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SEVEREN

I was in my bedroom, unpacking boxes. The scent of celebratory sex drifted in from the room across the hall, the master bedroom.

The Nest. I took a deep breath through my nose, inhaling our mixed matched scents, and the musk and potency of sweat and passion.

I could still feel Skye’s soft, damp skin against my fingertips, instead of the moleskine journals and spiral bound notebooks that I was trying to shelve.

I opened a box labeled Novel and selected a copy from the top, displaying it face out on my wall shelf above the desk. The deep red letters in bold font contrasted against the dark background of abstract shapes and burning embers. It looked good there. It looked right.

A Pack Of Shadows by Severen Heller.

I went to close the box, sighing at the army of covers staring back at me. Under that was another, equally sized box that was home base to the second battalion of unsold books. I shoved both boxes into the corner, banning them to never again see the light of day.

A sudden jolt shot through me, like missing a step when going down a staircase. Seconds later, a cascade of shattering glass made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. I went to the stairs and found Skye laying on the kitchen floor, a mosaic of broken plates all around her.

I raced down to the kitchen and fell to my knees next to her. I checked her pulse. It was still beating, but faint.

“What happened?” Crux asked, dropping the box he was carrying in from outside.

“Call an ambulance!” I said. I had no idea where my phone was.

Crux pulled his phone from his back pocket and dialed while I tried to revive Skye. Crux’s words to the emergency dispatcher drowned under the white noise of the pounding in my veins. It was like my pulse had to be twice as strong to make up for Skye’s thready flow.

I don’t know how long it took for the ambulance to arrive, but in that time, Skye did not respond to me.

Instinctively, I growled when the paramedics tried to get me away from my omega, but my civilized brain kicked in and I moved aside while they worked on her.

One of the paramedics peppered me with questions: Was she showing any symptoms?

Light-headedness, chest pain? What was she doing before she passed out?

Does she have a history of health conditions?

Did she take any medications that I know of?

They got her on a gurney and rushed her out of the house as quickly as they could, but a big moving truck, abandoned boxes, and hired helpers all provided obstacles in their path.

To their credit, the movers did what they could to clear the area.

Crux and I followed all the way to the ambulance until an EMT blocked us.

“Only one of you can go with her.” He looked from me to Crux and back with sharp eyes and a steel expression. He was not willing to kowtow to alpha nonsense. A beta. “Which one of you is pack lead?”

“I am,” I said.

“Get in,” said the EMT.

I turned to Crux. “Follow us,”

“I’ll follow you.” Crux’s head jerked in a way I think was meant to be a nod. “I’m right behind you.”

“And call Halo,” I added.

As I climbed into the back of the ambulance, Crux shouted. “Where are you taking her?”

“Caduceus Hospital,” said the driver, but then the doors to the ambulance slammed closed, and the world around me jostled as the vehicle sped away. The medics worked on my fragile, innocent little omega while I pressed myself into a corner. I never felt so small and useless.

The only productive thing I could do was stare out the rear windows of the ambulance and watch to make sure Crux’s blue Jeep was on our tracks.