Page 24

Xander

“SO WHO ARE we meeting first?” Billie mumbles around a mouthful of trail mix while shoving some additional M&Ms into the mixture, which her mouth doesn’t really have room for.

My arm is draped around my mate snuggled up against my chest, the two of us seated in the back of my truck. I give her a squeeze. She looks up at me with chipmunk cheeks. I dramatically swallow the nuts and dried fruit in my mouth with raised brows, which gifts me with an equally dramatic roll of the eyes and her stuffing more M&Ms into her mouth in bratty insolence. Shaking my head, I reply, “The Devereauxs.” My stomach twists with the thoughts of what still lies ahead, and I blow out a strained breath of air. “I want this over as quickly as possible. I gave these wolves time to consider my more-than-fair offer. The time for understanding and deliberation is over.”

The dark interior of the cab fills with the bright illumination coming from the floodlights on the exterior of the pack police station as Jax pulls the truck to park in one of the open spaces in front of the long porch. Jasper, with Gran sitting shotgun, pulls his black Jeep Wrangler alongside our passenger side.

“Sounds good,” Wilhelmina affirms, snatching her handbag from the floor and digging through it for her meds and a piece of gum. Grabbing the water bottle from the cup holder on the back of the center console, she downs her meds and offers me the bottle, which I take. Popping the gum into her mouth, she exhales a cinnamon-filled groan. “Maybe a bathroom break, first? Would hate to have me unable to focus and potentially miss”—she waves her hand around— “ something because of a full bladder.”

Swigging down the rest of the water and capping the bottle, I nod in agreement. “Yeah, I think that’d be wise.”

“Inside the house,” Jax adds, turning off the engine and unbuckling his seat belt. He raises a hand, “I know, it was me last time, but I don’t want us taking any chances.”

“We’re all house-trained after all,” Ethan adds in a wry tone.

Licking my lips, I puff out a short laugh. “That we are, E.” I slant to the side so I can see his reflection in the sideview mirror. His head is down, focused on his fingers quickly undoing the few buttons keeping his shirt closed, but I can see the hitch of his mouth in a micro-grin. His eyes slide to the side meeting my gaze in the mirror, and with a quirk of a brow, he spreads apart the front of his shirt. My mouth ticks up on one side, wondering if he’s finally put together all the too-long glances and unnecessary bumps and touches Colette’s father had managed to take over the years and has decided to use his unhealthy interest to our advantage. Seeing the hard lines of his muscular torso illuminated under the floodlights sends a pulse of desire through my dick, while the thought of anyone but one of my pack-mates touching him, his body, in any intimate manner shoots a bolt of fiery possessiveness up my spine. Leaning forward, I snake my hand around his front to cup the bottom of his throat and bring my mouth to his ear, letting my lips brush his flesh as I rasp, “No one but us touches you.”

He slowly angles his head in such a way that my lips drag across his cheek, and his lips trace my jawline. “Yes, Alpha,” he breathes, giving me a few nips. My dick hardens, and I have to push myself away.

The fighting. The killing. The life-threatening situations we’ve come out of, and the ones still ahead of us, have a way of making things clearer. Black and white. What matters and what doesn’t. When death is surrounding you, and you’re fighting to live, you realize what’s worth living for. And when the fighting is done, you want to live—experience what makes you feel alive, what could have been taken by death. The need to be with my pack-mates intimately is becoming harder and harder to keep pushing off.

“Dammit,” I growl, raking my fingers through my hair. “Let’s get this over with,” I snarl, flinging open the door with a little more force than needed.

Billie

Xander’s done. Just completely and utterly done. I don’t mean he’s exhausted or tired, though he may be those too. What I mean is he’s reached his limit of listening to words that mean nothing, statements that are hollow, and assurances that are lies.

Oh, and I’m pretty sure his need to fuck is also pushing him to expedite the proceedings. Based on the bond, we’re all aligned with him on that.

I slide my gaze from Xander to Colette’s mother, Bonnie. She’s seated in one of the wooden chairs set up in the middle of the interview room, sobbing with a lacey handkerchief held in a lace-covered hand pressed just under her eyes to retain her perfectly done makeup. She’s wearing a fifties-style pale-pink frock dress that surprisingly coordinates with the pale-green paint of the cinder-block walls. The small silver barrettes on either side of her head must be pinned or something, as they’ve managed to hold her black hair, similar in texture and color to Colette’s but shoulder length and curled at the ends, in place while her entire body convulses with each gasping garbled inhale.

Colette is on her knees at her mother’s side, trying to console her, even though she has thick black lines of eyeliner painted down her cheeks from her tears of sorrow and grief.

Colette’s father, Phillip, stands on the other side of his mate with one hand on the back of her chair, his gaze unfocused on the tiled floor and his thin face drawn down.

“How could you?” Phillip wheezes in a dry, nasally voice, lifting his close-set blue eyes up to face Xander. He wipes a hand just above his gelled-back, thinning salt-and-pepper hair before readjusting the navy-blue and white-dotted bow tie peeking out from under his dark-blue sweater-vest and light-blue button-down. “He... he was... was only standing up for—”

“No,” Ethan states with a firm shake of his head. Mr. Devereaux’s gaze floats over to Ethan as if his gravelly voice is the sound of angels singing. His eyes trail down Ethan’s body while his fingers drag down the center of his chest, coming to a stop midway like they’ve snagged a button or something. A low moan slips through his tight lips, and his cheeks are tinted pink when he raises his head back up. Maybe the chant of lustful demons would be more accurate with the carnal heat in his half-mast eyes. Ethan keeps his body still, arms firmly crossed over his mostly bare chest, spine straight and feet wide, looking like the beta he is at Xander’s side. With flat eyes and an even flatter voice, he continues, “He was out for blood. He and those with him planned an attack on the alpha of these lands, and I assure you they fully understood and accepted the risks of their actions. If you cared so much about your son’s life, you would have counseled him against such actions. You would have urged him to seek other options, and you most definitely wouldn’t have aided him by causing a distraction ensuring he wouldn’t be stopped until it was too late. You knew blood would be shed tonight, that lives would be lost. You’re just upset about who’s blood and what lives.”

“What was he supposed to do?” Phillp cries out with raised brows and a red face, throwing his arms out wide at his side before letting them flop down in a hopeless gesture. His frustrated outrage is accompanied by a long, wailing sob from his mate.

“What did you think would happen?” Jax queries with a tilt of his head, his knuckles rubbing the underside of his jaw. He shrugs a shoulder. “Honestly, what did you think Xander’s reaction would be? Our alpha made his terms and conditions of being either a member of this pack or temporarily staying on his lands very clear. Did you think he wouldn’t hold to his word?”

Phillp’s head snaps back, and his mouth opens and closes several times, the loose skin reminding me of a goldfish on dry land gulping for air. His face pales, and his eyes bulge as he tries to come up with answers to questions he should’ve asked beforehand—questions and answers that could have saved lives. “I...” he splutters. “I don’t know, but not...” He goes to brush a hand over his hair but again just brushes the air above his head. I swallow down the scoff climbing up my throat, noting that even faced with his son’s death and the errors he made that could have prevented it, he’s still vain enough to maintain a certain image. “Not this,” he mutters.

“Well, now you know,” Xander declares in a frosty tone that sends a shiver down my spine, making me sit up a little taller from my leaned-back position against the front of the large wooden desk. Xander may have put out the fire Little Fox had us cooking in, and I’ve got a belly full of food, but I’m still wiped, and my body temperature seems to be calibrating or something. Cleaning the pack house, though weirdly therapeutic, taxed me more than it should have.

Xander’s eyes glow, and he rolls his shoulders back right before sending out a wave of icy alpha energy that only bolsters his glacial sentiments. The Devereauxs all intake sharp gasps of air and cower among themselves as if Xander’s energy was the cold front of an oncoming nor’easter.

“I stand by my principles, my ideals, my mates, and the wolves and shifters I’ve taken under me. If my enemies come at me or mine, I will meet them head-on.” He takes one step toward the shivering family and hits them with another blast of his power, this one more intense, like the side of an iceberg plummeting into the frigid ocean. Phillip collapses to his knees, huddling into a ball with his arms covering his head, while his wife bends over her daughter holding her close. All three of them are shaking and crying out in pain and fear.

“I offered you the chance for your wolves to meet with mine. You denied that chance while choosing to unlawfully stay on pack lands. I will not let any wolf or shifter stay among my pack without me knowing who they truly are.” He lashes his arm through the air in the direction of the quaking family, and the temperature drops even lower. I tuck my arms inside the short sleeves of Jax’s T-shirt, wrapping them around my bare torso. With a cold snap of his fingers, Xander commands, “Heel.”

They all scramble onto their hands and knees in front of him, bowing and trembling as they await his next command. Again, I’m amazed by his ability to exert so much power over wolves who are not his, and I wonder if it’s the wolf mentality, if they’re genetically wired to obey. Maybe it’s because they have no alpha, leaving them vulnerable. Xander bends down and presses a hand on Phillip’s back, who whimpers at the contact. As in the past, I focus on something else, the ceiling tiles, and start counting them.

Whatever Xander and X-Wolf sense from Colette’s father and his wolf causes a snarling growl to erupt from Xander’s chest, drawing my attention. His hand on Phillip’s back takes hold of his sweater-vest, and he yanks the sniveling, thin man to half-standing before hurling him to the side. With a loud thump, Mr. Devereaux’s shoulder collides with the cinder-block wall. That thump is quickly accompanied by a crack as his head follows the same path. His shocked expression is replaced by slackened, unconscious features and his body folds over itself, slumping to the floor.

As if he didn’t just knock a man out, Xander systematically moves to Bonnie. Within moments of his hand being placed on her shaking shoulder, all that anger and agitation quickly vanishes, and the room’s temperature rises several degrees. Her wailing whimpers soon turn to gulping gasps, and her head vigorously bobs up and down. Staying on the balls of his feet, Xander drops to a low squat in front of her, and his free hand comes around to cup her jaw, easing her head up so she can face him. They stare into each other’s eyes, both pairs glowing, and something softens between them. He cradles one side of her face while his other hand works at delicately removing the barrettes from her hair. The silver jewelry clinks against the tiled floor as he flings them across the room.

My mouth drops open in shock, and my eyes are just as wide, watching him comb his fingers through her hair, breaking her locks free from the constraints of the hairspray. “I see you wolf,” he whispers before letting her go and moving to Colette.

My gaze stays on Bonnie, who is staring at Xander with wide dark eyes and a gaping mouth. As if the act of Xander messing up her hair ripped away the plastic-wrapped image she’d been seemingly forced to portray, a small, almost playful smirk slices across her pink lips. Then she rips off her lace gloves and plunges her cotton-candy-pink-painted fingernails into her hair, fluffing it up and pulling at the strands until it’s wild and free.

The warmth building in my chest quickly drops when my eyes slide to Xander and Colette. The temperature in the room oscillates from hot to cold, like Xander and his wolf are trying to figure out how to connect with Colette and her wolf. Though I’m highly interested, I force my attention skyward, this time counting the small dimples in one of the corner tiles. Xander grunts, and Colette hisses one second, then whimpers the next. I shiver. Xander abruptly pulls back from her and rises to his feet, drawing my attention. His eyes sweep over the Devereauxs and focus on the one who is both conscious and seemingly aware of her surroundings. “Bonnie, you are free to join the Southeast Pack or join our pack,” he states. I bite the insides of my cheeks to keep my jaw from dropping to the floor and swiftly slide my gaze to the back wall and the boring paint color, hoping to mimic the blandness portrayed there.

However, Xander’s low growl drags my gaze back to him. His glowing eyes harden on Phillip’s unmoving form, and it’s then I notice the blood on the off-white floor pooling out from under his head. Xander’s upper lip pulls back in a showing of teeth. “I’m sure you’re well aware of what lies at the core of your mate and what decisions I need to make regarding him.”

Not waiting for Bonnie to acknowledge his statement, he turns to Colette. Her wide dark eyes are locked on Ethan. Ethan’s gaze is empty as he methodically scans the room before settling on our alpha. The menace and disgust etching Xander’s face is erased with the swipe of his hand and replaced with pinched brows and frowning lips. Keeping his eyes on Colette, he addresses her mother. “As for your daughter, I’m unsure. If you left here to join the Southeast Pack with a written agreement that neither you nor your daughter would ever come to my lands again, I could let her leave with you. As she is now, I can’t let her stay here, not without certain conditions. And even then, I’m unsure.”

“What...” Colette’s mother starts, her dark eyes warily flicking between her daughter and Xander. Clearing her throat, her brows knit, and she nibbles on the inside of her lip, weakly asking, “What conditions would need to be met if we choose to stay here?”

“Tonight, she will be incapacitated,” Xander replies in a level voice, offering no room for rebuttal. His inner conflict is evident in the twisting of his lips when he drops his gaze to Colette, who’s still staring at Ethan. I never thought Amber’s salaciously frenzied leering of Jax would be the lesser of two stares, but Colette may have her beat. It’s not the feral desire churning in her eyes as she stares at Ethan but the note of reverence in her gaze that is truly unsettling. It’s as if he’s a deity, her personal savior, and through continued devotion he will protect her from all the evil in this world while also bringing her to the heavenly heights of pleasure.

Xander’s jaw tics, and he closes his eyes, taking several deep breaths through his nostrils before opening his eyes again. In a slow, deliberate voice, as if he’s choosing each word carefully, he says, “Tonight she will be housed in one of the safe rooms at the pack hospital for the newly shifted, where our elders and healers will be able to assess her more thoroughly tomorrow. That is all I can offer at this time.”

Colette’s mother’s gaze drifts to her mate still bleeding out on the floor. “I...” She falters and ruffles her fingers through her wild hair. “The Southeast Pack was my”—her lips twist into a grimacing sneer— “mate’s choice. His connections. His family. They’re not a pack I wish to be part of.”

“Then you know what must happen,” Xander states.

“I do,” she relents while lifting her chin. “If there’s a chance for her, then we should take it.”

“So be it,” Xander agrees and half turns to face Jax. “Have White prepare Colette for transfer to the pack hospital, and treated as an unpredictable new shifter. Cuffed and drugged.” Jax nods, and Xander’s eyes fall to Bonnie before returning to Jax. “Bonnie will stay at the station under lock and guard until either you, Ethan, or I give the command to release her. Ensure she has food, water, and is able to relieve herself properly.” Jax nods again.

Xander then steps over to Phillip and crouches down, adjusting the unconscious man to a supine position. With quick movements, he rips Mr. Devereaux’s bow tie off, and then using both hands, he tears the sweater-vest down the front, popping the buttons off the dress shirt underneath, exposing a thin, pale chest that’s not only cleanly shaven but glistening like it’s well moisturized. The real eye-catcher though? The shine from the two thick-gauged golden nipple rings with an equally thick golden chain linking them together. What I want to do is yell out, Holy pierced titties! or something along those lines, but none of my mates are showing any reaction to the bejeweled nips of Colette’s father. In fact, the only one to react is his mate, who whips her head around in the opposite direction, her face scrunched up in pain.

Without touching the adornments , Xander presses a hand firmly down on Phillip’s chest and closes his eyes. Within seconds, the air in the room seems to become charged, and the hairs on my arms, arms that are no longer tucked inside Jax’s T-shirt, not only stand at attention but feel like they’re being pulled to Xander. He deeply inhales, rounding his back and pressing his ribs against his flannel as if he’s physically expanding to accommodate the power he’s drawing into himself. My eyes trail down to his hand on Phillip’s chest, where a faint light begins to shine. It glows brighter and brighter, and I can’t look away. A thrumming whooshes through my ears, and my body buzzes. As if I’m a fish on a line, being reeled in by Xander’s power, my spine arches, and my feet float across the tiles.

A strong arm comes down like a barrier gate of a train track. I bump into it, and it doesn’t give. Blinking several times, I look up and find Ethan gazing down at me with a crease between his brows. My cheeks flush with embarrassment like either I should’ve known better or should not have been taken under the energy so easily. One corner of his mouth ticks up into a smirk, and he brushes his hand over my head before clasping the back of my neck. My lips part, and he bends over, taking them in a sweet, endearing kiss. I lean into it, into him. Groaning, he sucks my bottom lip into his mouth, dragging out the flesh and our kiss, until he reluctantly releases.

Our gazes stay on each other’s, and my seemingly pliant attention gets pulled into the dark, swirling galaxies of my love’s eyes. The hypnotizing spell is broken by rays of light flashing across Ethan’s face, and I turn toward it. Light strobes in and out from under Xander’s hand and, with it, heat—enough heat to ripple the air around Xander’s hand on Mr. Devereaux’s sweaty, red chest. His ribs seem to compress and bend under the press of Xander’s palm as he commands, “Shift, wolf.”

A crack like that of the whip resounds in the room, and all that heat and light gets sucked into a yowling Devereaux. The bare skin of his chest sprouts fur from every pore in a smooth wave. His hands curl and compress into paws. What was left of his once-perfectly-pressed-and-styled clothing tears as the human turns into the wolf.

A hissing growl has me stepping away from Ethan and twisting my head around. I meet Colette’s eyes, no longer staring at Ethan with a reverent-like intensity. Instead, they are glowing and glowering at me like I’m Judas to her Jesus.

Nothing is as valuable a teacher as experience, and I’ve been getting tons of experience in life-threatening situations lately. Totally schooled in it. I no longer freeze. Instead, my lips press into a firm line of determination, and my eyes narrow in on my enemy.

With a howling roar, she launches herself at me. The receding light coming from what Xander’s doing blinds me to the details, but I hear the ripping of cloth, and I squat down low enough to dodge her initial attack. When a shadow breaks over my head, I press through my feet. Using all my exhausted body has to give, I thrust my shoulder into her gut and grip the underside of her hips with my hands. The feeling of torn fabric and fur under my fingers confirms my suspicions and my need to put distance between myself and what is sure to be long claws and sharp teeth. Bending my knees and bracing my core, I suck down a steadying breath, then with a roar of rage and the strength of an Olympic rugby player, I lift the wolf above my head, tossing her behind me.

The resounding thump of her body coming down on the desk has me spinning on my heels. My hands curl into fists at my sides, watching the small black wolf slide off the wooden desk and scramble her way onto all fours to face me once more. Frustrated anger mixes with exhaustion, and I feel myself, my fox, give into the power within us. Too tired to think about the consequences and too pissed off to care. I hear the flip of the switch letting the power rise and giving it free rein.

Heat blisters its way up my spine and over my scalp. My eye sockets feel like they’re being filled with boiling magma, glowing so brightly I can see the reflection of the green light shining on the tiled floor. Inhaling a deep breath adds more oxygen to the fire, and the lump in my throat from earlier feels like a brickette of coal about to combust into flames. Crouching down over Colette’s wolf, I set my scathing glare on her, and a seething voice that is not my own or my fox’s, commands “HEEL, WOLF.”

Her wolf snarls and whimpers while flattening to the floor, her muzzle pressed between her forelegs. Her glowing eyes are on me and still slitted in disobedience. More power gets released, jacking up my temperature, causing sweat to stream from my hairline all the way down my torso. Beads of it drop down onto Colette’s wolf, each one hitting with a hiss, and the smell of burned fur tickles my nose. She flinches and writhes. That lump of hot coal in my throat cracks, and my royal power tuts, “No, wolf, you stay. You bow. You obey.” Her eyes close shut, and her body relaxes under the command, becoming completely submissive. “Good girl,” my power praises.

A strong hand lands on my shoulder, and my spine straightens, ready to take on another insolent fool. Only then to hear a deep voice hiss out, “Wilhelmina.” Recognition breaks through the haze, and I blink my dry, burning eyes several times, trying to come back to myself, to retake control.

Soothing energy ripples through my overheated flesh, and Little Fox joins me in the fight for control. The cool hand on my shoulder creeps under my shirt and removes the soaked material before settling on my chest. An arm bands around my slippery waist and pulls my back into his chest.

Little Fox and I continue to try and wrangle our freed power. A yip of pain passes through my lips as my scalding flesh meets the ice of Xander’s, his healing seeming more like an assault than an aide. I shiver and squirm as growls of resistance mix in with my painfilled yips. Tightening his hold, he takes my ear between his teeth and releases several low, harsh barks, each one like a metal wall dropping down and around my power, helping Little Fox and I put it back into its pen. We flip the latch closed, and my ears pop. I fall back into him, no longer resisting. What the fuck was that?

“Shh,” he murmurs through his teeth latched on to my lobe. “That’s right. Release into me, Duchessa,” he praises, sending more frigid energy into my chest, causing goosebumps to bloom along my skin while he trails cooling kisses down my heated neck.

I take several ragged breaths, pushing through the burning in my lungs as ice meets fire. Little Fox does a full-body shake, shedding hot droplets of green energy from her fur. Her bloodshot eyes are drawn and tired as she warily looks back at the switch labeled Royal Override. Yeah, we’re not doing that again. With a flick of her paw, she adds a two-keyed security measure and an additional clear hard-plastic covering before wearily returning to her curled-up position.

Xander continues to lay kisses along my heated skin while trailing his hand up and down my front, working his cooling energy into my roaring flesh. “More,” I rasp. Another body comes around to my front, and I’m lifted into Ethan’s arms, my legs loosely hanging around his waist while my chest is pressed flush with his. Xander moves with me, his arms encompassing both of us.

I vaguely hear a knocking on a door and the beeping of an alarm. Jax mutters some words, and there’s movement going on around us, but most of my existence is held between Ethan and Xander. Feeling Ethan’s power flow through to Xander and then into me, I squeeze my arms around my dark love. “Thank you,” I murmur, pressing my lips into the flesh above his collarbone. “Both,” I moan, kissing and licking.

“We have you, mate,” Ethan affirms rubbing his cheek over my head.

“Always,” Xander adds with a hum.