Page 127 of The Wolves of Forest Grove

The first rays of morning sunlight woke me, streaming in through the window to pool over Jared’s toned chest and caress the side of his face.

Making him look every bit the angel he was. My guardian angel. He always had been. Even after the betrayal of his uncle, when he went dark for a while, he never missed an opportunity to make me feel safe. Loved.

I carefully slid out of his grasp, distributing my weight so I wouldn’t jostle the mattress too much.

He still had a few hours until he needed to leave for the quarry to check on things.

Even though I knew the light wouldn’t wake him—hardly anything could rouse him when he was this deeply asleep—I slid the curtains closed, peering outside to check for Clay first.

Sometimes after a patrol he would go sleep in the studio above Grove’s End. Most nights, though, especially in summer, he preferred to nestle in the shrubbery below the window and sleep in his wolf form.

I didn’t blame him. I’d joined him a few times, in fact, and had to admit it was just as comfortable as the bed. Maybe even more so with the soft breeze and forest sounds lulling you to sleep.

But he wasn’t there.

I rustled around in my closet for something to throw on, settling on a Banner’s t-shirt and my already worn twice but not dirty enough to wash yet jean shorts. The ones that Clay could never stop staring at my ass when I wore.

It went without saying that it made them my favorite ones.

Something pricked at my senses as I slipped my cell into my back pocket and made my way downstairs.

My hackles rose, and my wolf surged to the surface.

There wasn’t anyone foreign in the cabin, I’d have sensed them.

Only the regular scents of the pack and the container of chocolate chip cookies Grams left on the counter for me greeted my nose in the main living area.

“Allie!” Vivian called from somewhere far off outside, and I was immediately put on high alert, my blood singing with the urge to shift as I raced out the door, clearing the porch and steps in two bounds. My hands turned to clawed daggers at my sides.

Protect, my wolf snarled within.

Kill.

Frantically, I scanned the dead campfire ring, finding it and the cabins beyond it quiet.

I sensed her approach from my right and took off into the trees like a bolt loosed from my bow. “Viv!” I hollered, adrenaline pulsing through my veins. If she were hurt…

A mental image of Gregory the witch choking on his own blood as my teeth sank into his jugular flashed through my thoughts before her scent hit me.

Not Vivian’s.

I slowed, seeing them walking toward me. Vivian and Archer with a girl between them.

Vivian’s eyes met mine with an apology. “I was just showing Arch the ropes and…” She trailed off, gesturing at the girl with the familiar dark hair.

Her scent reached me at about the same time my wolf recognized her as unclaimed, and she lifted her head to meet my gaze head on.

“Sam?” I asked, incredulous. It’d been four years, but I would know that bone structure—those eyes— anywhere. They were traits she shared with her brother. My mate. Clay.

Her lips pressed into a thin line as her gaze roamed over my body, no doubt taking note of the scars and the way the new muscle bulked up my frame. The last time she’d seen me I’d just killed Ryland. The former pack alpha. Her mate.

I’d been only eighteen then. A scrawny, anxiety ridden teenager with turquoise hair and not a clue what I was doing other than trying to protect the people I cared about.

Though where I’d filled out, grown the turquoise out of my hair in favor of embracing the silvery color inherited from my mom, she didn’t seem to have fared so well since she’d walked out on this pack.

I didn’t begrudge her leaving. I couldn’t, not knowing how it would tear me apart to lose either of my mates. But I did blame her for trying to kill me before she went.

“It’s been a while,” she said as though we were old friends instead of…whatever the hell we were.

Her cheeks looked sallow, and her eyes dark rimmed. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say they almost seemed bruised. Once, I’d been envious of her curves, but now, standing before me in her birthday suit, I could see that the world hadn’t been kind to her.

Her muscle and flesh clung to her bones so tightly that I was afraid if she didn’t get a drink of water soon she would begin to prune.

“What are you doing here, Samantha?”

Her upper lip curled at my use of her full name but her wolf remained confined within. Not so much as a spark rising to her bright blue eyes.

Her head dropped, making her messy dark hair fall forward to shield her face. Her shoulders shook. “I...I didn’t know where else to go.”

My lips parted, but I didn’t know what to say. My fingernails were digging half-moons into my palms and my wolf still called for blood, making my ability to stay level headed shaky at best.

“Look,” Sam snapped, seeming to get a hold on her emotions. Flipping the switch from poor me to fuck you in an instant.

“I just want to see my brother, okay? I’m...I’m sorry for what I did,” she gritted out through bared teeth. “Just let me see him, and then you can chase me out of your territory if that’s what you want.”

My jaw clenched at her request, and it took everything I had not to lay into her.

Did she have any idea what her betrayal did to him?

Had Charity not gotten in the way of her attack, and nearly died in the process, Sam might’ve succeeded in taking me out.

The pain in Clay’s eyes when he roared at his sister to leave, his hands shaking with the need to protect his mate, even against his own blood, still haunted my nightmares.

He’d patrolled every night since. For four fucking years.

He didn’t say so, but I knew, at least in the beginning, that he was waiting for her to come back.

Not knowing whether she’d come back tail between her legs or claws and fangs poised to finish what she started ate at him. It ate at him almost as much as the prospect that she might keep her promise and never come back at all.

“Save your apology,” I hissed, taking a shaky breath to steady my nerves. “I’m not the one you owe it to.”

I gestured to Archer and Vivian to bring her. “Bring her inside. Don’t take your eyes off her.”

They nodded and left, leaving me to whisper a string of curses under my breath alone.

With trembling fingers, I drew out my phone as they walked away, finding Clay’s name in my call history and hesitating for an instant before jamming the screen.

I paced as it rang.

“Allie?” Clay’s voice came over the receiver. “What’s wrong?”

Leave it to him to know something was up before I could even get a word in.

“Are you at Grove’s End?”

“What happened?” he growled, and I could already hear him moving, muttering to himself how he knew he should have stayed at camp. “Allie, start talking.”

“No one’s in danger,” I told him, mentally adding, at least I don’t think anyone’s in danger. “Just get here, ’kay?”

“Already on my way.”

The line went dead, and I sighed. I guessed we had about ten minutes before he got here. He was just that fast.

The telltale clatter of a screen door back at camp was followed by several others, and I knew that there wouldn’t be a soul at camp who didn’t know she was here within the hour.

A flash of light hair caught the sun through the trees, and I sensed him coming. It took a lot to wake up Jared, but camp just got a whole lot louder than it normally was on a Thursday morning.

Jared’s hands were in fists at his sides, and his eyes glowed with the light of his wolf begging to be freed as he came into view. His fury only served to reignite my own, and I had to work twice as hard to keep myself in control.

“Want to tell me why Samantha fucking Armstrong is in our kitchen right now?”

“She just showed up wanting to see Clay,” I explained, throwing a hand in the air. “What was I supposed to do, Jare?”

“She tried to kill you.”

He grabbed me by the arm, forcing me to face him. The contact sent a rush of angry heat pulsing into me, and I had to disentangle myself from his grasp.

“I know,” I lobbed back. “But that was four years ago and Clay—”

“Do you honestly think Clay is going to be glad to see her? He’s just going to send her away all over again.”

What he wasn’t saying hurt more than anything he could’ve said. Clay was going to have to grieve her all over again.

“Maybe not,” I argued. “It’s been four years. Maybe she—”

“Please tell me you’re not that stupid.”

I narrowed my eyes at him, trying and failing to find the Jared from last night in his stare. My steady wolf. My rock. The thing I held on to when things got messy.

This was a hard limit for him, though. He trusted our inner circle and had a wary trust of the rest of the pack, but he harbored no faith in anyone else. Not ever. Not since his uncle’s betrayal.

Not only had Ryland been to blame for the death of Clay’s father, the pack alpha before him, but he’d also been responsible for the death of Jared’s parents. The former gave him control of the pack. The latter gave him the deed to the quarry and control of all of its income.

I wouldn’t trust anyone anymore, either, but he needed to calm the fuck down.

“Maybe you should go,” I suggested, doing my best not to take his comment to heart. If he stayed, he might just end up saying more things he might later regret.

My words seemed to get through his erected barriers, and I saw a crack form in his facade. His lips parted and the strain around his eyes eased. There he was.

“Shit,” he cursed, throwing a fist through his bed- rumpled hair. “I’m sorry, Allie, I just...”

I nodded. “I know. It’s okay.”

“I’m not leaving,” he announced a second later. “I’ll have Todd go take care of things for me. I’m not leaving until she’s gone.”

I could see that there was no room for argument, so I didn’t bother trying. “Clay should be here any minute,” I told him, earning myself a scowl.

“You should have let me question her first.”

“And put you at the mercy of Clay when he found out you didn’t call him the instant she arrived?” I scoffed. “I’d be cleaning your guts up off the kitchen floor by noon.”

The joke fell on deaf ears as a knot formed between Jared’s brows, and we both made our way back to the cabin. Side by side, but miles apart.