Page 2

Stacy

The deafening bang rips through the air like a bomb has detonated.

My heart stops as I watch the massive black wolf drop.

I had a clear shot to hit his head, but then our eyes met. The world was frozen for two beats of my heart before I aimed lower and fired.

Nobody needs to know; I still did what I was told. And I now know I would’ve aimed lower even if he hadn’t looked at me.

But he did. He saw who shot him.

He showed up just as I was about to give up and leave. They don’t go for their morning run this late – at least not in the weeks since I’ve been watching.

And now, it’s done. I did what I was ordered to do. I should feel relieved, grateful it’s over, that I’ve followed orders, that there won’t be another day anticipating doing this. Even if I failed at killing him.

I guess it’s just not in me to fire a kill shot. And I know to my core that’s a good thing.

Instead of feeling grateful, acid relentlessly washes my back molars as I shakily set the heavy gun into my bag, strip, and erratically shove my clothes and shoes on top of it before I drop the bag into the hole I’ve dug. I hastily sweep the dirt back over it, toss the leaves and catnip trimmings on top, and now… I’m shifting.

Hands become paws that hit the ground and I’m painfully aware of my labored breathing as I run. I’m not fast enough. Must run faster. Must get away instead of vomiting like I want to do. I’m not very athletic; it's been forever since my last shift and my body feels shaky. My back and my limbs are sore, and my stomach is in knots. I’ve eaten a bunch of the catnip, too, and it’s turned my stomach. I didn’t have much choice; I know the rest of Aphra’s potion to mask my scent won’t last too long, and she told me catnip would help if I ran low, though would only stop someone from scenting my nature from a distance. If they get close, the catnip wouldn’t work as well as her potion.

We’re rarely allowed to shift, let alone go for the kind of runs that build endurance, agility, and speed, but I run as fast as I can, mind racing with the reality of my situation.

I shot that giant black wolf and watched him drop.

I did a terrible thing I didn’t think I was capable of just now, but it's done. I’ve obeyed Wyatt. Father has been avenged. And maybe this will be the first step in stopping the destruction of what’s left of our pack. There’s so much work to do to fix it. We certainly can’t sink much lower than where we’re at.

I'm nearly breathless already, but I must power through and run faster, run harder than I’ve ever run. The wind kicks up and it’s so strong it’s slowing me down, but I keep going, hoping hard that Jimmy will be waiting with more of the scent masking agent my brother promised to send so I can disguise my scent once more.

Then we can mask and come back later and fetch the gun and the bag, but for now… get out of this area before the alphas from the Arcana Falls wolf shifter pack catch my true scent.

It shouldn't have been me Wyatt tasked with this. But when Father taught us to shoot, he made no bones about the fact I’m a way better shot than Wyatt. Wyatt would never admit that he can’t shoot for shit. But since I can, and since he got teased for it endlessly by Father when we were kids, that’s probably part of why I’ve been tasked with this. Punishment for being a better shot.

I’ve also got a stronger nose than almost any male in the pack, too. Another fact my brother is angry about but takes advantage of. He’s got strengths of an alpha but yet I have some of those senses in spite of being female, despite being so weak.

Besides, I’m also tasked with this dangerous mission because I’m completely expendable to my brother, always have been. If any of the Arcana Falls alphas catch me and kill me, it’s not much of a hit to his plans.

He wouldn’t sacrifice one of his betas ahead of a female – that’s for sure.

I didn’t think I could pull it all off, but somehow I did.

So, why aren't I filled with pride at avenging my dead father, finally? Why is there a lump lodged in my throat? Why is my chest burning with remorse?

Because I might have killed someone. At the very least, I definitely injured him. Even if that man killed my father, two wrongs don’t make anything right. And doing what my brother tells you to do is almost never the right thing to do. But you have to heed his commands otherwise get punished, and his punishments are never light.

No, it wasn’t a head shot, but it could still kill the giant black wolf. He was bleeding profusely from what I saw until I got out of sight and the substance I dipped the bullets in might mean he’s unable to shift in order to heal.

***

I’ve been running for what feels like an eternity, but I’m panicking because I’m lost. I’m not where I thought I was. I’m nowhere near that old, unused highway that got me here.

I’m parched. Exhausted. And everything feels wrong in my nose, in my brain, in my chest. The wind finally died down, but the sky looks odd – a strange shade of blue. I’m afraid I’m about to pass out when out of nowhere, my nose and lungs fill with a new scent, a strong one, and I’m tackled to the ground by a large wall of heat.

I land with a yelp under a huge, heavy silvery wolf who roughly flips me to my back as he shifts, transforming to male human shape, ordering, “Shift!” in a deep, angry voice. And he's done it in slow-motion, the command coming out before he got all the way shifted. I’ve never seen a shift happen in slow motion like this!

And as if by his command, my body instantly obeys, my charcoal and white fur peeling away and vanishing.

This is an Arcana Falls alpha. And I’m under him. Not only is this one of their alphas, he’s often with Tyson Savage so I’m sure he’s one of the extra-alpha alphas. He’s been on every morning run I’ve witnessed. He’s the one with the gorgeous eyes that I’ve seen alternate between colors. Brown, then they flashed metallic silver for a second when he flirted with me in the diner that day. I found it odd, and I’m pretty sure I wasn’t supposed to see the color change as he wouldn’t have known I’m not human. And then they flashed a vivid gray color again when I brought him a to-go cup.

He’s the one with the gorgeous mouth and the sexy throat. Heck, they’re all handsome, but the way this one’s eyes sparkled every time he looked at me in the diner… the way his eyes followed me as I served other tables around him? It made me feel things. I had tingles in places I generally don’t feel tingles in. Because I haven’t had the best luck with men, to put things mildly.

And now I’m under him.

And I’m caught.

I’m screwed. It’s all over.

“Who the fuck are you?” he demands.

And liquid-looking metallic silver bleeds halfway into his irises, though this time there’s no flash of flirtatiousness.

My voice won’t work. I will my brain to calculate my options.

I have no options. None. I’m screwed. My pack is screwed. Those poor girls…

Aunt Shea. Little Halla. Addy. Misty. Caroline. Lukey. Please, no.

“Who. Are you?” he enunciates in a way I know means he’s losing patience.

I’m winded. I’m thirsty. I’m scared. No, terrified. And screwed.

“The waitress,” he states, recognition lighting in his eyes. Without the sparkle.

Nope. No sparkle because I shot an alpha in his pack.

“And my money is on you being the one who’s been poisoning us,” he tacks on, his eyes coasting over me with utter disgust.

And the lump in my chest burns hotter. Shame oozes from me in addition to fear.

I’m so screwed.

The extra-alpha alphas of Arcana Falls are famous. Our pack has whispered the rumored tales of them for as long as I can recall. How large their pack and territory is, how they have several alphas instead of one. How massive the alphas are in wolf form.

Father ranted about being unable to wrap his mind around why . He said a real alpha rules his pack alone, wouldn’t require help. The strongest should make the rest submit or else tear them apart with his teeth. A pack only needs one alpha, anything else is an abomination.

But I thought it sounded kind of awesome. To have a group of leaders sharing the load, making sure their pack thrived. A committee of sorts, instead of a dictatorship like we live under.

Not long ago, right around the time he kidnapped Aphra and started using her for her magic, buzz started because Wyatt had betas scouting the edge of the Arcana Falls territory under Aphra’s masking. When the team came back with news of a new alpha scent, my brother went on a recon mission and came back stating he recognized the scent as the shifter whose blood he wanted. Whose blood he is owed .

The shifter who killed Father, an abnormally large black wolf with glowing green eyes. Most believe that this black wolf ruined our pack by clearing the way for Wyatt to rule, though they’d never say it to Wyatt’s face because Wyatt doesn’t have to drive us into the ground, yet that’s what he’s doing.

The scent of the shifter who killed Father made Wyatt become obsessed. Obsessed with revenge. With taking that pack and that territory for himself. He cobbled together his plan. His plan that's already failing. He wants all those alphas taken out. He wants to take over and bring us there, to their large territory, their fertile and magic-coated lands, with the infamous pristine waterfalls and the invaluable magic-infused stones embedded in caves behind them. Wyatt says it’ll be even better than when our ancestor ruled the Silver Mountains generations ago.

A while ago, I overheard Malachi whisper to another of our betas that if that green-eyed alpha that killed John Meadows had taken over instead of leaving us to Wyatt, maybe things would be better. Overhearing this was what opened communications with me and Mal about change.

Wyatt defeated two of Father’s betas who I’m convinced were evil, but he also defeated a further three challengers who I thought could have been worthy. Nobody has challenged Wyatt since then and he's been running things even further into the ground ever since. And I’ll be the one to face the consequences of Wyatt’s orders to do this today, because not only does my brother get others to do his dirty work, but he also loves to make examples of you when you fail. Even if the failure is Wyatt’s fault because his plans are half-baked.

Wyatt has no patience, so even if he had the sense to put together a workable plan, he'd muck it up by jumping too soon or changing course part-way like when he had Jimmy bring me the gun a few days ago with the order to hand over the rest of the herb and to shoot Tyson even if I hadn’t disabled him with the anti-shifting herb.

I coated the bullets and watched for an opportunity. And now I’ve pulled the trigger, trying to forget that a person was the intended target. A person who, though he was reportedly responsible for my father’s death, appeared to really care about his people by the way he spoke. I’ve spied on them several times and he talks to the others about a woman in a sweet way that makes strange sensations work their way through my system. Because our men don’t talk about females that way.

I don’t even know if Wyatt’s accusation about him being Father’s killer is true; just knew I needed to do what I was told. Despite the fact that I've spent time watching these alphas interact, that I've seen things from them that have me thinking Father might have been wrong about a multi-alpha pack being an abomination.

And now here I am, under the flirting one with the color-changing eyes that now glare at me, demanding answers.

And I might be a murderer. Even if I didn’t take the head shot like I could’ve, I still caused harm to another being. And that’s not who I am, not who I’ve ever been. But life under Wyatt’s regime, life with the way our pack is dwindling and getting sicker… it’s forcing me to be this person that I’m becoming. And I hate it.

I don’t speak, don’t answer any of this alpha’s questions. Not even when he tugs me up to my feet, demanding to know who I am and why I’ve done this while holding my chin in a firm but non-violent grip. I’m braced and my heart pounds hard as I prepare for him to lash out, maybe backhand me for refusing to speak. But he doesn’t. Instead, he bends and puts his shoulder to my belly, hauls me up in the air, and carries me naked and crying to the village of Arcana Falls where I guess I'll face the consequences of following my brother’s orders.

***

I’m carried for a long time before I smell multiple alphas and Tyson Savage’s blood, which means we’re close, approaching my impending doom.

Terror grips me as I’m carried into a building and down a stairwell into a concrete basement, past a group of men, all with alpha scents who watch him put me in a cell with actual bars on it.

They all then disappear for a long time, and I continue to cry for so long, my eyes burn.

When he returns alone, dressed in dark jeans, sneakers, and a t-shirt, he comes into the cell and leans against the bars. He says nothing for a while, just studies me as I sit in the corner with my chin to my knees, my teeth chattering.

He approaches and I brace, but am surprised when he peels the soft-looking gray Savage Construction t-shirt off his muscled upper body and hands it to me. I’m grateful as I put it on. It’s big on me, covers my behind so shields it from the cold stone floor enough to make a difference.

“Thank you,” I hoarsely whisper.

He stares with his penetrating stare for a moment.

“Why?” he finally asks.

I bite my lip.

“Need you to explain yourself,” he advises calmly.

More fat tears roll down my cheeks.

He leaves and I choke on a sob. I try to take some deep breaths, but my heart is racing so hard it feels like it’ll leap from my chest at any moment.

I jerk in fear when he returns, but he’s holding a bottle of water and a box of Kleenex. He squats in front of me and extends the box of Kleenex my way.

I pluck one and wipe my swollen, red eyes and blow my nose.

Staying in the squat, he hammers me with more questions.

“Who are you?”

I don’t answer.

“Why are you disguising your scent? Where did you get the potion?”

I say nothing. It won’t be long, and he’ll know my scent because the potion will wear off.

“Where’s your pack?”

I blow my nose again.

“Why’d you shoot one of us? You poisoned some of our pack members at the diner, right? You tried to get me to eat that pie so you could poison me too, didn’t you? Why didn’t you just put it in my coffee?”

I keep my mouth clamped shut instead of telling him the herb’s flavor is detectable in coffee if the drinker doesn’t add sugar in their coffee so I never take the chance.

He doesn’t turn mean. He doesn’t hurt me. He doesn’t get impatient. But that stare penetrates as he slowly paces, looking thoughtful. I watch, unable to stop myself from fixating on his naked upper body, at his defined muscles. At his tanned skin. At his unique scent, which now blankets me as well as surrounds me.

“You’re gonna have to talk. You’re going nowhere until you do,” he tells me.

I swallow and bury my face in my knees. He paces another moment, slowly, patiently. When he stops moving and stands in front of me, I look up at him. His nostrils flare just slightly, so I shrivel.

The masking potion is wearing off. I’ve been worried about this eventuality. Once my actual scent takes over, it’ll be in this village and in their noses, and the alphas won’t ever forget it, so I’ll fail at hiding from them. If I even make it out of here.

As his nostrils flare, he continues to demand answers.

Did I try to kill Tyson specifically or would any of them have satisfied me?

Are there others nearby? Are they wearing the masking potion?

What’s my goal? Where did I come from? Then his eyes flash silver briefly as he asks, “Is Lily your real name?”

I’m surprised he remembered the name on my diner name tag, but I still say nothing. He’s relentless in his questioning. His rephrasing. He just hammers me with the questions but never hurts me, never threatens me even though I do nothing but sit here, staring at him pathetically.

And while he does it, he looks into my eyes like he can see through me, like he’s reading me and soon he’ll know all my secrets. He looks me over like he sees how dirty my life has been.

“Drink that water if you’re thirsty.” He gestures to the water he puts on the floor beside me.

I’m very thirsty, but I’m not about to drink it. It would probably serve me right if he decided to poison me right back.

He leaves again.

I need a toilet, but I’m afraid to ask.

His choice of words asking why I tried to kill Tyson means I failed.

I’ve failed at killing and I’m so relieved, but I’ve never before felt so torn in two over failure. Relief that I’m not a murderer, but devastated that I’ve gotten myself caught, what the fallout could be to not just me, also my pack. And innocent little Halla.

As I ponder the potentially horrific fallout, he comes back.

There’s a strange look in his eyes as he unlocks the cell and joins me inside it again.

And my first thought is… he’s out of patience.

Now is when the threats or the torture begins.