, she had a turban of bandages on her head, and too many wires running from her to various machines.

Her leg, not yet casted, was elevated in a sling above the bed and wrapped with what seemed like a thousand ace bandages and miles of gauze.

The steady beep of the machines was comforting and disconcerting as I stood there. Her not-so-little-anymore hand still fit in mine.

“She looks like Mom,” Tati said.

“I know.”

Leighann sighed. “I’m so sorry, Patrick. I know you weren’t going to tell them about her.”

“We thought she was moonborn, Leigh. We couldn’t know this was going to happen. And, not telling them was one of the stupidest things I ever decided.”

“We have to let her shift,” Uriah said.

“I know that as well.” I scrubbed my free hand over my face. “But what about the police? What about the fact there are all kinds of medical records now about her broken leg? I saw the chart. The ortho is coming in tomorrow to look at and cast the leg if he feels like it’s ready. We can’t let her shift with all that ahead her.”

“She’s so young.”

Tati sighed. “It’s the accident. Her wolf wants to save her life. And if you don’t let it happen...”

“She’s bound. And she’ll be insane and feral by the time she’s twenty-five,” Uriah finished.

“Is the doctor a shifter?” Tati asked.

“Yes, he is,” Leighann said.

She smiled. “Then we can work with this. I’m good with computers, and since everything is digital…”

Uriah considered her a moment. “Are you proposing what I think you’re proposing?”

“Probably more.” She nodded. Glancing at me and then at Cassie, she pursed her lips. “She can’t be bound. We can’t let that happen. She’s already been held back for ten hours. Get the doctor in here and we’ll do this. Fast.”

Uriah and I looked at Leighann. She gave a slight nod, and Uriah left the room to find the doctor, motioning my sister to follow him.

“Patrick…”

“No. It was going to have to come out some time. I’m an idiot for hiding this. We had such fun when she was little, and then I just became ‘every other weekend and vacation Dad.’ I don’t want that. She’s a shifter and she needs to know about that.”

“She loves you, Patrick. She does. I have never heard her once bitch about you taking her for the weekend. Or the vacations. She had friends who weep when their non-primary custody parent comes to get them.”

I looked at her across the bed. “Do we need a new custody agreement?”

“I threw the old one out years ago, Trick. Years. You were always welcome to ask for more time. You’ve been so good.”

Shaking my head, I disagreed with her. “No. I haven’t. I’ll be better, though.”

She cocked her head. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing you need to worry about.”

“Trick, maybe we didn’t work out, but we have Cassie and I consider you one of the best friends and best mistakes I ever made. You can tell me. Talk to me.”

I couldn’t stop the confession. “By not telling anyone about Cass, I may have just completely fucked any hope of winning my mate over. I screwed the pooch. Hard.”

A smile slipped onto her face. “You found your mate?”

“And lost her just as quickly.”

“You haven’t. We both did this wrong. We should have just been honest with everyone. I think…” She looked down at Cass. “I think this is my fault. If we had been honest with everyone about her, I wouldn’t be terrified of this not being an accident.”

I snapped my head up. “Are they still after you?”

“They never weren’t after me. I felt like keeping her a secret kept her safe. Now I just wish we had lived out loud and let everyone know. It’s easier to keep someone safe if everyone around you knows the need to be safe.”

“You know you can ask me for help.”

She grinned. “I have Uriah.” She looked at the door and leaned forward. “He’s CSIS. There’s a reason I let the cat out of the bag about Cassie.”

“Wait.” I narrowed my eyes. “Canadian Intelligence?”

“Yeah, he was assigned to me. We…were assigned to each other.”

I chuckled. “Well, that’s kind of stereotypical.”

“You only saw the wedding, you have no idea how stereotypical it was!”

“He’s good for you, Leigh.”

“And your mate will come around. Give her time. I give you permission to explain why we did hide her.”

I let out a breath. “I will. This is going to take time and I’m not sure I have it.”

“If she’s your mate, you’ll make time.”

She was right.

* * *

Doctor St. Sulpice, another cat shifter, stood in front of the door, with one of his other shifter staff, a big burly orderly named N’gadi. He was a damn gorilla shifter. I’d never met one; I knew they existed, but they almost never left Africa.

He had his arms folded over his chest and planted himself in front of the door. No one was coming or going.

“We have just a few minutes before someone gets suspicious,” the doctor said. “You’re sure you can get her to shift and shift back?”

Leighann and I nodded, and Tatianna and Uriah nodded as well a moment later.

He walked over to the IV he had set up and unhooked the sedative, rinsing it with a saline. He taped the IV lead to Cassie’s arm a moment later and stepped back to stand by N’gadi.

It didn’t take all of five minutes for Cassie to snap her eyes open and start panicking. Leighann and I grabbed a hand each and held on.

“Cassie, baby, it’s okay. Daddy and I are here.”

“It hurts, Mom!” She gasped and big fat tears appeared in her eyes. “Why is my skin crawling?”

“Do you remember the accident, Cass?” I asked, wiping her tears away.

“Yes.” She gasped. “Make it stop hurting, please…”

I felt her wolf below her skin, trying to do just that for her.

“Cassandra, your skin is crawling because your wolf wants out,” I said. “Don’t fight her, honey. Let her come out. She’ll help you. She can make the pain go away.”

“Wolf?” Her eyes were terrified and shot between the two of us. “I thought you said…”

“We were wrong, love, so very wrong,” Leighann said. “Let your wolf come out. Dad and I are here to help you.” She wiped off a tear this time.

Her nails reshaped into razor sharp claws and dug into my hand. The fur erupted quickly and traveled up her arm, her bones reforming and changing. Lying on her back wasn’t the best way to shift, but since her leg was pinned up in the sling, there was nothing to be done.

A moment later, her leg slipped out of the temporary soft cast, fully furred and fully healed. Leighann and I grabbed her and turned her over, so it was less terrible to shift, and watched as our daughter shifted from human to wolf.

It took less than a minute, which was excellent for a first shift. Her long legs were tucked under her, and there was a look of terrified confusion in her eyes. A soft whine left her adorable little muzzle.

Her coloring was a blend of her mother’s and mine. She had a dark brown muzzle that thinned out to light brown by her ears. Very much her mother. Her body was red-brown, like my wolf’s.

She was still a juvenile wolf and it was easy for her to stand on the bed, and that’s when we saw her paws. In front, she wore two white socks like mine, and in the back she had two black ones, like her mother.

“Oh, God, you’re beautiful.” Leighann sighed.

“You are, baby girl,” I agreed, digging my fingers into her ruff. “Feel better?”

There was a chuff and she licked my face.

Shift back, baby girl. I sent the words quietly to her. Can you do that?

Daddy? What are you doing in my head?

When you’re shifted, most shifters will be able to talk to you this way, Leighann said. Right now, it’s only Daddy and I who can. Once you’re eighteen, there will be more. Leighann glanced at me. “Can you shift back, Cassie?”

She stood stock-still for a few heartbeats, then whined. I have no idea how to trade places with her.

“Do you want to, Leigh?”

“Bad idea,” Uriah said.

I glanced over. Oh. Right. His mate. Bad idea asking her to get naked in front her baby daddy. “Gotcha.” I whipped my shirt off and yanked off the pants. The boxers were worth the sacrifice, and I shifted on the spot.

Dad. Your wolf is so pretty.

I put my paws up on the bed and sniffed her wolf. She sat down and sniffed at my head. You smell nice. Is that a thing? Can people smell nice?

Or rotten, yes. I snuffled the top of her head. I’m going to shift back, Cassie. Follow what I do and see if you can do it.

Got it. Her little wolf’s head nodded, and she watched as I shifted slowly back to human. It wasn’t really hard once you saw what another wolf did. Usually I thought of it as if asking someone to step aside and let you through. The other person, or wolf, stepped back and took a seat, allowing the other to drive a while.

But there was never any forgetting the other was there.

Half a minute later, her wolf receded, and Cassie lay face down on the bed.

Leighann quickly covered her while I pulled on the pants Tatianna had been holding for me.

Flipping over, she tossed her arms around her mother’s neck and held her tight. Cassie turned to me and did the same, a big, tight hug.

“Thank you, Dad.”

“Feel better, Cass?” Leighann asked, fastening the last of the ties of the hospital gown.

“A thousand percent,” she said. “Can we go home?”

“No,” Uriah said. “We have to play along a little, so we can get you home without suspicion.”

“Uri, are you a shift—are you all shifters?” Cassie was glancing around, her nose twitching.

“Everyone in here.” Uriah nodded and stepped forward to the edge of the bed. “Cassie, you have to keep this all a secret. You know what would happen, right?”

“Government labs,” she said.

“Or worse, private labs,” he answered. “You’re really young for your first shift, but you were hurt so badly that we had to let it happen. The police will want to talk to you, and Tatianna and the doctor have rigged your chart. You have to wear the soft cast for a few days.”

“But my leg is all healed… Oh.”

Nodding when the understanding hit her, I patted her hand. “Exactly.”

“Have a seat, young lady,” the doctor said, muscling in. “We need to get your leg rewrapped for this ruse to work. I hope you’re willing to play along?”

She nodded, watching the doctor motion over N’gani, and start pulling out bandages, and then turned to me. “Dad… Wait, how long was I out?”

“Just a few hours,” I answered. “I got here as fast as I could.”

She looked at me, and back at her mother, and then over at Uriah. “Uri, I remember everything. Everything. They wanted to kill me to get to you. They were screaming about how you and I needed to be out of the way, so they could get to Mom.”

“Flipped and wrecked three cars and risked the lives of six other children,” Uri said. “We’re going to have to get going on this again. We need to figure out who it is this time and where the threat is coming from.” He put his hands on his hips. “Patrick…”

“If Cassie needs to come to Juneau for a while, that’s fine. I have plenty of room.” A big fat empty house now.

“Hey, Trick,” Tati said, leaning up from the wall. “How about an intro?”

Motioning her over, I moved to the wall. “Cassie, this is my sister, your aunt Tatianna.”

“I got an aunt?”

“Yes you have an aunt. And two uncles, who are up in Alaska,” Leighann said. “We’ll explain everything once the doctor is done with your leg.”

She smiled at Tatianna. “Hi. Do we shake hands or hug?”

Tati opened her arms. “Totally hug, kiddo. Totally hug.”

Maybe I hadn’t fucked this up.

Not completely.

Chapter Thirteen

“So, you’re pissed?”

I looked at Jess standing near the water’s edge. “Me? Nope. Not pissed.”

She raised a disbelieving eyebrow. “Not even a little?”

“Nope. Slept like a baby. Been having a great time at the cabin. Found a cool swimming hole. Read about nine books in four days. It’s been nice.”

“She’s full of it,” Brandy said.

I growled at her and shoved my kayak into the water. I straddled it and paddled out to where Delia was waiting in the water.

“So, you’re pissed?”

“No! I am not pissed!” I screamed at the top of my lungs. “I am not pissed that my boyfriend took off in his private plane to go play baby daddy in Vancouver to a kid that not even his fucking parents knew existed. What would ever make you think I’m pissed?”

Delia pursed her lips and pushed me away from her with the paddle she had. “Don’t sink my kayak. I don’t have a baby daddy.”

Brandy paddled up, with Jess and Zanna just behind her. I stared at all of them. Even at the cabin I had been avoiding them. It was a defense mechanism, and I knew it, but what else was I supposed to do?

He had a daughter.

Even his parents didn’t know.

Martin’s rage had filled the car that night as he drove me back up the mountain from his house. He didn’t have to say a thing; his wolf was beyond pissed and I could sense that.

“Will you ever forgive him?” I asked.

“Someday, probably. It’s going to be a long time, though.” Martin navigated the curve with ease. “And you?”

“He’s supposed to be my mate. He knows everything about me and my horrible past. We said we wouldn’t lie to each other. I feel so utterly betrayed I don’t know if I’ll ever get over it.”

Martin gave a single terse nod. “I understand. I would still love to call you my daughter one day, but I understand.”

God, I wanted to have a family that gave a shit. To have someone who really earned the title of dad, and who would lift my children up on his shoulder and play horsey like a grandfather should. Someone who didn’t feel the need to make me kneel on rice before the cross, praying for a soul I no longer had. Someone who would be there, be open. Love me for me, not for what I could give them, like status and wealth.

But Patrick…

It hadn’t fully sunk in what had happened until a few hours later, and then the next thing I remembered was Brandy shaking me awake. I’d cried and slept for over two days and I needed some food.

And now I was in a kayak outside Juneau, with whales and fishing boats everywhere. I was pissed all over again, and I needed to work that off.

“Which way, Jason?” I called.

“North, along the shoreline for about five minutes to the muddy stream with the bleached tree.”

I dug my paddle in and started up. There was so much rage in me, I paddled the five minutes in three, and then went another minute farther so I could paddle back.

Delia scooted her kayak away. “Hulk smash?”

“Only things that won’t cost me five hundred dollars to replace,” I grumbled. Unlike the new sink in the bathroom I had ripped off the wall in a fit of rage.

Which was why they were all calling me Hulk now, and why Delia kept shrinking away.

It actually was funny. I was just still really, really pissed.

He could have told me. All he had to say was, I have a daughter in Vancouver, and that’s why I have to go every other weekend.

Did he think I wouldn’t get it? That I would judge him? Christ, I had been a fuck toy for dozen of men in Africa, raped repeatedly, abused, hit, whipped, caned, and finally left to die. Did he think I had no sympathy in my soul? If she was his child, then I would have welcomed her. He was apparently a good father, dedicated to her every other weekend and vacations.

Fuck, I didn’t even get that from both my parents after I came home with Winter. They wouldn’t even fucking look at me.

I stopped paddling.

“Addi?” Zanna paddled over to me. “Hey.”

Cocking my head, I looked at her. “That’s it, isn’t it? It’s never really been about the abuse. It was never about the sexual slavery or the beatings.”

Jess and Brandy had paddled closer when they heard the words. I turned and looked at Jess, then shook my head. “It was never about how my body got used. That was never my fault. I was a child and there was nothing I could do except pray for rescue.”

Jess nodded, quiet but encouraging as Delia joined her.

“It’s always been about how my parents shamed the fucking hell out of me for what was done to me. They slut shamed me for being kidnapped.”

Delia’s eyes were wide. “Go on.”

“They really and truly believed that their little twelve-year-old daughter used her sexuality to attract the kidnappers and the abusers. They still do! They think I’m a whore because I led these men on!”

Brandy nodded this time. “What else?”

“They hate me for having come back alive. They hate me for being a survivor and for making them think about things like their daughter’s vulva and her wrecked sexuality! They thought I had come back possessed by the devil.”

Zanna had her phone out and was handing it to me. “It’s Winter. I just called him.”

I grabbed the phone, careful not to drop it in the water. “Win?”

“Addi. I heard the end of it.”

“They didn’t want you to go after me, did they? They told you to just let me die over there, didn’t they?”

“They had the balls to call me and beg me not to go and find you,” he said. “After their speech about how I was nothing to them, how I was of the devil, they had the balls to call me and instruct me to let you die as God wanted.”

“Oh, shit, Winter…”

“I was already there, Sis. I was already in Sudan looking for you. I had been for days. My CO let me take the whole squad to find you. I kept an eye on Mom and Dad, and when they went to Africa with you, I kept tabs on the mission. I knew as soon as they reported you missing.” He let out a little sardonic laugh. “I didn’t even get the whole sentence out before my CO told me to find you.”

The tears in my eyes hurt. “You found me two years after I was taken.”

His answer was deadly and quiet. “I know.”

“They didn’t report me missing for eighteen months?”

“Not until they had to refund the ticket to go back to the US.”

The pain lanced through me, my heart finally breaking into a million pieces, and all the love I had tried to hold onto for my parents tumbled out, and away, down to the water and washed out to sea. I swallowed hard, the hurt tears tumbling out of my eyes. “I was never worth more than a plane ticket to them.”

“Your girls are with you right now?”

Sniffling, I nodded as if he could see me. “Yeah.”

“Good. We’ve been waiting for this, lil sis. It was just time, and you had to realize it. They’re all there for you. I can get there if you need me.”

I looked around at the expectant faces of my friends and shook my head. “Nah, Winter. We’re good. You can totally visit if you want, but I’m…good.”

“I’ll be up. But if you need to talk, you know where I am, and you know how to reach me.” There was a smile in his voice. “I love you, Sis. We got this.”

“I love you too, Bro. Fist bump.”

He chuckled. “Call me later. When you’re not sitting in the water?”

“Gotcha.”

After we said our goodbyes, I handed the phone back to Zanna and wiped the tears off my face.

“Well. Fuck them. With a splintered broomstick.”

“Right?” Delia smiled. “I mean, you’re worth at least two plane tickets and MaiTai served in flight.”

I soaked her with a flick of my paddle.

* * *

The beer in my hand tasted better than it should have, but I knew better. One beer, as long as there were people around.

Brandy sat next to me on the steps, her own beer in hand.

“How you doing?”

I cocked my head. “Good, actually. It’s a huge relief. I honestly thought years ago I was over the whole kidnapping thing, and I couldn’t figure out what was holding me back. Now I know.”

“Sorry you’re in the shitty parents club.” She held up her bottle and I clinked mine against hers.

“Who’s got good ones?” I raised an eyebrow.

“Delia, of course. Her parents rock. And Jess had decent ones,” she said. “Zanna’s parents mean well, but don’t parent well.”

“True story.” I nodded. “And you? How are you doing?”

“Zanna calmed the hell down,” she answered. “We haven’t talked through what happened, but she’s calmer now.” Pausing to take a long draught of her beer, she shook her head. “I’ve just gone back to unrequited myself. She’s never going to work out the feelings I know she’s got in there. She’s got no interest in being bisexual.”

“Could she just have been curious?”

“Bisexual, bicurious, whatever, she’s not going to deal with it. She’s just going to go back to fucking guys and wondering why she’s so out of sorts all the time.”

I chuffed. “You’re right. She goes off like a cannon over the damnedest things. You think that’s her not dealing with stuff?”

“Of course it is. How would you feel if your parents left you to homeopathic bullshit to deal with your cancer in a charlatan’s sweat lodge?”

“Good point.” I nodded.

“We all have shit we don’t deal with, and when we deal with one thing, something else comes up.”

“Example?”

“I’ve been gay since before I knew what gay was. Men are just…there. I mean nice bodies are always appreciated, and there have been a few, Brock O’Hurn and Jason Momoa, who I’ve joked I’d join the other team for. But not really. I like girls. And then into my life walks a guy who makes me want to…do rude things to his penis.”

I choked on the beer I was drinking. “I have never heard it put quite that way, Bran.”

“Well. If it was a woman, I’d say something like, drop a flag and dive that muff all day long.”

I choked again. “Could you not?”

Brandy cracked up laughing and it took both of us a moment to recover. She did first.

“It’s true, though.”

“Well, I get that. But you met a guy?”

“I wouldn’t say I met him as much as I’ve been around him and have an urge to ride him like a motorcycle on Route 66. Which has never, ever happened before. He’s good-looking, he’s rugged, he’s built, and I’m sure he’s packing.”

“It’s weird to hear you talk about a guy like that.”

“Yeah. Now just think how I feel over here.”

“That’s why you’re angry at Zanna for not dealing with her bicuriosity.”

She nodded. “It’s what I’m dealing with right now. I know I prefer women. Obvs. But why this guy? Why now? Is it that I’ve never met the right penis? Am I actually bi and not just gay? Are your pheromones with all this sex going around affecting me, making me a penis-envious?”

I shook my head, chuckling. “You have such a good attitude, Brandy. I wish everyone could know you and see how you deal with your life.”

She shrugged. “They’d all just want my magnificent natural ‘fro do. I’m good being anonymous.”

“I love that you stopped trying to get your hair to conform to some weird standard that doesn’t work.”

“Eh. Conforming is for losers. Also, this is so much less work. God. All that product and ironing and time. What was I thinking?”

“You weren’t. You were letting your Irish grandmother style your black hair.”

Brandy laughed. “Good point.” She took another swig of beer. “And you? How are you doing? Still want to Hulk smash some sinks?”

“Nah, I took it out on the wood pile this time. Nearly a whole cord of wood in the past three days.”

“You’re going to have muscles like Thor you keep this up.”

“That’s not a bad thing. I can beat Patrick more thoroughly.”

“Assuming his father and mother haven’t already done that.” She smirked.

“They’d give me his carcass to finish him off.”

“I’m sure they would.”

I sighed. “I don’t want to hate him. I don’t. He went because it was his child. But no one knew about her. No one. Not Garrett, not Martin, not Olga…no one. And you could just see how painfully disappointed Olga was that there was a grandchild out there she had never met.”

“Do you think you’ll ever talk to him again?”

“Honestly, I have no idea. None. After all he knew about me…”

“Could he have had a reason for keeping her secret?”

“Unless the mob was involved? I don’t think so.”

“So, you’re walking away?”

“I just don’t know yet,” I answered. “He’s a good guy. But that doesn’t negate his lie.”

“Did he lie?”

“Lies of omission are still lies.”

Brandy just sipped her beer. “You know, despite everything that’s gone on, and how much I was pissed that you guys took off, I feel like you’ve all found that person you’re going to go through life with. Yeah, the love and sex thing is gaggy, but more than someone to hump your brains out against my walls, I feel like you found your fist bump. The three of you.”

“My…fist bump?”

She nodded. “Yeah. Your fist bump. Remember the fist bump that Michelle and Barack Obama traded in front of the cameras? Well, it’s only a very special kind of relationship that can do that. They aren’t just husband and wife. They’re best friends, co-conspirators, partners. They have inside jokes that have been going for years, and may not even remember the origin of the joke anymore. They text each other inappropriate messages and can make out what the other is saying with a full mouth or four rooms away. It’s just so much more than being in love. It’s being, together. Two people with one direction. And an unabashed fist bump for all the world to see.”

I blinked a few times. “That’s exactly the kind of life I want. Someone who is so much more than just someone I share a bank account with.”

“And I swear, Jess and Delia have that. I thought you might too.”

I took another pull on my beer. “I thought I had too.”

“Consider giving him a chance to explain?”

“Whose side are you on?”

“Yours. And that’s exactly why I’m telling you to consider it. You deserve to be happy with your forever fist bump, just like anyone else.”

“Damn philosophy minor.”

Brandy laughed and drained her beer.

“Hello, Brandy.”

We both jerked our heads up and I found a mountain of man standing over us.

“Oh. Hi, Rick.”

He stared down at her. He had thick wavy brown hair, and a neat but serious beard. He was the complete epitome of lumbersexual, without the hipster edge. His dark chocolate brown eyes flicked to me. “Who is your friend?” His French accent was thick.

“Oh, right. Rick, this is Addi. Addi, this is Rick. He’s a lumberjack working for the coastal tribes.”

“Is Zanna around?” He smiled and holy shit it was dazzling.

“Inside, I think she’s decorating the last bedroom on the right.”

“Thank you, cheri.” He grabbed her hand and kissed her knuckles. “Nice to meet you, Addi.”

“Likewise,” I said, watching him walk around us and into the house. I glanced at Brandy, who was still watching where he walked into the house. “Is that your tempting penis?”

“Yes.”

“Damn. I don’t blame you. That is…”

“So utterly masculine I don’t understand why the hell I’m attracted to him.”

“Mrph. That is some nice stuff to be attracted—wait. He came here looking for Zanna?”

She pursed her lips and nodded. “Yup. I’m attracted to a man, for the first time, and he’s shagging one of my best friends.” She looked down at her empty bottle. “Damn. I need a lot more beer.”

I slapped her on the back. “I’ll buy you a case. You’re going to need it.”

* * *

I popped open the door and walked around the back. By the time I slammed the trunk, Tati had climbed out and Cassie was looking around as she stood from the backseat.

“All shifters live here?”

“Not only shifters, but just about everyone who doesn’t knows,” Tati said. “There are a few stragglers we’re trying to integrate into the community. So you have to be careful what you say. Just follow our lead.”

“This is a cute place.” She smiled.

“You ready, kiddo?”

“Yup. I’ve wanted to meet your parents for a long time, Dad.”

How to spear your shitty father right in the heart, kid. I put an arm around her, and we headed up the walkway.

There was no knocking. The door popped open and my mother walked out of the house and straight to Cassie. She didn’t say a thing. Just marched up and wrapped her arms around her, hugging her.

“Hi, Grandma,” Cassie managed through the hug.

“Damn, that sounds awesome.” Mom stepped back and held her at arm’s length. “Wow. A grandkid. This is kind of awesome.”

Cassie laughed. “Okay, Dad, I like her.”

I chuckled and motioned to the house. “Go on in, you have a grandfather and two uncles as well.”

Mom wrapped an arm around her shoulders and walked up the stairs. I heard her sniffling and watched her smear tears off her cheeks. Tati and I followed them in and found Dad standing in the living room waiting. His eyebrows were way up.

“Holy God, Olga, she looks like you!”

“See?” Tati elbowed me.

Dad shot me an evil look, then opened his arms and Cassie walked straight into them. “Hi, Grandpa.”

“Damn. That sounds really good.”

“They’re not married, at all.” Tati laughed.

“Of course not.” I grumped.

“We have lunch waiting out back. Then your father can take you down to his place and get you settled in.” Dad led us out through the back door.

“You don’t live here, Dad?” She looked confused.

“Nope. I don’t. I have my own place about a half mile down. We’ll be staying there, but you can come over here anytime you want.”

Three people stood and turned as we popped out onto the back porch. Dad did the intros. “Cassie, these are your uncles, Darius and Garrett. And this is Garrett’s girlfriend, Jessica.”

They all took turns giving her a hug, including Jess—which kind of floored me. How close had Garrett and Jess gotten? Was she really thinking about staying with him? It would be awesome if she did.

Lunch was way better than I thought it was going to be—and I hadn’t expected Darius to come all the way down. I knew it was hard for him to be around St. Terese after his wife had died. That he was here said a lot.

I had screwed up, but I hoped I was making up for it.

“Wanna go see the game room?” Tati asked, after we’d all finished eating.

“Oh, the one with the huge TV and awesome gaming setup?” Cassie grinned from ear to ear.

“That one.”

“Can I, Dad?”

I nodded. “Of course, but don’t play too long. We are guests here.”

“You’re family here,” Mom said, grabbing a napkin. “You play as long as you like.”

I bit my tongue and watched Tati lead Cassie into the house. Counting to three, I leaned forward. “Leighann and I had limited her gaming time when she was seven and had trouble getting her to go to school. She was throwing full-on tantrums about how school was a waste and gaming was better. Please, do not give her full reign of that system. Two hours, after her chores and homework are done—and I realize that there is currently no homework. But if she comes up during the school year, that’s the rule.”

“And weekends?” Garrett asked.

“Four, after chores. And after she has spent at least an hour doing something else, usually time on her bike.” I cringed. “I don’t know how much time she’s going to want to spend on that bike now.”

Dad leaned back. “You sound like a father.”

Cutting my gaze to his, I held his eyes. It was hard, since I knew he was the Alpha and that move could potentially be disrespectful. “I am a father.”

“You could have told us.” Mom looked at me, and I could see the sadness in her eyes that she had missed so much of my daughter’s life.

From the bag next to me, I pulled out a scrapbook. “Here. This is your copy. Leigh and I made it for you when we realized that…we wouldn’t be able to tell you about her.”

“Why, though, Son? Why would you keep a child a secret from us? Did we make you afraid of us?”

“No, no. I was afraid for you. Leigh is the daughter of an informant. A government spy. People knowing she had a kid was dangerous, and if they found her father, they would find her. If they found her, they’d find Cassie, then me, and then all of you. We had long talks when Cassie was a baby about telling you or not, and her father said that until his cover was blown or he was dismissed from service, it was better to keep it quiet.”

I picked at the remains of my salad. “It sounds weak. But we did it to protect you. And when she was in the wreck—which was not an accident, by the way—it was just letting the cat out of the bag. I am so sorry. But Leigh and I were just trying to protect her, and you all.”

My father had a hand on the table and studied it. This was his ‘deep in thought’ pose. “You’ve been there for her?”

“Leighann and I made a go of being a family for about the first six months and realized we weren’t meant for each other. We stayed roommates, though, until Cassie was two and a half. I was there all the time for her. Then I got the scholarships in U Alaska, and I had to come back. That’s when we switched to what we have now. Every other weekend and two vacations a year. I’ve kept a little one-bedroom place in Langley since then. Just a small one. So I had some place that wasn’t Leigh’s and she could sleep over.” I smirked. “Leigh didn’t like it at first, but then she met Uriah four years ago.”

“Uriah?” Garrett asked.

“Her husband. Well, her mate. He’s a cat shifter.”

“So, wait, Leighann is a shifter?”

“Wolf, yes.” I nodded.

Dad sat back in his chair. “I’m not happy that you didn’t tell us. Not even drop a hint, Patrick. I understand the reasoning, but that doesn’t make me any less upset. Eventually, I’ll get over that as long as you bring her around.”

“Nothing is secret anymore,” I answered. “Well, relatively. She’ll definitely be around and I’m more than happy to fly you down to Vancouver if you want to do that.”

I leaned forward. “I’m sorry. That’s all I can say. Leighann and I had to make decisions. She’s one of my best friends and I don’t regret anything. We did what we thought was best at the time. Now it’s different and we’re adjusting.”

“I like her.” Darius smiled. “She’s a good kid and she clearly loves you. She seemed really well adjusted and there was no resentment in her for finding all this out.”

Another quiet moment passed. Mom slapped her hand on the table. “I got a granddaughter. Whatever happened, happened. We missed the first twelve years and I’m not going to miss any more. That’s that. What do you need from us, Patrick? How can we help you be an even more awesome father?”

“That’s that.” Garrett laughed and slapped me on the back. “But I’m going to rib you about this forever, Trick.”

I groaned. “Tatianna told you.”

“Oh yes.” Darius laughed, rubbing his hands together. “Oh yes, she did.”

Chapter Fourteen

This was not how I had planned to spend one instant of my vacation. At all.

We didn’t have time to be coy, either. There were literally coyotes at the door and I wanted to know what we had to do. Delia and Jess would be our own personal Alphas, but they needed a kick in the ass sometimes.

I glanced at Jess. “Who was on patrol tonight?”

Jess seemed shocked that I brought it up, then shook her head. “I don’t know.”

Delia shrugged. “Bart. Pretty sure.”

I tossed a look at her, and Jess looked stunned again.

Delia looked between us. “What? You asked.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Brandy hissed.

“The pa…the guys at the compound set up patrols around the property. They alternate. No one wants the coyotes here.”

Well, this cat was thrashing to get out of the bag.

“Bart’s not out there,” Jess said. “He got into a fight with Martin and he’s the kind of asshole who would flake out.”

“What are you talking about?”

The bang on the door cut off the conversation. Someone had shifted and was now bodily slamming against the door. Jess needed another kick in the ass. “Call Garrett. We need them all up here.”

“Are they trying to break in?” Brandy was terrified.

“Line’s dead.” Jess laughed.

We all held out our cell phones in the next instant. She shook her head and grabbed her own. “I got his number on speed dial.”

The door rattled hard against an impact.

Jess stepped back and had her conversation with Garrett as Brandy grabbed my elbow. “Upstairs. Let’s get upstairs. You can pick them off like fish in a barrel if you have to.” She pointed to my gun.

“Good idea,” Zanna said and crept over to the stairs.

“Excellent idea,” Jess agreed. “They’re going to be here as fast as they can, but it’s still going to be about ten minutes.”

A polite knock rattled us more than any banging and howling.

“Brandy. Brandy Yéil, you are challenged. Come out and face the challenge. You are challenged for this land. You have to answer.”

“What?” Zanna looked confused.

“They want my land. I’m not answering, because it’s my land and I don’t know why they think they can challenge me.”

Jess’s face betrayed her. She knew. She absolutely knew the answer to that, but she wasn’t about to talk. “Go. Upstairs!”

At the top of the stairs I heard the most wonderful sounds. Wolves. Howling in the distance.

Patrick, Garrett. Martin, and even Tatianna. I could hear each howl as if they were speaking. Jess and Delia both had looks of relief on their faces.

“Joy. Wolves,” Zanna mumbled.

We were all distracted again when the doorknob down below groaned and snapped under an unseen pressure. It plunked down on the floor and the door creaked open.

“The doorknob?” Brandy hissed.

“Window. Go out the window,” Jess snapped, pushing me, Brandy, and Zanna toward it.

It was a good idea, and I grabbed the other two and pushed them along, Delia taking over a moment later.

None of them heard the door slam back, wide-open.

“They’re in.”

Jess nodded. “They snapped the knob.”

“Yeah, well, you know they’re strong.”

She nodded. We watched the bottom of the stairs.

I slapped a hand to my forehead. “Naked. They’re going to be naked.”

Jess groaned. “Of course. They’ll try to intimidate us with their swinging and not-so-swinging dicks in our faces. Best way to get us flustered.”

Delia hissed behind us. “Come on!”

We nodded and pressed our shoulders together, backing away from the stairs and into the room.

“Go,” Jess said to me.

I spun and raced to the window. Handing my gun out to Brandy, I swung out onto the roof. I grabbed the gun back and slipped it in the window. I really didn’t want to fire it—I would ruin Jess’s hearing.

A minute later Jess was out with us on the roof.

Zanna was nearly wringing her hands. “The coyotes are everywhere. They’re around the front. Yipping. Shoving into the house.”

Delia glanced over the edge. “Ten feet to the deck. We can hang drop, and it’s not too bad.”

“And do what then?”

“Hide in the underbrush.” Delia shrugged.

“The what? That’s not safe.”

Garrett howled, very close.

“The woods are safe,” I said.

We all quickly glanced at each other and shrugged. Brandy and Delia sat on the edge.

“When are they going to be here?” Zanna asked, looking into the dark forest around us.

“Soon. Garrett, Patrick”—Delia looked at me, but I didn’t react—“are on their way. Probably Jason and Martin too. Just, let’s get out of their line of sight.”

I watched as Brandy and Delia were the first two down. They landed and ran as fast as they could. Zanna was right behind them with the two guns we had. I dropped down next and turned to grab Jess’s gun as she sat to hang down from the gutters.

Blood and bone rained down on me from above. Jess’s body jerked and fell.

“Oh my God! No!” I knew I screamed the words, but it didn’t feel like it. I scrambled to get under her, but I was knocked out of the way by the body of a massive wolf.

“Garrett, oh, Garrett.” I scrambled over and put her head on my lap. “Holy shit, she’s hit so bad…”

He shifted instantly back to human and gasped.

“Shit, shit.” My voice rose to hysterical levels. “We need an ambulance. We have to get her to a hospital!”

“Jess! Jessica!”

“Don’t shake her!”

“Who shot her?” Garrett wasn’t himself. He was as hysterical as me.

“I don’t know!” I cried.

There was so much blood. Her shoulder was a ruin and I could see a pulse. See it. There was no way she was going to live.

Someone knelt behind me, holding me up, while I kept her head on my lap.

“Don’t die, Jess. Don’t die…”

Garrett growled from deep inside. “Find them. Take them out. I’ll take the heat, I don’t care.”

The person behind me—Patrick, I realized—kissed the top of my head and ran off.

I gasped. “Zanna! Zanna is a field medic!”

Tatianna yipped and ran off.

I put my forehead on Jess’s. I wanted to will her to stay alive. “We tried to get out. I don’t know where the shot came from.”

“I do. I saw. The gun came out of the window.”

I looked at him trying to find a pulse, whispering desperately in her ear to stay with us.

“Where is the closest hospital?”

“To handle this? Anchorage.”

Oh, God. That was hours away.

Jess’s eyes fluttered open and she found Garrett right away. The love between them, the sensation of right and destiny nearly knocked me back.

Garrett was her fist bump.

“Gar…”

“Ssh, Zanna’s coming.”

She tried to shake her head.

“It’s not too late,” he said. The tears he didn’t even try to stop dropped onto her cheeks and lips. He knew he was lying.

Jess was dying.

He threw his head back and let out an anguished screaming howl. “Don’t leave me! Please don’t leave me!”

Zanna dove in and shoved me out of the way. She ran her hands over Jess’s exposed mess of a shoulder and her eyes filled with fear. “Oh. Oh God. I can’t… This is too much. There’s no kit in the world…”

Jess’s hand fluttered, and Garrett leaned down.

“I love you…”

My heart hurt. She was going to die.

“Oh, God, baby, don’t do this… Hang on. Please.”

“…trying…”

A strong, tenor voice filled the air around with a calm sensation I didn’t know could get through our panic. “You know what you have to do, Son.”

Mine, and Garrett’s, head snapped around. Martin stood there on the stairs.

Garrett’s breath became panicked. “She never said yes.”

“Risk her ire, or lose her forever.”

While there were hints of his Alpha there, the true sound was that of a father, encouraging his son to grab life before it slipped away.

And I gasped. Garrett could mate her. I didn’t know how it worked, but if he mated her, she’d be bound to him and his magic and she could heal! “Can you do that? Can you? Please, anything. Save her.”

“She never said yes.”

“Don’t try to be noble. Please. She’s dying, and she loves you. Save her.” I caught his eyes and he stared hard at me. It took him just a moment to nod.

“Leave. Everyone leave.”

“No!” Zanna screamed.

I grabbed her and pulled her back. “Trust him, Zanna. He loves her and he can do this. But we need to go.”

“No! He—”

“Zanna.” Martin’s Alpha was out. “Come with us. Come.”

She shook her head and still resisted.

I stood and pulled her to her feet. “Go. Go with Tati.”

Everyone moved quickly after that and left me standing with Garrett. I dropped a kiss on the top of his head. “Save her. Please. Save her.”

Running after Zanna and Tati, they were heading for the Range Rover. Zanna had a look of complete confusion on her face and seemed very lost.

“Tati, I got this,” I said, trotting up. “Go help the rest of the pack.”

She nodded and shifted before we got another two steps. I’d never seen her wolf, and she was a pretty little brown wolf. She darted off after other wolves around the house, engaged with the coyotes.

Pulling open the door, I basically shoved Zanna in the back. Neither of us could fight a coyote, and I didn’t want them sniffing around us.

“What’s…what’s going on?” Zanna whispered. She turned and plastered her gaze on the maniacal fight outside, in front of the cabin. She turned slowly to me. “Did Garrett Pauler and his sister just turn into wolves?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Are we letting Jessica die?”

“No, Z, we’re not. Garrett is her mate, and he can save her.”

“How?”

“I don’t know how it works. But because he can make her his mate forever, she gets the magic properties of his blood, and she’ll heal. At least that’s how Patrick explained it.”

“Patrick?”

“Well, his sister and brothers are shifters…”

“They change…into…”

“Wolves.”

“My head hurts. How is this possible?”

“I don’t have all the answers, just some of the facts. I do know that you weren’t supposed to find out that they can shift. But at the same time, since those damn coyotes were attacking you as well, you have a right to know.”

“This is like one of Brandy’s books…”

I shrugged. “I guess so.”

“Jess.” She sucked in a breath and pointed out the window.

Jerking around, I saw Garrett walking toward us carrying Jess and flanked by Martin and Patrick. Slamming the door open, I jumped out of the back and pulled the back door open.

“Where are we going?”

“My house, please,” he said.

“She’s alive?”

He nodded tightly. “She’s alive. The wound is really bad and it’s going to take a few days to fully heal.”

“So she’s your mate,” Zanna managed.

“Yes.”

I closed the door and walked around to the front of the Ranger Rover to climb into the driver’s seat. I slammed the door and opened the windows.

“Addi.”

I turned and a fully naked Patrick was standing there. “Can we talk? Later?”

Glancing behind him at Martin, I could see the man was working on forgiving his son for whatever this was he had done. I took a deep breath.

“After. Call me. We’ll meet somewhere.”

“Somewhere?”

“Neutral territory.”

He nodded and stepped back. Garrett needed to get Jess back to his house and take care of her.

* * *

“Is she awake?”

“Can we see her?”

“Does she hate him?”

“Is she hungry?”

Martin laughed and held his hands up to stop all of us from attacking him. “Ladies. She’s fine. They need to go visit Grandmother because there’s something different with this mating. Different,” he cut off our squawking, “does not mean bad. She’s fully healed except for a bruise on her shoulder.”

I let out a breath, as we all did. Jessica had been out for two solid days. She’d been an absolute mess when Garrett brought her to the car, but she’d been breathing. That was all I needed to see.

And now she was awake and with Garrett—who was her mate. Our friends knew the truth about St. Terese and the shifter and I felt relieved that I didn’t have to keep it a secret anymore.

“Let’s let them get on their way,” Martin said, ushering us to the door. “I’m sure she’ll come back and tell you all about it. You are besties, after all.” I heard the smirk as we filed out onto the porch.

“Is Jessi gonna be okay?”

The voice came from the right and I turned to find a smaller, younger version of Olga standing there, with Patrick’s eyes watching us.

Cassandra.

Patrick rose from the couch and stood behind her, hands on her shoulders.

“Jessica is going to be fine,” Delia said. “She just needs time to heal and relax.”

“Oh, thank God. I know Uncle Garrett was a mess.” She glanced back at Patrick.

He smiled at her, then looked up at us again. “Ladies, I’d like you to meet my daughter, Cassie. Cassie, these are Jess’s best friends. Delia, Zanna, Brandy, and Addi.”

“Hi.” She smiled.

They all answered with a pleasant greeting and Delia cleared her throat. “We’re going to head up to the cabin and get shit sorted. There’s still stuff to do, like curtains and rugs. Come up when you can, Addi.”

If Delia could have grabbed Zanna and Brandy by the ears and dragged them away, she would have. I schooled the laugh at her antics.

“Come on, Cassie. I think your grandmother has breakfast waiting for us,” Martin said.

Cassie looked at me. “Have you had Grandma’s wild boar bacon? Holy crap, it’s so good. I freaked out about that wild boar part, but honestly? So delish.”

I nodded. “I have, and you’re right.”

She stared at me, then glanced at her father. “Can I talk to you for just a sec, Addi?”

Me? “Uh, sure.”

Pushing the door open from the porch, she walked down the stairs to the small front lawn and off to the side. She picked at a nail for a moment and then sniffled. “Look, Addi, don’t be too mad with Dad. He and Mom agreed to keep me a secret. And after my accident last week, I kind of get it. They were aiming for me to get to Mom. Thankfully I am a shifter, and Uri—I mean Uriah, my stepdad—is former CSIS, so…things are changing. Just.” She shrugged. “He loves me. He’s an awesome dad. Don’t count him out because he and Mom made decisions.”

Glancing down at my own shoes, I let out a little laugh. “I know, kiddo. This isn’t just about you, and you being a secret from like…everyone. But, I hear you. I know your dad isn’t really a bad guy. Trust me, I wouldn’t hold you against him.”

She nodded and looked at me through her lashes. “Are you going to come over for breakfast? Grandma always makes too much bacon.”

“I have to help my friends today, but I’ll be around.”

“Cool.” She nodded. “Grandpa! I want bacon!” She started walking down the street without him.

Martin hopped down the steps and headed after her. “Her mother said since her shift, she’s just turned into a bottomless pit.”

“Shifter and puberty,” I said. “Have fun keeping that fed.”

“It could be worse,” he said, pushing through the gate. “She could be a he, and then we’d have to sacrifice a whole cattle daily to keep him fed.”

I chuckled as Martin trotted to keep up with his granddaughter. She was already an Alpha personality. We were all going to have fun with her around.

We?

Patrick stood next to me, watching them walk back to the house, his hands shoved in his pockets. “Can we talk? Is this a good time? Neutral territory?”

“I think it’s as neutral as we’ll get.” I sighed.

The words were barely off my lips when he was jumping in. “I’m sorry. You have no idea how sorry I am. I cheated everyone out of knowing who Cassie was. We cheated. Leighann and I made the choice.”

“All the things you know about me…” I said.

“But I just couldn’t tell anyone, Addi. Not just you. My parents are pissed at me. Garrett is pissed. I don’t blame them for it at all. But last week, Cassie almost died because someone found out about her. My daughter almost died…”

The pain in his voice was overwhelming. And with all of us rejecting him, making this hard for him, he was still standing and still had his shoulders straight.

“Cassie is going to be safer now that she’s not a secret,” he continued. “Everyone knows her and can keep an eye on her. When she was little it was easy. Leighann and I were always there. And then Uriah came into the picture. But now…she’s a teenager in a few months and we can’t keep her strapped to our sides. We need other people to help us with her. The accident made us all realize that.”

“She’s a hot commodity?”

“She’s the granddaughter of an American spymaster. They can get to him through her.”

“Oh.” I studied his profile. “So her accident was no accident.”

Patrick shook his head. “It was a warning.”

“She’s going to be safe, though?”

He smirked. “She’s a shifter, with a shifter mother, shifter father, shifter and CSIS stepfather. She’s going to be fine.”

“What the hell is See-Sis?”

“Canadian special forces.”

I kept my lips sealed. I hadn’t realized that Canada had special forces. But if they were anywhere near US special forces, I was duly impressed.

“Can you give me a chance, Addison? I’ve screwed up a lot in my short thirty-nine years, and I’m trying to fix it. I didn’t expect that I would meet my mate so soon, and then screw that up as well.” His voice was plaintive and sad.

The truth was, I didn’t want to walk away from him. I didn’t know how this whole thing was going to turn out—I was supposed to go back to Chicago and look for a job at the end of August. But that didn’t mean I wanted to walk away from…this. Whatever this was.

“I need a few days, Patrick. Just a few. Can you give that to me? I am not going to avoid you, but I need time to wrap my head around you, and Cassie, and just…everything.”

He nodded. “Yes, yes, of course. I wouldn’t dream…”

I stared up the road. “You’re a good father, Patrick. Just let me get used to that idea.”

A tight, small smile graced his lips, never really reaching his eyes. He leaned in and kissed my cheek, and pushed back through the gate a moment later, heading toward his house.

I stood, just staring at the gate for a long time.

Chapter Fifteen

Jess walked me down the side of the house. “Look, just get to know her. Cassie is a great kid. This is the perfect chance to try and get this settled in your head.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Are you trying to pair me off?”

“You already know Patrick is yours for the taking.” She smiled. “But this will be a nice chance to get to know her. And see how she and Patrick interact.”

“You just want me to be there for this whole thing, don’t you? You’re still dealing with the mate-thing.”

Jess stopped and leaned against the wall. “Yes. Jesus tap-dancing Christ on a cracker. Yes. I am. I’m still terrified.”

“Did you talk to your mate about this?”

“He knows I’m scared. He’s also trying to keep his possessive quality to himself, and he struggles with that. But this is really huge, and I’m just having trouble adjusting. I need…”

“Someone normal. And you picked me?”

Jess’s look of despair lifted, and she laughed. “I did. I picked you. Because apparently your insanity is a lesser degree than mine.”

I patted her on the shoulder. “You’ll be fine, Jess. You get to live for five hundred years. Just imagine all you can learn and change in that time. It’ll be fun to have Garrett there with you. And eventually, any kids you have can join in on the fun. It’s magic, and you don’t want to question it too much.”

“Did I tell you what Tomasina said?”

“Aside from you’re going to be really old?”

She laughed and nodded. “I’m going to be able to shift one day. That creepy, crawly, not ready yet feeling under my skin is a newborn wolf.”

Three months ago, I didn’t even believe in magicians and could figure out their every trick. But now? This was real magic, a whole force that none of us really understood. It had laced its way into our lives, and into our very beings, altering everything we thought we knew.

And now Jess was telling me she had a wolf inside her.

That was…amazing. “You get to shift?”

“Not yet. But I’m still freaking out about it! What if I can’t control her? What if I like it so much I never go back to human?”

I grabbed her arm. “Jess. You have time to worry about this. You don’t have to figure out everything right this instant. Give yourself some time, and some breathing room. Garrett is there. He’s not going anywhere. Believe me.”

She took a deep breath and nodded. “Right. Right. He and I are in this together. The fist bump.”

I laughed. “The fist bump.” I gave her a little shove. “And who is who in the moral support category, anyway? You for me, or me for you? Get going. I smell food.”

We walked into the backyard and there was indeed a barbeque grill going, as well as a smoking pit. Which meant more of Olga’s glorious wild boar dishes.

“Jess, Addi!” Olga called from the table. “Come on over! We’re still getting everything cooked but have a drink.”

“Thanks, Olga,” Jess said, grabbing a local beer from the cooler.

I grabbed a soda and sat down at the picnic table.

“How’s that cabin?” Darius asked, walking down the stairs.

“It’s awesome. Brandy loves everything about it,” I answered. “She’s having so much fun decorating and arranging. We’re all happy she has a place she can call hers.”

“She didn’t before this?” Cassie asked.

“Well, not really,” Jess said. “Her father’s family wasn’t really interested in raising her after her mother was killed. I don’t even know if she talks to that side of the family.”

“Everyone on her mother’s side, except her grandmother, was mortified that she married a black man,” I shrugged. “Her grandmother was only able to care for her for a few years before the Alzheimer’s forced her into a nursing home.”

“Wow, people suck,” Tatianna said, joining us at the table.

“They do,” Jess said. “They really do.”

Martin appeared from around the corner of the house. “I’d ask how you ladies are liking Alaska, but I think that’s kind of an irrelevant question at this point.”

Cassie shot her hand in the air. “I like it.”

“You like the food,” Patrick grumbled.

I hadn’t even seen him in the chair up on the porch, but he was there, flipping through a biology text book, scribbling something down.

“So? I like food. There’s really not a problem with that.”

He slapped the book closed. “Keep eating the way you are and we’re going to have to teach you to hunt so you don’t eat me out of house and hearth.”

“Please,” Olga said, rolling her eyes. “She’s got nothing on you boys. Seriously. I made an entire damn boar I don’t expect to last three days.”

I laughed. That was true. The men in her family would eat that pig from stem to stern in three days flat. And not leave any for Cassie.

“Alpha,” someone called from the walkway.

“Oh, fuck,” Garrett grumbled. “Even on Sundays?”

“Every day, son. Every. Fucking. Day. No matter how many times I tell them to call before they appear on my property!” Martin stood with his beer and walked over. Garrett and Patrick followed him, and they made the person come out from behind the building. “What, Lovecraft? Why do you all insist on forgetting my rule?”

“Alpha, we found Bart.”

Patrick and Garrett exchanged looks and their stances changed to be more threatening than annoyed.

“Did you bring him here?” Martin stared at him.

“We thought it was the best idea.”

Garrett ran a hand down his face. “What don’t you get about we have a jail and we have procedures.”

“I would have thought that you of all people, Beta, would want to see him—”

“I want to have a peaceful day with my mate and my family, Lovecraft. Just one, before we have to deal with the ridiculousness of Bart and his cohorts. Call. For the love of God and all that’s holy. Call.”

Letting his son’s words hang in the air a moment, Martin nodded. “You’re here now. Bring him in.”

Two big burly men flanked the scaly-faced man who abandoned us on the hill to die by the coyotes. Another two followed them, heads down, shame-faced. Martin motioned for the two guards to step back, and he circled Bart once.

“What do you have to say?” His tone was clipped.

“We want our hunting rights back.”

Martin cocked his head. “Are you serious?”

“We want our hunting rights back.”

“You are serious. You left those women on that hill to die, because you feel cheated that you’re not allowed by the pack and tribe to hunt elk.” He stared Bart down. “Is that correct?”

“We want—”

“Is. That. Correct?”

“Yes, Alpha.”

Olga leaned into Tatianna. “Go. Tati, get Cassie out of here. You and Darius head to Patrick’s. Go.”

She nodded and grabbed Cassie’s hand, heading up the porch stairs and through the house. Darius was hot on their tail.

“So you saw fit to leave my daughter-in-law to die.”

“Alpha, it was a simple request—”

“That I denied twice because your idiot cousin shot an elk shifter last summer. He’s exiled. Want to join him?”

“He was drunk.”

“I don’t give a shit.”

Olga motioned Jess and me to stand. “Look intimidating,” she whispered.

That wasn’t hard. This man who had the simple job of watching that coyotes didn’t get close to our cabin had abandoned his post and nearly caused one of my best friend’s deaths.

“Jail. Put him in the jail. Tomorrow evening you’ll hear your sentence, but I guarantee no one is going to object to me exiling you with your cousin, Bartholomew. Because you will also get drunk and use that an excuse, and perhaps this time to kill the last of the Yéils. Go. Get out of here.”

“And if you all don’t start using the fucking phone, I’m going to start meting out consequences,” Olga snapped. “This is not the nineteenth century, you primates!”

The two men behind Bart watched as the burly dudes pulled him away. They turned to Martin and looked like they were on the verge of tears.

“No, don’t even try,” Martin snapped. “You’re not being exiled, but you will be punished. And I expect that you will never bring up this hunting right again until I do. Understood?”

“Yes, Alpha.” They trembled from head to toe.

“Go, get out of here.”

There was a moment of tension in the air, but as soon as they were around the corner, Olga flew up the stairs, into the house.

“Back soon,” Jess growled, running up them just behind her.

Both Garrett and Martin leapt up the porch after them, the door slamming behind him.

And then it hit me.

Alpha effect.

Just because I was still angry with Patrick, and we weren’t official yet didn’t mean that biology didn’t continue to work. I swallowed. My whole body lit up.

He stalked toward me, his eyes dark. “Addi…”

Did I want this to happen?

“Addi, tell me now if I need to run this off.” His voice was hoarse, deep. “If I touch you—”

I dragged in a breath. “Touch me.”

His mouth was the first thing to hit, and then his arms went around me. “Baby, I need you.”

“I know,” I managed.

He released the button on my pants and shoved them off to my knees and picked me up to drop me on the picnic table. All the while, I did the same for him—yanked his pants off his ass and palmed his straining cock.

Pulling one leg out of my clothes completely, he wrapped it around himself and pulled me close to the edge. “Are you good with this?”

“Jesus, my blood is on fire,” I answered. “Just fuck me.”

He speared himself deep inside me and it was like a pressure valve was released for both of us. I groaned loudly and grabbed his ass with both hands, directing him on how to move himself in and out of me.

“Shit, how could I forget in two weeks how fucking good you feel around my cock?” he grunted.

There was no good argument on my side. He felt incredible inside me again. He was rough, hard, but nothing I couldn’t take, everything that I wanted.

“Damn it, Addi, I’m so sorry I fucked up.”

His apology was in the middle of his driving his dick into me. I couldn’t forgive him. Not yet. So I offered the next best thing as his finger found my clit.

“I am not walking away from you, Patrick. I’m not. Just need time.”

His teeth grazed my neck and screeched a little. I wanted him to bite me, but I couldn’t let him. Not yet.

Planting his hands on either side of my hips he drove and drove himself as deep as he could get, dragging the fabric of my bra over my nipples, creating a fabulous friction I wanted more of. I pressed myself into his chest and grabbed the shell of his ear in my teeth, nibbling and sucking hard.

“Addi, sweet Christ…”

“Come on, Patrick, fuck me hard. Come in me.”

I hissed the words in his ear and nibbled again.

“Come, Addi. Please, come on my cock. Please.”

His words were of a man on the edge of ecstasy, and I couldn’t stop my climax if I tried. He slammed hard inside me, and his finger pinched my clit.

“Shit, yesssss!” I kept my voice quiet and low so only he could hear my orgasm. My body spasmed around his shaft, and he came hard, grunting and growling as he released his cum inside me.

Panting, he dropped his head to my shoulder. I wrapped my arms around him and held him there. It was peaceful in the wake of the turbulence. I liked having him there, on top of me, still inside me. His big body was a comfort, and…

Well. I just wanted him there.

“Stay with me,” he whispered. “Don’t leave.”

“I just need time, Patrick. Soon.”

Raising his head, he stared at me. “I love you.”

Oh. “Patrick…”

“I know. But I had to tell you.”

I inhaled and was ready to push him back gently—but stopped. Bang.

“What’s that?”

He angled his head to listen, and his face burst into shock. Bang bang bang. “Oh, shit. That’s…”

My eyes went wide. “Your parents?”

“Their bed at least.” Bang bang.

I bit my lip to keep from laughing. “Holy crap.”

Patrick stepped back, and I felt his loss. He grabbed my waist and helped me down, offering my pant leg to me so I could get dressed. “Oh, shit. I hope he doesn’t—”

He didn’t have to finish the sentence. A tremendous howl came from the room above us.

“Well.” I managed to not laugh. “Let’s get the table wiped down from our sex, at least.”

Hanging his head, he nodded as he fastened himself back up. “That’s so mortifying.”

“What? Your father howling his orgasm, or yours all over the picnic table?”

He looked doubly horrified.

* * *

I found Brandy in the not-all-that-secret swimming hole about a hundred yards back from the cabin. She had stuffed her hair in a swim cap and looked miserable.

I sat on the rock above the water. “What’s up, buttercup?”

She screamed and spun around. I giggled and kicked some water at her.

“Could you not see that I’m thinking?”

“You’re swimming, not thinking.”

“Do you know how awesome this warm water is for doing both? Honest, this is great.”

“Stalling.”

Her hand emerged from the water, middle finger up.

“Seriously. What’s up?” I dangled my legs in the water. “You’re not yourself.”

She paddled a bit before finally turning back to me. “I think I’m going crazy. Everything this summer has just been…so nuts. I can’t get my head on straight. Look on the rock next to you.”

I glanced down and realized I was nearly sitting on a massive black feather. I picked it up and twirled it in the sunlight, watching blue highlights come and go on the strands. “It’s pretty. A crow? Raven?”

She stopped and sat on a ledge just below the waterline. “Me.”

“I’m sorry. What?”

She tapped her chest. “Me. Mine. I’ve been finding them on my pillow, or in my hair for the past four weeks. No crows, no ravens, no fucking idea where they are coming from.” She sighed.

“You’re telling me these feathers are yours?”

“Maybe someone is fucking with me? But I found that in my hair today.” Shrugging, I could see her kicking her legs under the water. “Add in that our best friend is now mated to a wolf shifter—which I still have trouble even saying, never mind believing—and you’re dating one who had a secret kid, and I’ve got this weird ass unique bisexual attraction to the damn man-bear, and Zanna’s…”

I straightened. “Zanna what?”

“The Vitaz people are after her again. They are going to bankrupt her. I swear it. They’ll be her ruin. I know her parents were trying to do right, but oh my God to leave her with the bill.”

“They’re back again? How much this time?”

“Thirty.”

“Oh, ouch.”

Brandy just nodded.

“It’s been a really weird summer. Are you and Zanna at least on decent terms?”

“I guess so.” She sighed. “It’s hard to be around her and Rick.”

“Rick is the man-bear?”

She nodded. “His name is Hercule Debrossier.”

“That’s a goddamn mouthful.”

She peered at me. “So I hear.”

The laugh escaped me. “Every night?”

“And usually at least once during the day.” She sighed. “I don’t know where Ric lives, but I kind of wish she’d go there. It’s exhausting to hear them. I even unsubtly moved my bedroom away from them.”

“Which is why your stuff was upstairs.”

“Did you know that even being a floor above two sexually overactive adults doesn’t stop the sound of the bed hitting the wall?”

“Yes. Yes, I did.” I grimaced. Brandy quirked an eyebrow, and I cleared my throat. “So there’s this thing called the Alpha effect. If Martin or Garrett has to pull out their Alpha, anyone who is a Beta or an enforce reacts to this. Martin had to deal with Bart after the incident with Jess. Garrett and Patrick were there.”

“And you were…”

“Swept up in the fervor. Yes. I hadn’t planned on that before I sorted my thoughts on Patrick and what was going on, but… He was there, I was there. And so were Martin and Olga. And. Well. I just pray you never hear people who could potentially be your in-laws going at it.”

“Ooh, ouch.” She cocked her head. “Going at it or just getting it.”

“Did you know that you can hear a bed hitting a wall outside the house? And that I seriously think that Garrett and Jess should soundproof their house in case they almost scar their children?”

“Oh, damn!” Brandy couldn’t stop chuckling. “That’s bad.”

I knew my cheeks were flaming red and I needed to take back the conversation. “Back to you, missy. Do you think Zanna and her man-bear are pulling a trick on you?”

“No.” She shook her head. “She’s cranky around me, but not mean.”

She let out a breath and kicked her feet again. That was a sure sign something else was brewing in her mind. I didn’t ask again. I just raised an eyebrow.

“So, I’ve been having these dreams. I mean, I’ve had them most of my life, but lately they’ve gotten incredibly intense. Like, I don’t want to sleep intense. They’ve gone from murky and muddy to clear as fucking day and terrifying. And every time I have one…another feather.”

Nodding, I didn’t want to say anything so I didn’t break her spell.

“They all start with my grandfather, at the beginning of the 1900s. He’s young. Really young, like five or six, it’s just dream-knowing that he’s Grandpa Xavier. There are dozens of black birds around him—the dream tells me they’re ravens. One by one they fall from the sky, shot either by a gun or a bow and arrow, and the coyotes come and eat them. Rip them apart and destroy them. It’s a long time, but someone who looks like Martin comes and takes my grandfather—and someone who looks like his brother—away from the death and destruction. But the feathers follow him. Everywhere he goes, more feathers. More feathers. I finally wake after a while.”

“Has it ever gone further?”

She nodded. “Each time a little more. But it’s so hard to get past the death of all those beautiful birds. Once I do, the dream gets longer every time. I’m all the way up to when my mother meets my father. Everyone in my grandfather’s adopted family hates my dad because he’s black. And my dad’s family doesn’t like her.”

“You’re dreaming your family’s history?”

“Seems like it.” She sighed. “And feathers. Dreams and feathers.”

“You need to talk to Delia,” I said. “You have to tell her about these dreams. You know that she’s the most mystical of all of us. She might be able to help you. I can’t. I suck at dream interpretation.”

“I’ve been scared to say anything, to anyone. My dad’s family just doesn’t like that mystical shit because they are all about Jesus. And the only person left on Mom’s side is Harrison and he’s an asshole I want nothing to do with.”

“Wait.” I looked at the feather. “What about Tomasina? Grandmother? She might be able to help you. According to Jess, she likes company and doesn’t get enough of it.”

“The lady up by the glacier?”

“Yes.” I put the feather down. “If you want to know more, maybe she can at least tell you the history of the land around here. Everyone calls it the Yéil land and everyone calls us the Yéil women. I’ll bet money Grandmother knows more about this land than anyone else, and that she can answer the feathers thing.”

Brandy’s face relaxed. “That…actually sounds like a great idea. Someone who knows more than I’m gonna screw you out of every penny if you want this land.”

“Definitely.”

Chapter Sixteen

I stared at Delia sitting at the table, utterly flabbergasted.

She had been paying for everything for us. All this time, she was the one who had been making sure we had enough food, gas, power, extremely expensive medical care.

Delia had footed the bill for Zanna’s treatment. The one that put her leukemia in remission. And she was now setting up a lawsuit for the shithole she nearly died in.

She’d helped Brandy get the house.

She’d helped Jess with her car.

She’d helped me with all the plastic surgery I’d needed.

How the hell had this woman managed it?

“You see, I’m really quite wealthy, and I like to help my friends. Zanna needed her SCT—the stem cell transplant—to keep the leukemia in remission. I never want to hear from Vitaz again. Ever. Not ever.”

I swore. “You paid for the stem cell transplant!”

Delia grinned as the lawyer shot to his feet and started pumping Delia’s hand. I just stared. I had a million questions, but she just shook her head and motioned for me to wait until we were in the car again.

God damn. She was wealthy. Apparently like really rich. I didn’t remember much of the meeting after that, but we were finally on our way out.

“Delia.”

“Let’s just get to the car.” She grinned.

We crossed the street and headed into the parking lot. I was trying to line up my questions in some kind of logical order so I didn’t overwhelm her or myself.

“Hello, Madeline.”

We both whirled around at that voice, but a club came down and smashed Delia on the side of the head.

I almost screamed until there was a gun in my face.

“You’re my insurance. Don’t make me hurt you. We’re going to that large, beige vehicle over there”—he waved with the gun in a general direction—“and you’re going to get in and stay quiet. I don’t want to shoot you or Madeline, but I will if you need convincing.”

I didn’t argue. I just walked to the car and waited for him to open the door. I wasn’t leaving Delia with this guy.

Climbing in, I sat and he threw Delia in the back and across my lap. “Don’t let her get hurt. I need both you bitches for now.” He slammed the door.

Waiting for him to walk around and climb in, my brain started to kick in. I realized I had just basically acquiesced to being kidnapped. I clamped down on my panicked response. This wasn’t the time for me to freak out and freeze. I didn’t know what was going on and I needed to.

He jerked the car into drive and pulled out of the lot. Not only did he smell like a whiskey bottle, I was pretty sure he had drunk Juneau out of most of its booze.

“Who are you?”

Grunting as he jerked his car out of the collision course he was on with the parked traffic, he didn’t answer me right away. “Ain’t she said nothing about her family? I’m her uncle. Uncle Charles Hoengaard. Her father’s only brother.”

Liar. Delia’s last name was LaPlage. “What do you want?”

“Her money. Every last penny of it.”

Oh, that was a problem. I had only just found that she had money. I didn’t know how much. “So you’re holding her for ransom?”

“You’re the prisoner, sweetheart. She’s gonna sign every penny over or you get a bullet in the brain.” Yanking the wheel again, he barely avoided oncoming traffic this time.

This was Juneau, Alaska at two in the afternoon—the man was drunk and determined to murder all of us before he could clear the city limits.

“Why don’t you just ask her for a loan? Or a gift?”

“Please. Those cheap ass people? They would never, ever give me even a whiff of their money. So I’m taking it.”

I just watched him in the rearview as he wound us through the straight streets, to the south end of the city. He jerked the car over to the side and pulled to a stop.

“Gotta piss,” he said. “Don’t move, or I’ll shoot you.”

I opted not to move. He might be drunk, and staggering, but those bullets flew straight. Wandering down the alley, he did the usual public piss dance.

Delia wiggled on my lap and her eyes fluttered open.

“Don’t move,” I whispered.

* * *

“Addi and Delia are missing.”

The words froze my blood, but not my feet and I had been to Garrett’s house in less time than it took to hang up my phone. Jess, Jason, Garrett, and I all piled into the truck and shot down the highway to the bank, where Quentin was waiting for us.

It was right about the time he pulled us to the side of the building that my blood finally started to run again.

“I’m so sorry. I couldn’t get out here fast enough. They were gone the instant I saw it happen and the damn customer wouldn’t let me run even after I stood and walked away from them.”

“Why would he take them?” I asked.

My heart was now in my throat for Addi. Jess was a mess too, but holding it in. Kidnapping a former kidnapped victim was not a good way to support her mental health.

“I just had this camera fixed on the side, and I’m calling up the footage, but I doubt we’ll get anything. I sent a few of the cops to ask at the strip mall if anyone had security. But I think the lot is too big for good coverage.”

This felt utterly surreal. Addi and Delia had been kidnapped in broad daylight and no one knew a thing. We had to find them.

I raked a hand through my hair and stared around. Garrett, totally Alpha and totally in control, stared at me, then lifted an eyebrow.

“Bro…you need to take it down a notch.”

“I can’t, Gar. That girl has been through hell and this isn’t going to help her. I’m supposed to be protecting her, keeping her safe. And I fucked that up too.”

“Is this about Addi or Cassie?” he asked.

“Maybe both. Maybe it’s about Addi because of Cassie. Or because I’m a coward. Or because you all will never forgive me for screwing up with Cassie and I’ve just tossed away my mate.”

“Hold up, hold up,” Garrett said, grabbing my arms. “No one is holding Cassie against you, man. Maybe we can’t get the whole story about her, and maybe we feel a little cheated out of her childhood, but that’s because we wanted to share it with her. We wanted the chance to love her. And yes, we live incredibly long lives, but those formative years…you always remember those. I’m a hundred and nineteen, man. I remember everything about my childhood. Who loved me, who tortured me, who pinned me to a scarecrow on Halloween when I was ten. We just wanted to be a part of that.”

“Who pinned you to the scarecrow when you were ten?” Why had I never heard this story?

“Bella and Bertrand Buckleberry, two raven shifters. They were horrible, horrible children. They ran amuck all the time, terrorizing anyone smaller and younger than they were.”

Raven shifters. Which meant they were dead.

“You really all forgive me?”

“You’re an idiot. There’s nothing to forgive. Just to get used to. You’re a father and that’s fucking mind-blowing right now. Even more, you’re apparently a good father by the way Cassie natters on about you all the time and defends you.”

I smiled. “That’s my girl.”

“Well, let’s work on getting your other girl. And you need to take a deep breath and stay in control. It’s not going to do to have a Beta who can’t keep his head in a crazy situation.”

I nodded. “I’m still going to be quietly freaking out here.”

“Well, duh.”

Standing on the side of the bank, we quickly ran through all the possible scenarios that could keep the kidnapper here or allow them to escape. Planes, boats, cars, on foot…there weren’t a lot of ways in and out of Juneau.

Just as we were about to head over to the parking lot and the stores to start our own canvas, Garrett’s phone rang. We didn’t need the speaker.

“Garrett, it’s Fergus.”

My brother grumbled. He’d been dealing with Fergus and the assholes his pack had expelled since the attack on Jess. “This isn’t the time—”

“No, this isn’t about the cabin, Beta.”

Oh. Fergus used the formal title. That was interesting. Garrett cleared his throat. “Go on.”

“You’re missing two women from the cabin, aren’t you? Patrick’s and Jason’s women, specifically.”

“Yes.” Garrett stared at us.

“Wendell saw them. He’s here with me, and I’m going to let him tell you what he saw.”

The phone was passed to Wendell. I hated Wendell. He was an ass and a fool, and he’d been suckered in by the damn exiles when he was exiled for something a thousand times less serious. Now he was desperately trying to make amends, because he saw what those other coyotes really were.

“Beta. I didn’t know who to talk to and figured my own Alpha would be best. I saw the women this morning. They were in the back seat with no driver. I pulled ahead and parked. A minute later, a human emerged from the alleyway, zipping his fly. He climbed in and pulled away from the curb. Sort of. He appeared to be totally shitfaced behind the wheel. I followed for just about half a mile, until he got to the turn off for the mountain. I couldn’t go farther without suspicion.”

“You’re sure it was them?”

“Yes. I’d know them anywhere.” He paused and cleared his throat. “I’d circled that cabin a thousand times.”

I growled at the phone. The fucker just had to remind us that he was part of those exiles, didn’t he? Garrett’s eyes flashed at me to back it down.

Jason rubbed his forehead, missing the look from my brother. “But we can’t pick up their scents. There’s too much—”

“He pissed in the alley.”

Jess looked disgusted, but Jason and I stared at each other. I leaned into the phone. “He pissed.”

“You’re sure?” Jason asked.

“In the alley,” Wendell repeated. “He was pickled. Fetid. Cheap tequila, some beer. Gin? Skunked. I stayed three cars behind and it was overpowering. It was just about noon when he made the turn off for the mountain. I’d put money on still being able to smell him if you got to that intersection.”

“At Thane?” Jason asked.

“Sheep’s Creek, yes.”

“Good, put Fergus on.” Garrett held up a finger as the phone shifted back to the Alpha. “That’s twice, Ferg. Does he need one more?”

“He’s been with the pack for about a week now. No trouble. He’s regaining footing.”

“Good. We’re going to Thane right now. Tell the other packs to keep an eye open?”

“Done.”

The connection closed, and Jason and I headed for his truck. Jess and Garrett got in the truck and we headed down the road.

“How are you hanging on?” I asked Jason.

“Not well, thanks for asking. You?”

“About the same. Definitely worse for wear.”

He sniffed and made the right to follow Garrett. “You two serious?”

“Seriously stuck in a rut, but she’s missing and I’m not going to let anything happen to her. You?”

“Smitten. She’s mine.”

“Looks like we all got lucky at the same time.”

He coughed. “They say it comes in waves. Tomasina said things are about to change in big ways. This is just the start.”

“Tomasina?”

“Grandmother. I can’t…call her that anymore. She’s not that old. Not really. A few dozen years older than your dad. That’s all. She’s also pretty much awesome.”

I raised an eyebrow and let him drive in silence. This guy needed to be one of our enforcers when my dad stepped down as Alpha. No question. I liked him. He was smart and fast. I had seen how fast he was when Jess was attacked. He was honest, and he meshed with us. He also had been hit by the Alpha effect, so that meant he was a possibility.

Currently he was the more level-headed of us.

“You’re calm,” I said.

Jason glanced over at me and shrugged. “My mate can kick ass and take names. She’s not going to let shit happen to anyone she loves.”

The words I needed to hear to calm my ass down.

* * *

Armed, dangerous. Expert survival skills. Do not approach without backup.

Seriously? This was the way the Nome police described Charles Hoengaard? Rancid alcohol and liver failure, body odor and bad breath that a plain human could smell a hundred yards upwind?

Wendell had not been kidding. The dude stank. Even diesel fumes couldn’t hide him, even though the guy in the bad truck tried real hard.

Quentin, who had joined our search after locking up the bank at three, swore from the back seat of Jason’s truck. “That motherfucker! That’s one of my loan managers!” He pointed to the jalopy that had polluted just some of Chuck’s stink out of the air.

The jalopy had gone up the hill just a little bit and made a hard right into the tree.

“Where’d that road come from?” Jason asked.

“I’ll bet they cut it out and sold the timber illegally,” Quentin said. “Fergus is gonna be pissed. Amos is going to kill someone.”

The bears and the Turner Lake Coyotes shared a lot of land. They oddly got on famously, and I had forgotten until that moment that Quentin was an enforcer in the Taku River Den.

Amos was going to be pissed. Fergus was gonna be pissed. And so was the St. Terese pack. No one fucked with our mates.

Garrett leaned against the window of the truck, Jess next to him. “New track. I think this gives us our plan. Patrick, Jay, we’re going to shift and make our way up to that camp. Jess, Quentin, you guys follow up in the trucks, so we can get the hell out of there as fast as possible.

Jess paused, then nodded. “Leave the clothes. No more busting out of the jeans. We only need so many rags.”

Moving the trucks up to the new track, Jason, Garrett, and I stripped out of the clothes and handed them to Jess, strategically making sure she didn’t see anything more than our chests.

We didn’t need a newly-mated Alpha thinking we were flashing our junk at his female.

Jason and I shifted smoothly into our wolves, which left Garrett in human.

“There’s no way we can miss him. Just follow, but not too close. No headlights.”

Garrett didn’t even seem to shift. He was human one instant, wolf the next. We took off into the brush, following the track closely.

The stench of gun oil, alcohol, and sexual intentions wafted through the air.

We picked up our pace.

Chapter Seventeen

The headlights flashed through the window.

Delia walked over and glanced out through the filth she had wiped off before.

I was still slightly in shock from her confession. She wasn’t just rich. She was grossly, disgustingly, nauseously wealthy. She could literally wipe her ass with hundred-dollar bills and not care.

But she did care, and that was how we were all doing as well as we were.

Or, as in our current situation, as badly as we were.

Because Uncle Chuck wanted all that cash, credit, and off-shore funding. Pronto. He wanted all of the LaPlage money.

And just to make me feel worse, they would all surrender it to make sure that Delia and I were safe and secure. Goddamn, I was such a fucking liability to everyone around me.

“It’s not you, Addi,” Delia said quietly from the window. “It’s Chuck. He’s the asshole. It could have been anyone else with me and they’d be in your place.”

“Are you fucking psychic?”

She glanced over her shoulder and smiled. “Sometimes, and sometimes, it’s obvious the only things you can think in a situation like this.”

The doors of a pickup slammed and Delia watched. “Two men. Motherfu—that’s the guy from the bank today. The manager. I’ll bet that’s how he knew I was here.”

I walked over and saw that he had a rather thick manila envelope in his hand. “Transfer papers?”

“Probably. Should be interesting to see. I wonder what they found of mine. There’s a lot more out there than they think there is. I’m not stupid.”

I smirked. “Five’ll get you ten, Chuck thinks that the lottery winnings were never diversified and that it’s all one bank account somewhere.”

“I’ll just give you the ten on that one.” Delia chuckled.

“’Bout fuckin’ time,” Chuck crowed from the living room.

“Fuck off, asshole. This chick has money hidden everywhere. I had to wait on goddamn Beijing to get back to me for some of it. I’m not even sure we got all of it.”

“You didn’t,” Delia whispered.

“Are they here?” another voice asked.

“You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t. Back room.”

Oh, shit.

I snapped my eyes to Delia’s, who paled and shared a terrified look with me.

“Oh, God.”

I nearly puked all over the bed. Kidnapped and sold.

Again.

I shook my head. No. No, I wouldn’t be used like this again. I would kill them, or myself, before I let either of those men have their way with me. It was not going to happen again.

I took a deep, deep breath and prepared myself to either kill or be killed. There was nothing in between. I would not be raped.

The door slammed open and two men swaggered in, both rubbing their crotches already. Delia tried to shield me, stand in front of me, but there was no hiding me from them.

The banker stepped forward. “Hello, ladies.”

Delia folded her arms. “Leave.”

“Ooh, lookit this one. All tough,” the other said. “I think I want to tap that later. But first I want to dig my dick into that pretty little thing behind you.”

The words did all kinds of weird things to my brain. I wanted to scream, run, cry, vomit, punch things. But mostly, I wanted to crawl into a ball and let Winter save me again.

Not Winter. Not this time.

I wanted Patrick. I needed him. I was his. He was mine.

Never once in all the weeks we shared did he ever make me feel less than welcome, less than alive, less than beautiful. His interactions with his daughter were the window in our future. He would love every child we had with just as much fervor as he did her. He would make the decisions that seemed wrong to keep them safe. He would never back down from how he loved them.

I wanted him here. Now.

To save me.

Because I was either going to kill or be killed.

The banker shoved Delia out of the way, and her leg shot out and landed a kick to the knee.

The other guy grabbed her and dropped her on the bed, her hands suddenly tied and hooked on the bed.

The banker grabbed me, and without a thought, I launched my head into his face. His nose made a satisfying crunch as it started bleeding everywhere.

The guy who had been tying up Delia grabbed my hair and pulled me back. “No, bitch. You’re gonna take this and you’re going to like it.” His hands were like meathooks into my upper arms, and he was way too strong for me.

Delia jerked the bed so hard, she yanked it away from the wall and halfway into the center of the room. While they were distracted by her ‘Hulk smash’ moment, I leaned back and started kicking.

One kick landed in his junk. He doubled over and the second one landed in his face.

They didn’t like it and I didn’t care.

But I didn’t have a chance to continue my assault. The banker pulled out a gun and cocked it. “You need some gentling. Then we can break you.”

“No!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, all while trying to maneuver myself into the bullet’s path for a fatal shot. I wouldn’t be gentled. They’d have to put me down.

But he was fast and steady with his shot, and it went right through my thigh.

Right through my femoral artery.

Enough time to fuck me and leave me to bleed out.

I started screaming. I hauled in a breath and let it out as a shriek. I kept doing that, over and over.

The banker jerked me to the ground and the other guy searched the room for something. Delia was screaming, but I couldn’t hear her. The sounds in the rooms went dead in my ears, my guts heaved and churned. I kept sucking in breath after breath and just screeching.

“Shut up! Shut up, bitch,” the banker screamed in my ear. It echoed like a tunnel.

“Let her go! Let her go! Let her go!” Delia was dragging the bed at this point. I could feel the feet vibrating as she pulled and pulled.

Things were starting to get fuzzy at the edges.

I heard thumping that didn’t sound close and ripping and tearing that sounded way too close. My legs were suddenly cold, but was that because I was dying or because I was now being stripped naked?

Delia broke the hook off the bed. I heard the snap. I watched her, pissed as hell, whale her ziptied hands into the head of the man who was on top of me, ripping my pants.

The door blew open.

Wolves.

Three of them. Garrett’s massive gray, Jason’s sweet caramel brown, and Patrick’s motley red-brown coat.

Kind of like the calico kitty I’d had when I was very little. Miss Boots. She was old, and I had loved her so much. She was just gentle and sweet and had the most wonderful fluffy tail.

I missed her.

I missed a lot of life I had been robbed of.

Everything was in shades of gray now. Ironic maybe? After all I had fought and won, here I was bleeding out on the filthy floor of an Alaskan cabin. It wasn’t fitting.

It wasn’t even fair.

I heard the click of a gun. A moment later, there was a crash of glass. I heard a snarl, a click, a scream.

“Go with Jason!” That voice I knew. Jess. That touch I knew. Jess. “Go! Deal with the assholes!”

Two more people left the room and my head was on Jess’s lap, cradled.

The sounds of fighting and snarling and death moved away from me.

“Addi.” Jess was quiet.

“Ssh. I’m dying.”

“Femoral,” Patrick hissed. His face moved over mine. “Addison.”

“Hey.” I tried to smile. Looking at him was like looking at a grainy black and white image on an old RCA tube television. I could make him out clear enough, but there was something wrong with the reception. “Glad you could make ii to the end.”

“You’re not dying.”

A giggle escaped me. “Could have fooled me. It’s really cold in here. Could we get me a blanket so the last thing I know is being warm at least?”

“You’re not dying!”

Jess snapped her eyes up. “Don’t let her die.”

He stared at her, hard. “I—”

“She made the call for me. I’m making it for her. Do it. Mate her. Give her a wolf. Give her a chance.”

The words were getting tinny and everything was going darker and darker. “I think we’re kind of out of time. I love you guys. Sorry about like…everything. I wish I were warm.”

“Patrick!” Garrett’s voice snapped through the air, all Alpha. I wanted to laugh, but there wasn’t much air left in the room. I must’ve used it up screaming earlier.

I was jostled a bit and found myself on a new lap. Patrick’s. He was warm. It felt nice. His skin was soft and I wanted to curl up and just be held.

* * *

There was blood everywhere.

Still pumping out of the wound in Addi’s leg, it coated everything in the room. All of her blood. Curling her into me, I felt her sigh.

“Thank you,” she whispered. “I wish it could be more.”

Jess nodded at me, holding her friend’s hand. “Do it. She did it for me. You don’t have time to think about this.”

She was right. I had no time to think.

I rolled Addi into my body, so her head was on my shoulder. Without hesitation, I let my wolf drop his fangs and slipped them into the skin on her shoulder. The taste of her was beyond anything I’d had before from her, including the taste of her sex.

She was dying. I could tell by the taste of her blood.

Slicing my wrist with my teeth, I rolled her back to my lap. She flopped, like a dead woman. I slammed the bleeding wound onto her lips, prying her mouth open.

“Swallow, Addi. Swallow!”

Her breath raced out of her body, and she was limp.

“Addison!” Jess and I screamed it at the top of our lungs.

She was dead. We hadn’t gotten to her fast enough.

“Addi, don’t die! Don’t!” Jess slid to the floor in the blood, wrapping her arms around her best friend. “Don’t go, don’t die…”

Garrett snarled and stormed out of the room.

Addison was gone.

I was empty.

No, it was worse. There was nothing.

I shifted my hold on her and Jess screamed, thumping her chest. “You can’t go!”

Addi’s body shuddered and convulsed.

She pulled a mouthful of my blood into her throat.

She shook this time, drawing in a deep, hard breath. And another.

Jess and I stared, dumbfounded for a long moment, until Jess screamed, jumped up, and ran from the room. She skidded back just a half a minute later with an emergency kit and ripped Addi’s jeans the rest of the way.

She pulled alcohol and gauze from the kit and washed the horrible, draining wound. With most of Addi’s blood washed away, she could see the weak pulse that was the artery, as could I, and she pinched it together, securing it with two butterfly bandages.

“I know she’ll heal fast now, but I wanted to help it along. She’s missing most of her blood…”

“You don’t need to explain,” I whispered. The pale, chilled cheek on my hand was starting to warm again. “Should I give her more?”

“Yes,” Jess said. “You have the magical blood for now. It will be a while before her body changes over. Yours will help.”

I pressed my wrist to her lips and she suckled lightly.

Jess stood and looked around. “Holy fuck, we’re going to have to burn this place. There’s blood everywhere—”

The screams of someone being torn limb from limb echoed through the trees around us. Jess jerked around, nearly slipping and falling in blood that slicked everything.

One thing they never told you—blood was like motor oil. It was thick and greasy in more than just a few drops.

She looked horrified, but I wasn’t sure at what. Catching herself before she fell, she planted her ass on the bed. “Jesus Christ, what is that noise?”

“Right of Blood,” I said. “Delia can call her rights, as Chuck’s blood relative, to punish him for his misdeeds, up to and equal to the worst he visited upon others.”

She gasped. “He’s killed people.”

I looked down at Addi, still breathing slowly, carefully. I tucked a stray strand of her hair behind her ear. “Then he’s dead.”

Chapter Eighteen

I sneezed.

Which immediately made me sit up and wonder why I was sneezing in the afterlife. Was sneezing a thing in Heaven?

Or were my parents right and I was now in Hell with Satan and would spend eternity sneezing?

I flicked my eyes open and slammed them shut.

Damn. Someone had turned up the sun.

Or the hellfire. Whichever.

I slowly opened my eyes this time and found myself in the bedroom at his cabin. It was probably noon, and my bladder and stomach were at war.

There was no way that peeing was a thing in the afterlife. At least the good one. If bladder and stomach were at war, it was a better case for Hell.

Swinging my feet off the bed, I could hear the scrape of cloth against cloth. The wind was loud outside even though there was barely a breeze. The birds were screaming, and the crickets were yelling. I could smell dirt, loam, pine, mulch, decomposing flesh, old blood, new blood, Patrick, Jess, Garrett, Delia, Jason…

I screamed and put my hands over my ears.

Too much. It was too much.

The door slammed open and Jess ran in. Her lips were moving, but I wasn’t listening. I was trying not to listen. She sat on the bed next to me and took my wrists.

I let her pull them away for just a bit. Her voice was quiet and barely a whisper.

“Calm down, Addi. Calm down. it’s okay. You have to learn to tune it all out and turn it all down. It’s going to take a while. Just listen to me and you can start to turn it all down.”

“Aren’t I dead?” My words were so damn loud in my head and my ears. I turned down my voice. “Aren’t I dead?”

Jess smiled. “We thought you were there for a few seconds.”

“I bled out.”

She shook her head. “Damn close, though.”

“Why am I alive?”

Jess took a deep breath. “Patrick mated you.”

I stared for a long minute. “He…what?”

“You made the call for me. So, I had to make the call for you. If you hate anyone, hate me.”

“No, I don’t hate you. I don’t hate anyone. I’m relieved that I’m not Hell. Or Heaven, really.” I took a deep breath and was assaulted by the smells again. “I really have to pee.”

“Come on, let me help you stand. Take your time, things have changed—”

Jess didn’t have a chance to finish. I stood and pushed off the bed, pushing the bed back, slamming it into the wall six feet behind me. I whirled around. “What the fuck?”

“Yeah. You’re a shifter now. You’re way stronger than you used to be. That’s what I was trying to say.” Jess grinned. “You’ll get used to it.”

She walked with me to the bathroom. “Go slow. You’ll feel the strength and be able to judge it better until you can get used to it. I have all kinds of tips for you. But go slow is the most profound right now.”

“Thank you. I just really need to pee.”

I closed the door and used the toilet and immediately ripped off the handle on the toilet and then cracked the handle of the sink.

Walking back out, Jess was laughing. “I heard. I’ll get Garrett to fix it.”

“Where’s Patrick?”

“He had a class this morning. He’ll be up when it’s over.” She smiled at me. “You’ve been out for four days. He’s been here waiting, and I’ve been trying to convince him that you were fine and just needed time to heal.”

“Every day?”

She pointed the corner where I noticed an air mattress and a mess of what seemed like a bed. “He’s been sleeping here.”

“What about Cassie?”

“She’s fine at Martin and Olga’s. They’re more than happy to host her, and they all understand what’s going on.”

“Jess?”

“Yes?”

“Thank you.” I walked over to her and hugged her. She wrapped her arms around me and held me.

“You have no idea how happy I am you’re alive.”

I giggled this time. “I might have a clue.”

She laughed. “Maybe.”

“And I’m not blaming you for anything. Not you, not Patrick. No one is getting any blame. I am here. I am alive. Yes, I’ll have a hairy problem in a few years, but whatever. I’ll get to be with the man I love.”

A smile snuck onto Jess’s face. “You love him?”

“Yeah, I do. Stupid idiot. I do love him.”

“Good.”

“What happened? I mean, to Chuck and the assholes?”

“The packs have a ritual. It’s called the Right to Blood, or the Right of Blood. It’s a lot like a vendetta, but a lot more gory. Delia can tell you more. She was there. They called it on the banker and Chuck. Quentin handled the other guy.”

Handled. Meaning they were all dead.

Which was fine with me.

“Delia’s been asking for you.”

I gasped. “Is she okay?”

“Fine. She just wants to know that you’re okay.” Jess smiled. “Your clothes are in the drawer over there. Get dressed and we’ll go down to Olga and Martin’s for lunch. I’ll let Deels know we’re coming.”

* * *

Cassie caught me around the shoulders and hugged me fiercely.

I gasped, then hugged her back. I wasn’t expecting that at all. Not at all. Jess waved from the car and pulled down the street to Garrett’s—and hers—house. That wasn’t the plan, but…

I looked down at Cassie. She had her father’s eyes in her grandmother’s face. I guessed her hair was a gift from her mother.

“I was so worried about you, Addi,” she said, tears in her eyes.

The wall of ice I had about Patrick lying, not telling us, about this little girl, shattered and melted way. I put a hand on her cheek. “I’m fine, Cassie. Really. I’m just fine.”

“Dad said you were nearly dead.” Tears trembled in the corner of her eyes.

“Well, maybe. I don’t remember much when everything went gray. But I’m fine now.”

“Are you leaving?”

I jerked back. “Leaving?”

“Dad said you might leave once you woke up.”

Smiling, I wrapped her arm around my waist and we walked into the house. “Your dad and I have to talk, but I’m not leaving right now. My ticket says September, so I’m not going anywhere just yet.”

She looked very much like she had more to say, but Olga and Martin bustled out and I found myself in the middle of a group hug.

The damnedest thought filtered through my brain.

I am home.

It staggered me. Olga and Martin both watched me, a hand on each arm and a question in their eyes.

“Are you all right?” Martin finally asked.

“I need to sit.”

In a flash, I was on a kitchen chair with orange juice and a blueberry muffin in front of me. Olga popped the refrigerator door open and started pulling things out.

“Whoa, whoa.” I laughed. “I just needed to sit. Though I won’t turn down bacon, honestly.”

She threw her head back and laughed. “Everyone loves the bacon.”

“Are you okay, Addi?” Cassie asked, pushing the juice at me.

“I’m fine, just fine. I just…”

Martin sat down. “You are always welcome here, Addison. Whether or not you and my idiot son can work this out, you are his mate and that makes you part of this family.”

“I…” I stared at him. “I don’t know what to say. I have never had a family.”

“You have your brother,” Cassie offered helpfully.

“Winter and I are a team, we’re an unstoppable force. But our parents, and their parents, all of our aunts and uncles, cousins…reject us because we weren’t dedicated to the church.” I choked. “How could I be when they so resoundingly shamed me for something I didn’t do, didn’t want?”

“Oh, sweetheart.” Olga sank down next to me. “People are fools. They’ll use anything as an excuse to not take responsibility. But you’re away from that now. You have a home here, with us. Forever. For as long as Martin and I have the ability to welcome you.”

I glanced at her and realized there was a sheen to everything I was seeing. There were tears in my eyes.

I wanted to be in Patrick’s life. I wanted to be with him. I wanted to see what kind of children we would have, what kind of redecorating he would allow. Vacation photos. Family photos. What we would be like twenty, forty, a hundred years from now.

Patrick was my fist bump.

Martin’s phone buzzed, and he looked at the text. “Delia is coming down the street for you.”

I gasped and ran out of the house. I could see Delia running for me, and I started running for her.

We crashed together, and I didn’t even realize that I lifted her right off her feet and spun her around. She laughed at the top of her lungs.

“What’s the damage, Captain?” she snapped at me.

“All systems are fully operational.”

“Even the…”

“Even the artery.”

“Show me later?”

“I have a scar that is totally worth showing you my untamed nethers for. You bet your ass I’ll show you later.”

She blew out a breath. “Garrett said…”

Patrick was suddenly there. I could feel him behind me without even touching me. “Jess and I changed positions. Jess whacked her somehow, and she shuddered and swallowed. It was all over after that.”

His arms slid around me from behind and grasped me in the middle. I tipped my head back.

Hello, Addi.

Oh. He was in my head!

Hi, Patrick. I didn’t know…

Side perk. He sighed and looked at Delia. “Are you mad at Garrett?”

“For what?”

“Right of Blood…”

Delia rolled her eyes. “Not even close. Chuck killed people and would have killed us. Just desserts if you ask me. Better a way to get around the law than me putting a bullet in his head like I put in the cars.”

“I heard about that. Putting down old cars like you knew what you were doing.”

“On that Continental? It was a blessing.” She glanced between us. “I’m glad you’re still here, Addi.”

“Thank you for all you did up there,” I said, stepping in to hug her again.

She whispered in my ear, “Go. You two need to talk.” I felt her grin. “And get laid.”

* * *

I could totally overhear Delia tell Addi that she needed to get laid.

I had already worked that into our schedule for the day. I grinned as Delia skipped back to Jason’s house, happy as a clam in high tide, and I waited just a moment to hold out my hand.

I’m so sorry, I said. I never wanted to lie to anyone about Cassie.

Stop. She shook her head. I’m over it. I’m over all of it. Whatever was, was. We go forward from here. Addi dropped her hand into mine.

“I love you, Addison.” I pulled her in close and shuffled us up the walk to my house. “I wanted to be there when you woke up, but I had to teach. How are you feeling?”

I shut the door behind us, and she pulled me back against it, slamming her mouth over mine. I yelped this time, startled that she was so strong now.

“You’re so good at being responsible,” she breathed over my lips. “I like that in a mate.”

“Oh, do you?” I teased, easing my hands back on her waist and down her back to her firm ass. “What else do you like in a mate?”

“Brown eyes. Messy hair. Groping hands. A nice ass. And a big dick.”

I tossed my head back and laughed. “Well, four of five ain’t bad.”

She punched me in the shoulder and pulled me in close again, laying her head in the crook of my neck. “Did I really die?”

I shook my head and scooped her up to carry her to my—our bedroom. “Your heart stopped for sure. I don’t think you were dead, because it still picked up and started beating again.”

“You did that.”

“Only partly. Jess made the call and hung on for you.”

“But you hung on too,” she said softly, as I placed her down in the middle of the giant mattress.

“I will never let go.” I settled myself above her. “I want you here, always. You’re mine and I need you.”

“That’s a lot for one person to handle from that four out of five score…”

You have no idea how much I love you. The words weren’t enough for me. Not out loud, not through our mate bond. My finger danced on the hem of her shirt and a moment later, I pulled it up over her head.

Putting her hand on my chest, she pushed me up. “Patrick. Just get naked. I don’t need a seduction right now. I need connection. I need you inside me.”

My shirt was gone before she even finished her words, and I rolled to the side to discard my pants. I just only tossed them off the side of the bed when she rolled on top of me, completely naked.

Damn, Addi. I managed as her mouth found mine again.

“I feel alive.” Her words danced on my skin as she kissed and licked over my neck, my shoulders, my pecs. “I want to feel alive with you. I want you.” She kissed her way back up to my ear. “And I want you inside me right now.”

Her aim was true, and she sank herself onto my more-than-willing cock. I groaned. I couldn’t find the words, and I wasn’t sure I needed them anymore.

She moved over me, her pussy a tight and wonderful fit around my erection. She pulled and pushed and pressed, and I found myself staring at her slowly swaying breasts.

“Patrick,” she breathed.

“My Addi,” I answered on a whisper.

She leaned down and kissed me, hard, but even when she pulled back, her lips stayed. I could feel her panting, her chest heaving, her hips in an undulation that made my balls pull up to release inside her.

“Patrick, what if I asked you to get me pregnant?”

Her hips never stopped, but my cock grew even harder.

“Right now?”

Green eyes stared down at me. “As soon as you’re comfortable with it. I don’t know why, but I feel like…”

We rolled, and I took over the slow, sweet thrusting that was working to make us come. “You feel like… What?”

“Like having a child with you as soon as possible is right.”

“We have years ahead of us…”

Addi’s hand landed on my cheek. “I can’t explain it, Patrick. I just…want a baby. Your baby. Your sweet little shifter pup growing inside me.”

The more she spoke, the more right it felt. The more I wanted to see her pregnant, holding our son...

Son?

I think so. It won’t happen this time, Addi, there are rituals. Timings…

“Then let’s call this practice. You can practice making me come, and I can practice enjoying your heat inside me.”

“Fuck, Addi,” I breathed. “All right. Yes.”

I love you.

I’m yours, always.

Epilogue

…Four months later…

I leaned over her shoulder and she turned away again.

“Stop it.”

“Come on.”

“I already did.” Addi looked up at me and grinned.

“At least twice last night and once this morning.” I grinned back. “I could go for another.”

“Look, I just wee’d on the stick. You have to give it three minutes.” She put the test on the countertop. “Stop getting excited about my wee.”

“I get excited about everything on you.” I paused. “Except wee. That shouldn’t get me excited, at all. That’s shower time.”

She backed me out of the bathroom. “If you ever try to piss on me.”

I wrinkled my nose. “No. Ew. That’s for marking territory.”

Addi cocked her head. “And sometimes I feel like I’m your territory. I mean, the way you went after poor Daniel the other day because he said hello to me… Shameful, really.”

Lowering my eyes, I nodded. “I know. I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me. He’s one of my students and we were at a function and that wasn’t right.”

Shaking a finger at me, she clicked her tongue. “You need to keep that under control. Otherwise, you’re going to rip someone’s head off. We aren’t that newly mated.”

Chuckling, I backed her against the wall of the bedroom next to the door. “Oh, my sweet Addison. We are still newly mated. We are considered newly mated for five years after.”

“Five years? I have to deal with you neanderthal’ing around for five years? Tossing me over your shoulder, hauling me off to a dark corner and fucking my brains out for five years.”

I lifted an eyebrow. “Yup.”

The devious grin spread on her lips. “Sounds good.”

My hand brushed over her breast. “How long?”

Addi glanced at her watch. “Two minutes, fifteen seconds. Why?”

I slipped my hands inside her panties. “That should be enough time.”

Letting her breath escape, she stared at me. “What…”

I didn’t say a word. I just slipped two fingers inside her, while my palm pressed against her clit. She was always wet for me. Always ready and so, so willing. I could feel her pressing down on my hand.

“Ride it, baby. Go on.”

She did. Grinding down, her hips twisted, trying to gain more contact with my palm. I let the two fingers stroke against her walls while she pushed her clit against me. I could make her come in no time flat. There was a trick to her orgasm I had learned in the past few months.

The scar that ran across her clit had no feeling. But, the rest of the flesh on either side made up for it. And while she rode my hand, and I tickled her channel with my fingers, I let her build the climax. When she was panting, senseless, and moaning like a she-wolf in heat, I brushed my thumb up one side of her clit, over the scar, and onto the other side. Something about touching the ultra-sensitive part after the numbness just triggered her.

There was little more I enjoyed than hearing my mate, my wife, scream her orgasm into our bedroom. Feeling the rush of her cum on my hand and the limp, exhausted satisfaction of her body against mine just pleased me in ways I didn’t know I ever wanted.

“I will never get tired of hearing that.”

Her head was in the crook of my neck again, and I felt her smile. “Two minutes, fifty-five seconds.”

I glanced down. “What?”

“That’s how long it just took me to come. Fuck, that was good.”

I chuckled. “So our three minutes are up?”

“I could wait another three.”

Laughing, I helped her right herself from the wall, adjusting her nightshirt and panties again. “Stop it!” She laughed and swatted me away as she walked into the bathroom.

Leaning against the wall, I watched her. “So, it’s three minutes.”

Addi turned the test around.

Positive.

The End

…For now…

The Alaskan summer ends with

Brandy and Zanna.

Uncovering Alaska

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Five friends.

One Summer.

Everything changes.

We wanted to celebrate the end of college. The end of all the hard work, the beginning of our new lives. Brandy had the perfect place:

Alaska.

Jess

There were problems with the house, the wildlife, the land. The only thing that wasn't a problem was the neighbor: Garrett Pauler. We hired him to fix the house, and he did way more than that.

There was something in the woods though. Something that didn't want us there, something that would go to any lengths to get rid of us. But it shared the woods with something—someone determined to keep us safe.

Garrett

The old Yeil place was a disaster, but I wasn't above the challenge. The challenge lay in the gorgeous woman who was waiting for me there. Jess Smythe. My mate.

As human as they came, she was everything I dreamed and wanted in my life. I just didn't expect to show her my wolf before I convinced her we were meant to be.

But there was something in the woods that would go to any lengths to get rid of the women, and of me and my pack. And it would force me to make decisions that would change the course of my mate's life...

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Five friends.

One Summer.

Everything changes.

We wanted to celebrate the end of college. The end of all the hard work, the beginning of our new lives. Brandy had the perfect place:

Alaska.

Delia

I was only too happy to pay for the renovations to my bestie's hard earned homestead. I loved spoiling my friends, and I had ways to do it. I also loved the outdoors, and new adventures.

Jason was definitely a new adventure. We seemed to be the perfect couple, and we fell together easily. I thought it was his secret that was going to drive a wedge between us--I never expected it to be mine.

Jason

Fate has terrible timing. The instant I saw her, I knew Delia was mine-- and I couldn't have her. Still, being around her was amazing and I hoped that we could be together someday.

But there was someone who would go to any lengths to get rid of my mate. It would force me to make decisions that would change the course of our lives...

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More Magic?

Yes please!

DARKWATER

The Elemental Dragons 1

The water called her name.

Maybe it always had, but it was only when Betsy Tillman slipped into Pine Valley that she could hear it. She wanted to find out why. But Wayne, her boyfriend and partner in crime, wanted to stick to the plan: smash and grab and get the hell out. Money from that was a sure thing, why change it up? Robbery and larceny was her whole life, and she was good at it.

The water was too strong.

Betsy was too tired to resist.

What she discovered in Darkwater was nothing like she had ever seen before. What she found also found her, also needed her. It pulled her in and gave her a way out.

She found her escape.

She found a dragon, named Niko.

He was her answer.

All she needed to do was change everything…

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About

Katherine Rhodes

Armed with a pen name, Katherine Rhodes has gird her loins and set her mind to writing erotic romances which are kinky, dirty, and fun. As a lackadaisical laundry goddess, and an expert in the profundities of bad music, terrible cinema, and awful literature—thanks to her husband—Katherine strives to find balance in the universe and time to cook dinner. An East Coast dweller, currently located in the Philadelphia Tristate area, she is the proud servants of two cats and would take a vacation in Prague over a day at the beach any time…

www.katherinerhodes.com

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CONTEMPORARY

CLUB IMPERIAL

Consensual

Broken Bonds

Knots

Untied

Lessons

Now. Forever.

Inevitable

SILVER SOUL

Not Quite Juliet

CITY OF STEEL (THE VAULT)

Innuendo

Double Entendre

THE CLUB SERIES

The Darkest Corners

Anything for Her

Teach Me To Sin

Come Fly with Me with Isobelle Cate

Sweet Pain with Emily Walker and Jenni Moen

THE DA SILVA HEIRS

All the King’s Horses

Princess of the Plains

Empire of Dirt

STANDALONES

Captain

Acts of Contrition

Obsidian Escape

PARANORMAL ROMANCE

VAMPIRE CROWN

Queen of Gods

King of Gods

Death of Gods

Blood of Gods (Coming Summer 2019)

THE COMPLEX

Balance Point

One Thousand Wishes, One Thousand Stars

Brilliance (coming in July 2019)

THE JUNEAU PACKS

Taming Alaska

Frozen Alaska

Exploring Alaska

Uncovering Alaska

(Subscribe to the Pack Chronicle Newsletter!)

THE REALM

Half-Soul

THE NIGHTSHIFT IN NEW YORK

Moonlight Calling

THE DEMON SLAYERS

Passion Flames

THE ELEMENTAL DRAGONS (Pine Valley)

Darkwater

Skydance (coming June 2019)

Fireborn (coming 2020)

Katherine also writes under:

J. Rose Alexander

Chatter box, compulsive writer, bon vivant, stunt commuter, and a ninja in her dreams, J. Rose enjoys losing herself in the capes and masks of her superheroes, finding new trouble for her witches and werewolves-- and is always on the look out for a new adventure, on the page or in real life. J. Rose write sweet, clean(ish) stories that are suited to readers 13 and up, unless she warns you otherwise...

www.jrosealexander.com

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*  *  *

THE ORIGIN STORIES

Penumbra: Equinox

Penumbra: Solstice

The Art of Dying

The Art of Living

THE FACTION STORIES

Apathetic Avengers

The Natural Order of Things

The Royals of Grand Island

Shadow in Glass

Family Portraits (coming 2020)

SKELETON KEY

Eunica

Neuvma (coming 2019)

STANDALONES

Zenko (Woodland Creek)

Slip the Waves (Hotel Paranormal)