Page 11 of Betrayed Knocked-Up Mate (Rosecreek Special Ops Wolves #8)

The pack center’s meeting room breathes like a living thing in the dull light from outside. I've photographed this room a hundred times since coming to Rosecreek—the way sunlight spills through the high windows, how shadows pool in the corners like secrets, the graceful arc of wooden beams that somehow manage to look both ancient and modern.

But this morning, everything feels different. The light falls harder, more clinical, turning familiar spaces into something out of a war correspondent's portfolio. The kind of lighting that makes everything look like evidence, like the moment before catastrophe.

My hands hunger for my camera, currently locked safely away in Rafael's house. The instinct to document is so deeply ingrained now that its absence feels like missing a limb. Five years of chasing increasingly dangerous shots around the globe have taught me to recognize these moments—the calm before violence, the intake of breath before the plunge.

We're arranged around Aris in what looks like casual groupings to untrained eyes. But I've photographed enough conflicts to recognize a defensive formation. Bigby and Rafael flank our Alpha, their massive frames somehow making him look more imposing rather than less. Thalia has drifted to the left, where the morning light catches her knives just so—a subtle warning to anyone paying attention. The rest of the core team positions themselves with careful precision, every placement calculated, every angle covered.

Through the faint thrum of the pack bond, I feel the collective tension—a low hum of readiness that makes my wolf pace restlessly. The bonds themselves feel strange this morning, stretched thin like overtightened wire. I catch Rafael watching me, concern threading through his scent. He knows how new I still am to this, how pack bonds still sometimes overwhelm me after years of deliberately avoiding them.

"Easy," he murmurs, too soft for anyone else to hear. "Just breathe through it."

I manage a slight nod, focusing on the familiar patterns of light and shadow. If this were a photo shoot, I'd want to capture the way tension writes itself in subtle ways—how Bigby's hands look deceptively relaxed at his sides, the particular angle of Thalia's chin, the controlled rhythm of Aris's breathing. The story told in small details.

The elevator doors into the meeting room open with deliberate slowness, and the quality of light changes again.

Kane enters our space like he's stepping onto a stage he's already claimed, and something in my chest goes cold at the sight of him. The intelligence photos in Marcus's files didn't capture this—the fluid grace of contained violence, the absolute certainty in every movement. He carries himself like someone who's never needed to hide what he is, who's never doubted his right to take up space.

He has short hair, slicked back tightly against his head, so black it almost looks blue in the cool overhead lights. His pale blue eyes are narrow, bearing a kind of impossible precision, seeing all.

Yes, I think—his eyes are the worst part. I've photographed predators across four continents, but I've never seen eyes quite like his, sharp with a kind of focused madness that makes my wolf want to bare throat and teeth simultaneously.

His people file in behind him with military precision that makes my skin crawl. Six of them, spreading out in a mirror of our own formation. Through my photographer's eye, I catalog details automatically—the way they move in perfect sync, how their apparent casualness masks combat readiness, the subtle bulges of concealed weapons under expensive clothes.

"Alpha Cadell." Kane's voice catches me off guard—gentle, almost pleasant, like he's arrived for afternoon tea rather than an armed confrontation. "Thank you for meeting with us on such short notice."

Aris doesn't move from his position, doesn't yield an inch of space. The sunlight catches the silver in his beard, the new lines around his eyes that speak of battles fought and won. "What brings you to my territory, Kane?"

The deliberate absence of title hangs in the air like smoke.

Kane's smile doesn't waver, but something in his scent sharpens. The smell reminds me of predators I've photographed—the particular musk of something that kills for pleasure rather than necessity. "We've been tracking a group of... persons of interest. Their trail led us here. We have business with them."

"Did it?" Aris's tone could freeze hell itself. The temperature in the room seems to drop several degrees. "Interesting, considering we haven't had any new arrivals in weeks."

My heart pounds so hard I wonder if they can hear it. Through the pack bonds, I feel the others' tension—Rafael's carefully contained fury, Bigby's tactical focus, Thalia's predator stillness. The air feels charged, like the moment before lightning strikes.

"Come now." Kane spreads his hands in a gesture of false openness that reminds me of corrupt officials I've photographed—people who smile while signing death warrants. "We both know that's not true. Marcus Hillmarton and his people passed through here. We have proof."

"Do you?" Aris takes one step forward, power rolling off him in waves that make my bones vibrate. "Then, by all means, present it. Along with your authorization to conduct investigations in my territory. Even if they were here, this would still be an act of impermissible aggression, Kane, and you know it.”

The temperature seems to drop another few degrees. Kane's people shift slightly, hands drifting toward concealed weapons. The morning light catches the movement, turning it into a deadly dance.

"The traditions of the shifter world," Kane says softly, each word precise as a blade, "are becoming increasingly irrelevant in these changing times. Just like those who cling to their outdated ideas about cooperation with humans." His eyes sweep the room, lingering on each of us like he's taking measurements for coffins. "Times are changing, Alpha Cadell, and I know you know that. Old alliances are crumbling. New powers are rising. The smart ones will adapt."

"Is that a threat?" Rafael's voice carries clearly, sharp with challenge. I feel his rage through our sibling bond—not hot like mine, but cold and focused. Deadly.

Kane's attention shifts to my brother, and my wolf surges with protective fury.

Something in his expression shifts, and becomes more intent. More hungry. "Merely an observation. Though I find it interesting that you'd interpret it that way. Guilty consciences often hear threats where none exist."

"The only guilty one here," Aris cuts in, his voice heavy with Alpha authority that makes the windows rattle slightly, "is your trespassing on my territory. Making baseless accusations. Threatening my people."

"I haven't threatened anyone." Kane's smile turns razor-sharp, all pretense of pleasantness falling away.

The unspoken word hangs in the air like smoke, like blood in water: yet.

"Let me be perfectly clear." Aris takes another step forward, and the power radiating from him makes my teeth ache. Morning light catches his eyes, turning them to burning gold. "You have no authority here. No right to demand anything. You will leave my territory now, taking your people and your threats with you. Or you will be removed. Your choice."

For a moment, the silence is absolute. Even the morning light seems to hold its breath.

Then Kane laughs, and the sound makes me think of photographs I took in war zones—the particular quality of light in places where violence has become routine. "You sound just like a man I once knew, you know. All that righteous certainty. That unshakeable faith in rules and order." His eyes gleam with something that might be madness or might be perfect clarity. "Right up until the end. You cannot survive in this world without principles, Cadell. You know it’s true.”

Something in Aris's scent shifts—recognition? Understanding? The light catches his face at an angle that makes him look older, weighted with knowledge I can't decipher.

But before he can respond, a gunshot shatters the morning quiet, like breaking glass.

The sound comes from across the street, from the clinic.

Where Marcus is hiding.

My breath catches in my throat, and I move.

Chaos erupts in an instant all around me, transforming the beautiful meeting room into a symphony of violence. Kane's people spring into action with practiced coordination, weapons appearing in their hands like magic. Bigby tackles Rafael clear of the first shot while Thalia spins into a fighting crouch, a pistol in each hand, catching the light. The pack center dissolves into destruction—wood splintering, glass shattering, the terrible percussion of combat.

I'm at the door that leads out to the stairs before I can think, before I can process the fear clawing at my throat. Because Marcus is out there, and whatever's happening at the clinic—

A body slams into me from the side, sending me sprawling across polished floors now slick with blood. One of Kane's people looms over me, teeth bared in a snarl that transforms his handsome face into something monstrous, half-shifted, an almost feral glint in his eyes. I roll with the impact, using techniques learned in a dozen dangerous places, but my mind is elsewhere. My heart is across the street, where another gunshot has just split the air.

Through the pack center's broken windows, I catch glimpses of movement near the clinic. More of Kane's people emerging from hiding like shadows given form. The crack of gunfire.

Someone screams, a high, desperate wail.

I fight harder, desperation lending me strength I didn't know I had. The world narrows to a series of brutal snapshots: blood on my knuckles, the crack of bone meeting bone, the savage dance of survival. Around me, the pack center has become a warzone—Aris and Kane locked in Alpha combat that makes the air itself shake, Rafael and Bigby working in tandem against multiple opponents, Thalia's knives flashing in the morning light like deadly stars.

But none of it matters.

Because Marcus is out there, and I'm running toward the sound of gunfire, toward whatever violence awaits across the street. Running like I should have run five years ago, when he pushed me away. Running like my heart knows something my head hasn't figured out yet.

Running like everything depends on it. Because maybe, this time, it does.