Page 91 of Crossed Fates

But only the sounds of the night met my senses.

I spun around, tracking her scent, my heart in my fucking throat.Where are you?I demanded.Why can’t I feel you?It was like she’d been cut off.

Or maybe knocked out.

Shit, you’d better not be dead. We’d just met.If I lost her…No.I refused to follow that strand of thought.Not fucking happening.

Someone had taken her.

She’d called one of them “Bendy” because of his crooked snout. He had brown and gray fur. That didn’t help me much. Neither did his scent. I tracked it with my nose, unfamiliar with the owner. Definitely a Bitten wolf, but not one of mine.

I picked up the trace of his friend, the smoky undertones reminding me of the hybrid. Which was why she’d called him “Vex Junior.” It seemed my mate had a penchant for nicknames.I wonder what she called me when we met?

A question I’d ask when I found her.

Because Iwouldfind her. And I’d kill those who dared to take her from me.

Come on, Mak, talk to me.

Nothing.

Fuck!I howled, my wolf in agony over losing his mate. He could feel her life force, but it wasn’t enough. She wasn’t safe. Gone.Missing.

The realization crippled my ability to focus, my entire world standing still as I reacted to a loss unlike any I’d ever experienced. Tyler’s death had gutted me. But losing Makayla—it shredded apart my fucking soul.

How had someone I’d just met begun to mean so much to me?

This is fate,I realized.This is what fate does. How fate works. Why we know our mate upon sight.It was like our souls had been bonded in a previous life and had finally found each other again.

Only to be ripped apart.

Destroyed.

She’d only been in my head a day, and already I missed her.

How the hell will I survive if she actually leaves?

A concern for another day.

Right now, I needed to find her and annihilate those who dared to touch her. I also needed to trust in her own strength.She’ll survive this. She’ll find a way to contact me. Together, we will fix this.

I stole a deep breath, my chest aching from lack of oxygen because I’d forgotten to breathe.Think, Calder. Think. You’re smarter than this. You’re stronger than this. Locating people is what you do. You’re a damn wolf. An alpha. Cut the shit and find your girl.

My brother’s voice was loud in my head, his spirit heavy against mine.

He wasn’t really talking to me. I knew that. Yet, it was exactly what he’d say to me now. Or maybe it was just what I would say to myself.

Regardless, it worked.

I put my snout to the ground and tracked Makayla’s scent to a set of tire tracks in the dirt. I growled at the sight. Not only had someone taken my mate, but they’d also driven ontomyland, during her patrol. Those patrol routes were brand new. No one knew about them except the inner circle. So how the hell did they—

A presence at my back had a snarl building in my throat.

Hardt.

Of course.

That son of a...