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15

KAT

I didn’t expect to spend nearly two hours at the table with the enforcers talking through potential suspects.

I thought they would have better things to do with their time than help me, but if the next target is likely to be their boss, they are trying to help him, not me, despite Emilio's joke before. Their priority will be him, not me.

Aren is standing near the piece of paper on which we wrote the victims' names. He’s focused on talking to Finan about something, but some internal awareness makes me think he’s paying more attention to me than to Finan.

“Did you record it?” Joy asks, pulling me from my thoughts.

“Record what?”

“Scaring your ex shitless?”

I shake my head.

She releases a sad sigh. “Shame.”

“Joy would have plastered it all over the internet,” Emilio says, crossing his arms.

She doesn’t look the least bit repentant. “I totally would have. What did he do? No need for specific details if you don’t want to give it. Broad brush strokes are cool.”

We’re encroaching on dangerous territory here. I thought I had left all that behind. Now here I am, talking about something I wish I could forget.

“He betrayed me,” I say quietly. “And I never saw it coming.”

Joy lifts her hand, and I watch as claws extend from the tips of her fingers. “See, you must be kinder than I am because I’d have killed the guy and not thought twice about it. A knife in the back is a death sentence. I’d have set the guy on fire then plastered that shit all over the internet.”

I look at the man beside her, Emilio.

He kisses the top of her head and grins at me. “She can be vindictive, and I love that about her.”

“How’d you know?” she asks me.

“How’d I know what?”

“That we were running a test,” she says. “Back when Aren was convinced you were a feral. I wasn’t sure, so he agreed to a little test to prove who was right.”

I glance at him. Now, that I did not know.

He still has his head swiveled to face Finan, but I’m still positive he’s focusing more on our conversation than Finan.

“Ah, so that’s what that was about.”

Someone had opened my cage, a prison made of silver that had been slowly killing me and my wolf. I’d known it was a trap even before I left it, but it was stay and die or get out and try to escape.

“How did you know it was a trap?” she asks.

I’d seen a woman being pursued by a wolf. And just before I’d stamped on the gas in Aren’s Jeep, I’d watched the wolf take the woman to the ground, and the woman—Joy—had looked me right in the eye, like she was pleading for her life.

I look at the woman now. “How’d I know it was a setup?”

Joy bumps her shoulder with Emilio’s. “He was staring at my ass, wasn’t he?”

She surprises a smile out of me. “No. I swear you looked more annoyed than fearing for your life.”

She grins at me. “It was Emilio. He kept trying to lick me in places that he shouldn’t have been.”

I blink. “Uh…”

He gives her a slow grin. “You didn’t have a problem with me licking?—”

“Yep. Time to move things along.” Cruz throws an arm around my shoulder and steers me away from a conversation that was definitely venturing into a more personal topic than I needed to know. Especially for people I literally met a couple of days ago and only just learned their names.

When I glance over at Aren, he’s staring at the arm Cruz has around my shoulder with an intensity that makes me wonder why it’s not exploded into flames.

A second later, that arm is gone, and Cruz is standing a foot away from me.

I raise my eyebrow at Aren.

He nods and turns to continue his conversation with Finan.

The guy nearly kills me, yet he has a problem with someone putting their arm around me?

A knock sounds at the door, and it swings open. “Kataleya?”

My dad sticks his head in, and I smile.

The name tickles a distant memory that feels a little less distant whenever I hear it. But it’s mine. Deep down in my bones, that name is mine in a way no other name has ever been.

“Yeah?”

“Do you have a minute?”

I glance at Aren, who is frowning at my dad.

“Sure.”

I follow my dad out of the house. I’m not the least bit surprised when I glance back and spot Aren standing right outside the meeting room, arms crossed, watching me.

“We’re having a problem back home, and I need to get back to deal with it,” he says. “It’s nothing serious, but I don’t want to leave your mom to deal with it alone.”

I’m used to people throwing me away. In foster care, they always preferred an easier-going child than me. But I never expected that I’d meet my dad and he would throw me away as soon as he found me.

I force a smile to my lips as I turn to walk away, my eyes prickling. “Sure. No big deal. I’d better?—”

He stops me, looking at me like he can’t believe he has to say this. “I want you to come home with me . Did you think I was leaving you?”

I don’t respond, but he pulls me into a hug and holds me.

I breathe in the scent of his skin. It’s still not as familiar as it should be or as I want it to be, but sometimes, I get a tickle of a memory. Not a place, a thing, or a face. The memory isn’t as tangible as that. It’s the warmth of the sun on my cheek. The wind tunneling through my hair as I run, and the sweetest, most incredible floral scent enveloping me in the sense of home.

Hugging never came easily before. I don’t think it does to most foster kids used to being carted from one home to the next, like a never-ending conveyor belt.

But I don’t even think before I wrap my arms around my dad and I hug him back, wishing I could go back with him and see the field of sunflowers he told me I used to run through, and meet the mom and little sister who are strangers to me.

“I can’t go with you,” I speak quietly, knowing Aren is probably listening. “People died on my college campus and they died because of me. I have to find out who did it, and they have to pay.”

He releases me, reluctantly pulling his arms from around me as he steps back.

Cradling the back of my head with both hands, he peers down at me, blue eyes fierce. “I can stay.”

“You said you have trouble.”

“If my little girl needs me, then I’ll stay.”

“I’m not a little girl.” Even if some tiny part of me wishes I were so, I could relive my life without so much pain and rejection. Another part of me wouldn’t change things even if I could. Those experiences made me into the person I am now. I’m stronger because of what I went through.

He kisses my forehead. “You will always be my little girl. Do you have your cell phone?”

“I do.”

He holds his hand out for it, and I hand it over.

He types as he speaks. “Every single number you should need to know is here. Me, your mom, Leonore, and your little sister Karlie.” He sighs and shakes his head. “Karlie is seventeen and has the attitude to match. How long do you think your hunt will take?”

I shrug. “Not sure. I’m hoping no longer than a week.” Hopefully less than that so I can have some actual downtime before I start my new job in the city. “Why?”

“Call whenever you need us. I’ll try to resolve this problem as soon as possible and will be happy to help you.”

“You don’t have to do that.” But I wish he would. I want him to come back, and I’m scared that if I put something I want that badly out into the universe, then it won’t come true.

He hands me my phone back. “I will. Leonore and Karlie will want to come as well. We can deal with this killer and you can come home.”

“Karlie as well?” I thought at seventeen he’d want to keep her at home.

He snorts. “Karlie is breathing down the back of my neck that the very second she turns eighteen, she’ll get to be an enforcer.” He shrugs. “She’s a better fighter than most I have, but the rules are no enforcers until age eighteen.”

“Who set the rule?”

He grins. “Your mother. Karlie is stubborn, but she didn’t get it from me.”

We say our goodbyes, and I walk him to the bunkhouse to collect his bag and then to his car.

I stand there, watching until his truck disappears from view. It’s so much harder than I thought it would be seeing him leave.

He’s going to come back with the family I didn’t know I had and I want to see them. I truly do want that. But I’m not sure how that’s going to feel. Or even what’s going to come next. Family takes you as you are. Even if you don’t like them, you love them. But they don’t know me enough to know that they love me.

What if they don’t like me?

And what comes next?

He wants me to go home to Nebraska, but what does that mean for my job in Montana, and the future I worked so hard for?

I want that future, but I also want to know what my life was like before.

I want to be Kataleya Prairie again and have all my memories back.

Not ready to go back inside yet, I head for the creek. There’s something incredibly calming about watching the water when your mind is in turmoil.

“Kitty cat?” Aren calls from the house.

I twist to face him. “I’m going to sit by the creek for a bit.”

He moves to follow me.

“I want to be alone.” Maybe it’s rude, but I have a lot to process.

Too much.

And I have to deal with this stupid need to cry because my dad left me.

I cannot be around anyone right now, and I can’t let Aren see me cry. I can’t let anyone see me cry.

“I could?—”

“Don’t push.” I harden my voice, not in the mood for him to barge his way into my life the way he broke into my apartment and refused to leave.

“Okay, Kat. Whatever you need.”

I feel him watching me as I walk down to the creek and sit beside it, wrapping my arms around my raised legs. With my chin on my knees, I stare out across the water at the towering pine trees in the distance.

I should have gone for a run instead, taking advantage of all this green space while I have it before I return to the city and then visit Nebraska. With work starting soon, I won’t have nearly as much time with my newfound family as I’d like.

Lost in my thoughts, I startle and twist around when a soft weight lands on my shoulders.

“Don’t stay out too long. It gets cold at night here,” Aren says gruffly, and he walks back up to the house, leaving me staring after him with what smells like his coat draped over my shoulders.

I wait until he’s disappeared inside.

“The guy isn’t just a tool, he’s a grade A toolbox, Kat,” I whisper to myself. “He is not being nice for no reason. He wants something from you. Never forget that.”

I’ve had someone stab me in my back before. I don’t intend to let it happen again.