Page 1 of Ethan (Pecan Pines #7)

Dean

“You’re going to have to be on your best behavior, you hear?”

Carter’s voice cut through the silence like a blade against leather. Firm, authoritative. Alpha.

I didn’t respond. Not because I didn’t hear him, but because I was tired of being spoken at instead of to.

My elbow rested against the truck’s passenger-side door, my cheek pressed to the cool glass as I stared out at the road.

Miles of dry cornfields blurred past, gold turned gray by the overcast sky.

Our family had called these fields home for generations, but to me, they were nothing but dead space. A gilded cage with stalks for bars.

And now, finally, we were driving away from it. Leaving Thornebane territory behind. My lungs expanded easier than they had in weeks. Maybe months.

Even my wolf stirred from where he lay listless in the back of my mind, tail twitching once, slow and uncertain. Neither of us said it aloud, but we felt the same: relief.

It wasn’t about Carter being a bad alpha. Hell, he was probably the best Thornebane had seen in decades. My brother was calm, collected, strategic and fair.

He was everything the crazy bastard who’d ruled before him hadn’t been. Carter saved the pack. But he didn’t save me.

He didn’t see that every time he looked at me, all I felt was scrutiny. That no matter how good his intentions, my wolf couldn’t submit to him. My older brother.

The one who used to shove me into snowbanks and steal my fries and now sat in the alpha’s chair, giving me orders like I was some mouthy cub who needed taming.

In some ways, I guessed that’s exactly what he still thought I was. The truck curved, and in what felt like the blink of an eye, the scenery changed.

The cornfields dropped away, replaced by thick, towering pines that loomed on either side of the road. There was a scent in the air here. Wet earth and cedar, sharper, wilder and older.

We were in Pecan Pines now.

I straightened a little and rubbed the back of my neck, voice dry as I spoke for the first time during the two-hour drive. “You know, you didn’t have to come.”

Carter glanced over, one eyebrow raised.

“I’m not a kid you need to babysit. I could’ve come here and introduced myself to Cooper on my own,” I pointed out.

Cooper. Even thinking his name made my stomach tighten. My new lead alpha. My future alpha. The word didn’t sit right in my mouth, like a tooth that hadn’t healed straight after being broken.

I’d met Cooper at the pack summit a few months back. Watched him speak. Watched how the wolves of Pecan Pines responded to him. They responded with loyalty, not fear.

He wasn’t loud, but he was dangerous. The kind of alpha who didn’t need to raise his voice to be obeyed.

A part of me, some raw, aching piece buried deep, wondered if I could belong here. If I’d finally feel like I fit in with this pack. Or if I was just as broken here as I’d been back home.

“I have some matters to discuss with Cooper,” Carter said flatly, eyes back on the road. “Besides, your track record doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.”

I scoffed, rolled my eyes, didn’t answer. The truth was, I’d made that reputation myself.

I shoved the other enforcers too hard in training, talking back at the wrong moments, blowing up when I felt cornered.

What Carter didn’t see, what nobody did, was that I acted out because it was easier than feeling like I wasn’t enough.

I’d learned a long time ago that people didn’t ask questions if you gave them a reason to back off.

We pulled into the Pecan Pines pack compound just as the sky started to spit rain.

The gravel driveway crunched under the tires, leading us past a tall iron gate and up toward a sprawling house made of dark wood and stone.

Not the cold, sharp lines of Thornebane’s fortress of a packhouse, but something warmer, more lived in. Lights in the windows. A porch swing. Wind chimes on the corner.

Carter parked in front. I stepped out, letting the breeze whip through my hair. My wolf perked up at the scent of other shifters, faint but strong. Earthy, warm and alert.

We walked up the steps and through the front doors, the sound of our boots echoing off the floors. The packhouse was quiet, but not sterile.

I caught glimpses of framed photos on the walls. There were smiling faces, pups wrestling in snow, group shots at bonfires.

Carter led us down the hallway toward a closed door. A gold plaque read: Cooper Hayes. He turned to me, resting a hand on my shoulder.

“Wait out here. I’ll call you in when we’re done,” Carter said.

My stomach twisted.

“Seriously?” I stared at him, bristling. “You drag me all the way here and then tell me to sit outside like I’m at the damn principal’s office?”

“It’s not personal, Dean,” he said, but his voice was already turning to stone. “I need to speak with Cooper privately. Just wait.”

He disappeared behind the door before I could answer. The click of it locking made something cold flare behind my ribs. I sat down on the bench outside his office, arms crossed.

I felt angry, embarrassed, and humiliated.

I wasn’t some reckless pup who needed managing. But clearly, that’s what Carter still saw. And it didn’t help that with my supernatural hearing, I could catch every third word from inside.

“…probation period….”

“…temper.”

“…history of fights…”

I gritted my teeth.

Then Cooper’s voice, calm and clipped. “So basically, you’re offloading your problem child to me and my pack?”

I cracked my knuckles. That was it. I stood, fists clenched, ready to storm in?—

But then I caught movement from the corner of my eye.

Someone was walking down the hall. Broad-shouldered, dark-haired, about my age. Thick arms crossed over a pecan-colored T-shirt.

He walked with that slow, easy confidence that only came from knowing you could flatten anyone in your path. His gaze landed on me. Sharp, amused. Not unkind, but not deferential either.

Definitely not a pushover. Enforcer, I thought immediately. The air around him practically hummed with dominance. Like mine did, on my worst days.

He stopped a few feet from me, leaning a shoulder casually against the wall.

“You the new guy?” he asked, eyes flicking to the door behind me. “The Thornebane import?”

“Guess that depends on who’s asking,” I muttered.

He let out a low whistle. “Wow. They weren’t kidding.”

I stiffened. “About what?”

“You’ve got a chip on your shoulder the size of a small country,” he said with a smirk, pushing off the wall. “Name’s Griffin. Enforcer for Pecan Pines.”

“Dean,” I said, stepping forward until we were almost chest to chest. “Used to be an enforcer trainee back in Thornebane.”

“Used to be?” Griffin asked.

I didn’t answer.

He tilted his head, clearly entertained. “You looking to join our enforcer team?”

“Why? You scared I might take your spot?”

The moment the words left my mouth, the air between us shifted. A crackle of challenge. I wanted a fight. Needed one. Something to bleed off the fury burning in my gut.

Griffin saw it too. His grin faded. His posture shifted, less casual now. Ready.

“You sure you want to do this here?” he asked, voice quieter now. Deadlier.

“You sure you can keep up?” I shot back.

For a second, neither of us moved. Just breathing, sizing each other up. I could see it in his eyes: not fear, but calculation.

He was strong, disciplined. Controlled. Probably everything Carter ever wanted me to be. I hated how much that stung. Griffin didn’t move when I stepped into his space. Neither did I.

The tension between us stretched taut like a tripwire. The air in the hallway went thick, buzzing with challenge. I didn’t care that I’d just arrived.

Didn’t care that Carter had told me to behave, or that Cooper’s office was barely five feet behind me.

All I saw was another wolf who looked at me like I was some half-trained pup. Like he was already measuring my worth, and finding me lacking.

Griffin’s smirk said he thought he had me pegged, and maybe he did.

But I was tired of being the younger brother, the second choice, the one too wild to trust and too damaged to keep around. So I did what I always did when the walls felt too tight. I struck first.

My fist flew. It connected with the edge of Griffin’s jaw, and the crack of it echoed down the corridor like a starting gun.He didn’t even stumble.

He just blinked, exhaled through his nose like I was more of an annoyance than a threat, and then came at me like a freight train.

We collided hard. Shoulders. Elbows. Grunts. Every hit he landed felt deliberate and controlled. Mine were rage-driven, instinctive.

I swung wide, missed more than I hit, but when I did connect, I made it count. The hall was too narrow for real maneuvering.

Our boots scraped across the wooden floor as we shoved and slammed into walls, portraits tilting, a table skidding out of place. I heard someone shout faintly from another room, but I didn’t care.

I couldn’t stop. Not when my chest was full of heat and shame and the aching need to prove I wasn’t just Thornebane’s leftover trash.

Griffin grabbed my shirt and shoved me backwards into the wall, hard. Pain lit up my spine, and I lashed out with my elbow, catching him in the ribs.

He grunted, but didn’t release me. Instead, he spun us, my back now slamming into the opposite side of the hallway. The picture frame beside my head fell and shattered on the floor.

He pressed his forearm to my collarbone, just under my throat.

“You done yet?” he growled, breath hot against my face.

“Bite me,” I said.

I drove my knee up, aiming for his gut, but he twisted just enough that I only grazed him. He slammed his shoulder into me in retaliation, knocking the wind from my lungs.

Something inside me snapped. My wolf surged forward, rage-hot and ready to tear loose. I didn’t fight it.

My nails sharpened into claws, and I felt the shift coming fast, bones tightening, senses sharpening. My vision tunneled.

Griffin’s aura flared in answer, his own wolf pushing forward, teeth bared just enough to glint under the hall lights.

One more second and we’d both lose control. Claws. Fangs. Blood. And then a roar shattered through the building.

“Enough!” The word didn’t just carry authority. It was alpha command, raw and unforgiving. Cooper.

I staggered back, body locking up like I’d hit an invisible wall. My wolf snarled but obeyed, retreating with a reluctant growl.

Across from me, Griffin’s shoulders heaved, his claws half-shifted before pulling back. He straightened, breathing hard, and I hated how steady he looked.

I was a mess. My nose was bleeding, my lip was split, and my ribs ached like someone had taken a sledgehammer to them. I could barely see out of one eye.

My shirt was torn at the collar. And still, I stood there, jaw clenched, not willing to admit how much it hurt. Carter’s boots thudded as he approached fast, furious.

Cooper was right behind him, calm but radiating that same chilling control I remembered from the summit.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Carter barked, stepping between us.

Before I could even throw out some half-baked excuse, Cooper’s voice cut in, low and cool.

“Stand down. Both of you.” Cooper didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t need to.

His aura pressed down on me like cold stone, quiet dominance that didn’t scream but simply was. My wolf curled its tail instinctively.

I straightened out of sheer stubbornness, wiping blood from my mouth with the back of my hand.

“Call for a healer,” Cooper said to someone.

“He started it,” I muttered.

Carter turned on me with a glare that could’ve turned a river to ice. “He what?”

I didn’t respond. My pride was already bleeding more than my mouth.

Griffin didn’t gloat. He just rolled his shoulders, wiped a smear of blood from his knuckles, and said, “Kid’s got a lot of energy. You sure you want to leave him here, Carter?”

“Oh, I do,” Carter snapped, dragging a hand down his face like he was holding himself back from doing something drastic.

“Because if he comes back home, I will throttle him myself. But it’s Cooper’s call.

He decides whether he wants to keep my sorry excuse of a brother, or toss him right back into my lap. ”

I could barely stay upright. My knees felt like rubber, and every breath made my ribs throb. The corridor tilted to the left, and I blinked hard, trying to steady it.

Carter’s words finally sank in, sharp and cold. And my heart dropped. After that little show I’d just put on, Cooper probably already knew I didn’t belong here.

That’s when I caught the scent. It hit me like a freight train, knocking the fight right out of my lungs.

Fresh pine. Rain on warm stone. Sweetness threaded with something deeper, earthy and steadying. Calming. Like standing barefoot in forest soil after a storm.

My head whipped toward the hallway just as someone rounded the corner.

And then everything stopped.

He moved like a breeze but looked like he could hold his own in a hurricane. Average height, lean but strong, about my age.

Short dark hair, and the most striking green eyes I’d ever seen. Not just bright. Alive. And currently, furious. He was scowling at me like I’d knocked over his favorite bookshelf.

But those eyes…they practically glowed. Not literally. But close enough. Like they could see straight through every wall I’d ever built.

And I felt him. His presence slid over my raw nerves like balm and fire, all at once. My wolf, still snarling and half-feral inside me, went deathly still.

Frozen mid-growl. Breath caught. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t think. I just stared, dazed, stupid, and bleeding, at the most gorgeous person I’d ever seen.

The green-eyed man looked me over, taking in the bruises, the torn shirt, the blood dripping down my chin. His scowl deepened.

Cooper, still standing beside Carter, nodded toward me. “Ethan.”

Ethan. He must be the pack healer.

He crouched in front of me, already checking me over with quick, practiced hands. “Next time you decide to get in a brawl, maybe try not to concuss yourself.”

I heard the words, but they barely registered. My gaze stayed locked on him. His scent wrapped around me again. It was clean, grounding, and dizzying all at once.

My knees buckled. I went down hard, and Ethan caught my shoulder, cursing under his breath. I barely noticed.

All I could do was lie there, struggling to breathe past the sudden, thunderous pulse in my chest, and stare up at those eyes.

“Let’s get him to the clinic,” Ethan muttered, clearly irritated, but his touch was steady and warm.