---

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN 
     
QUINN
“Who was that?” Rowan asks as he turns away from where he had his head buried in the fridge.
“Emery. He called me an asslicker and hung up on me,” I say before setting my phone on the table.
“Do you blame him?” he asks with a playful grin.
“Nope. But it makes me feel better that there’s a doctor with equipment there to help him. Until we can get Dr. Lambridge the resources he needs, we don’t have much here to help. Emery just needs to have some patience and heal up. I mean it’s a little over twelve hours from now that we’ll be there to pick him up, and he’s acting like I’ve told him we weren’t getting him for at least a month. He’ll survive,” I say.
“But will Graham?” Rowan teases.
I grin at him, realizing that I really don’t know. “I think those two are as thick as thieves now. Of all people that I thought Graham would end up with, I never would’ve guessed Emery.”
“But the moment he met him, he had a thing for him,” Rowan says, which is very true. I’d caught on quite quickly to Graham’s new obsession while dealing with Apollo’s pride. “He could barely look away from him and was so flustered whenever Emery ignored him.”
I grin at the thought. “I know. I’m just wondering how Graham broke down that wall Emery had clearly spent a while building between them.”
Rowan seems to think about it for a moment while nodding. “Very good question. Your brother doesn’t seem to be the most… charismatic.”
I snort. “Not so much.”
“He’s practically evil. He tried running me off when I first started coming around and if he didn’t have his hands full with other stuff, I’m not so sure he wouldn’t try it again.”
I pat his shoulder. “Nah, he likes you now,” I assure him, but Rowan looks less than convinced. “I’m going to go check on the pack, but I’ll be back in half an hour.”
“I’ll make you dinner,” Rowan says. “Unless you want me to go with you?”
“Nope. I’m all good,” I say as I step into him and give him a quick kiss before grabbing my coat.
Outside, I head to the security room first where I find Trenton and Enzo sitting behind the computers that are constantly relaying information from the security cameras. Both of the men are busy talking, even though I thought Enzo’s scheduled time was this evening.
“Things going alright?” I ask, in case that’s why Enzo is there.
Trenton leans back in his chair and stretches. “Yep. Haven’t seen a lick of anything. Even our cameras way out yonder are pulling nothing up. No scouts. Nothing.”
Honestly, I can’t believe how lucky we’ve been. I can only hope we continue to stay as lucky. “Good. Enzo, I thought you didn’t work until tonight?” I say.
Enzo looks over at me with a smile. “I don’t. I just stopped by to see if he needed anything. Then we got to talking about sports.”
“Enzo here used to play football in college,” Trenton says.
“That’s awesome,” I say. I know little about sports, despite Graham’s interest in them, but I clearly don’t need to know much more because Trenton takes over.
I leave them to it, after adding very little to the conversation, and continue on my way to the house that’d been partially converted into an infirmary. Just inside at a desk we’d put in there for him, Dr. Lambridge is taking a nap. He’s tasked himself with watching over Ethan, even though I told him to find some people to rotate with. It’s clear he hasn’t yet if snoozing on the hard desk has anything to say about it.
Trying not to disturb him, I creep past and into the room Ethan is being held in. He has a TV in front of him that he’s staring at. He doesn’t acknowledge me when I enter, but I take a seat anyway.
Overall, he looks fine, he just doesn’t act it.
“How are you doing, Ethan?” I ask and he flinches, which is more reaction than I got out of him when he first showed up, but he still doesn’t bother looking at me. When the door swings open, I’m surprised to see Gina.
“Hey,” she says with a smile as Dr. Lambridge follows her. “I didn’t know you were stopping by.”
“Just making my rounds while Rowan cooks dinner,” I say. “You?”
“We’re trying to make him feel more comfortable with us in the hopes we can get a bit of blood for some testing,” Gina says. “If I could just get some more information on what was done to him, I might be able to help him, but right now, seeing anyone coming at him with a needle stresses him out and we don’t want him too stressed. So we’ve just been spending time in the room with him.”
“Let me know if you need anything,” I say. “It might help if Addie came in with you two, since she’s closest to him.”
She nods. “Thanks. That would be nice.”
After a few minutes, I continue on my rounds before making it back to my house. I walk inside and am immediately greeted by Talon who seems happy to have me home even though I’d only been gone a few minutes. I rub his ears and head toward the oddly silent kitchen. The chicken is sizzling on the stove to the point where it looks like if it sizzles much longer it’s going to become blackened.
“Rowan?” I ask as I grab the tongs and use them to pick up the chicken to check.
That side is definitely done. I flip them before lowering the heat since I have no idea where Rowan is.
“Rowan?”
Cleo meows from her sunning spot in the window.
“Have you seen Rowan?” I ask, as if she could answer. She stretches in response before closing her eyes. “What about you?” Talon wags his tail, happy to have been included in the animal interrogation.
That’s when I see a sock… weird.
I follow it to the hallway where I see another sock and farther down is a shirt.
Huh…
I head over to the back door that’s wide open, doorknob showing clear signs of having been gnawed on. Outside, I look around as Talon bounces by my side. “Rowan?”
Silence.
“Rowan?”
I hear leaves rustling above me and slowly look up. There, hanging from a branch, is my one true love. The issue is that the snow leopard doesn’t really seem to be hanging on to anything… no… what’s keeping him suspended in the air is the pants he’s wearing, which appear to be hooked on something.
“Rowan, are you stuck?” I ask. It’s now apparent he can’t pretend to be invisible with me staring right at him.
“No.”
“I can clearly see you’re stuck.”
“You clearly can’t see well because I’m perfectly fine,” he says, trying to twist this way and that as I realize it’s his belt that’s hooked over a branch.
“When you shifted did you forget to take your pants off, then climb a tree, and when you went to jump down, your pants got stuck?” I ask, feeling pretty confident that I got the order of events correct.
Rowan is silent for a long moment. “I swear to god, if you laugh.”
I bite my lip as I shake my head as quickly as I can. “Of course not. I could never just laugh while you’re hanging around.”
He hisses at me, clearly not finding my joke hilarious. “I did this on purpose.”
“Of course you did. Why wouldn’t you?”
He swings around a bit before catching a branch with his paw. The issue is that no matter how much he pulls, he’s not getting unhooked.
“Do you need help?”
“Nope. This is all going as planned.”
“What made you climb the tree?”
He seems to be taking a moment to think about this. “I was saving a kitten that got stuck up here.”
“And was that kitten actually a squirrel?”
Silence.
“It was a squirrel, wasn’t it?”
“No, it was a kitten. A defenseless one that I was saving.”
“Did you eat the defenseless kitten, then? Because I don’t see any kittens.”
“It ran away. Its mom retrieved it. Or dad. I’m not sexist.”
“No, no, you’re definitely not. I’m super glad you could save that kitten,” I say.
“Me too,” he says as he looks around uncertainly.
“Alright. So… you need help then?”
“Nope. I’m all good,” he says as he flails this way and that for a bit before hanging defeated.
I jump up and catch the first limb of the tree, not at all as skilled at tree climbing as he is.
“I’m not sure why you’re coming up here. I don’t need any help.”
“Maybe I missed you so much I can’t stand to be apart any longer, and if I have to climb the tree to get close, then so be it?”
He lets out a grumbly noise. “I would shift, but if I did, I probably wouldn’t bounce as well when I hit the ground.”
“Probably not. Just hang tight. Get it? Just hang in there.” I chuckle, pleased with my own jokes as Rowan’s tail flicks.
“I should have just let myself fall.”
“That’s no fun.”
“Anything to get away from these godawful jokes.”
I snicker, rather pleased with myself as I climb up a little higher. “You’re acting like I put you up there,” I say, finally reaching the branch he’s stuck on. I have to shimmy my way down it to reach the spot where he’s trapped.
Not quite sure what I’m doing, I hook under his chest to pull him up. Honestly, I’m not too worried about dropping him—I’ve seen him willingly jump down farther than this before—so as long as I hold his weight up, I can pull the belt off the branch and let him fall. Finally free, he lands on the branch below, flicks the pants the rest of the way off and jumps down to the ground still in his underwear.
I’m far too pleased as I watch him dart into the house. When I drop down to the ground, Talon curiously comes up to me. “Your dad is quite the strange one,” I say.
“Am not,” Rowan yells from inside the house, clearly back in his human form.
When I head in, I find him in the kitchen, fully clothed and working on supper like he’d never had a single distraction and had been there the whole time.
He even smiles at me like I just arrived. “Hey, hon. When’d you get home?” he asks, apparently trying to play this off like none of that tree nonsense happened.
“Oh, a few minutes ago. The funniest thing happened on my way home, though. There was a cat in the tree wearing pants. I saw it and I was like, ‘You gotta be kitten me right meow.’”
Rowan doesn’t even spare a sliver of his attention to look at me. It’s like I don’t even exist as he dishes up one plate and heads over to the table to eat alone. I have been mercilessly forgotten. “Yum. I sure love eating alone.”
I laugh as I fill my plate and hurry over. “I’m sorry. I’ll stop laughing at you. It was just pretty cute, and I’m disappointed I didn’t get a picture.”
“I would have torn the tree down if you had whipped out that camera,” he says, rather confident when he couldn’t even unhook his pants.
“I wouldn’t do that to you,” I say as if my camera roll isn’t full of all the ridiculous things he does.
Knowing me far too well, he shakes his head as he grins. “I just can’t win. But it makes you happy, so I’m fine dealing with the torture.”
“Good. I like torturing you. This is very good. Thanks for making supper.”
“Thanks for flipping it before it burnt to a crisp.”
I point my fork at him. “Teamwork. You do all the cooking, I flip it once, and suddenly it looks like I had a role in supper.”
He smiles at me and I love that the smile reaches his whole face. “Yes, teamwork. You know my love for you is strong when I make it through all of your harassment and still can only think how much I love you.”
I smile back at him. “I love you too. And it is massively strong, just like that branch you were stuck on.”
While the rest of the dinner is uneventful, I love every moment of the normalcy of it. Lately everything has been so chaotic, and I’ve had to fixate so much on my pack as a whole, that it’s nice just having a night for us. A night where I can be with my mate and do something so fully domestic that it makes me finally feel like things are going to be alright.
When the night winds down and we end up in bed together, I roll onto my side. We’d talked a little about his father, but he still hasn’t fully opened up to me, so I hold my hand out to him. Rowan slides his fingers between mine and smiles. “Yeah?”
“How are you doing?” I ask, honestly concerned.
“I am… humiliated… embarrassed… horrified.”
Now I’m confused. “By… what?”
“That I didn’t catch that squirrel for you,” he says. “It was going to be dessert.”
“You ass,” I say with a grin. “You know what I’m talking about.”
“I do,” he says, clearly proud of himself. “Honestly… I mean it was tough finding out. But more than anything… I feel awful for the shifters who suffered by my father’s hand. That people like Emery had to go through the things they did. I feel awful that Brennan was tortured the way he was and deceived because his own father passed him off to Mercer. But… I think I’ve detached myself so much from my father that this tiny, awful part of me feels relief. Like… don’t… don’t judge me, but a part of me was still slightly hung up on him being my father. So then knowing this, it’s almost like I now have the biggest excuse to hate him. Which is ridiculous, right? I had plenty of excuses before. I don’t know. That’s stupid, right?”
I run my free hand up his arm. I can only imagine all the emotions he’s going through. “No, it’s not stupid. Rowan, you have a lot of shit you have to deal with, and no part of it is stupid. I’m so sorry you’re dealing with this.”
“Thanks,” he says as he leans forward and gives me a kiss. “I don’t know if you understand how much you’ve done to help me get through this.”
“Same,” I say.
As we lie in each other’s arms, I feel like I’m at ease for once. Like things might be turning around for the better. Graham and Emery are back and safe. Rowan is by my side. Deke is going to help us. Things will be good.
OceanofPDF.com

CHAPTER NINETEEN 
     
EMERY
I’m up again.
It’s not rare for me to be unable to sleep, but I know it’s made worse by being in this place. Careful not to wake Graham, I slip out of the bed and creep over to the door. I’m still wearing Graham’s hat, honestly surprised he hasn’t made me take it off even though it’s clear it’s now mine.
I slip on some shoes that were given to us earlier, then step into the hall. When I hear no one, I hurry past the corner to Brennan’s door and hammer on it again.
“Brennan, you fucking asshole, open the door,” I growl as I beat against it some more.
The thing is… I hear nothing inside. I never do. So is he not even here? And if he isn’t, where is he? Did he already run? Did he go back to Stone?
Why the hell would he just run off?
I turn around and step past the corner when I hear someone in the hallway I was headed toward. Before they can see me, I slip back. Just peeking, I see there are three people standing outside the door of the room I was supposed to be staying in before I claimed Graham’s room as my own.
What the fuck do they want with me? And why at this time of the morning?
Quickly, I pull my head back and listen, but they just knock again. “Is he even in there?”
“I’m not sure. Let me unlock the door.”
I didn’t lock it, so I’m sure they’ll see that when they go to open it. But it just goes to show that there was no sense in even locking the doors when it’s clear they can just unlock them.
The only way back to Graham is past them, so I decide that if I can slip out the window of one of the rooms, I can creep around to his window and let myself in. Quickly, I start backing toward Brennan’s room when I hear one of them say, “He’s not in here—where the hell did he go?”
“We might have the wrong room. I’ll search the others,” someone says as I hear them heading toward me. I start looking for an open door, then I realize I never checked Brennan’s. Quickly, I turn the handle, surprised to see it’s unlocked since it was locked when Rowan had tried getting in. I shut the door behind me and lock it, even though it’s clear they have keys to the room.
“Brennan?” I whisper as I look around the room. There’s enough light from the moon creeping in to see that this room isn’t as tidy as mine had been. The bed has been shoved at an angle and the lamp is lying on the ground in multiple pieces. Either Brennan had a temper tantrum and started breaking shit or there was some kind of scuffle in here.
I rush over to the window and push up on it, only to realize that it won’t budge. The locks are set to open, but it still won’t move no matter how much I tug on it.
My anxiety hits me hard as I realize I’m stuck in this tiny room without Graham. How fucking stupid was it of me to leave without him? I just wanted to talk to Brennan. I just… thought I could get answers about Stone or why this happened. I don’t know why I even bothered. It wouldn’t change the past. How stupid can I be?
Footsteps heading down the hall hit me as I rush for the bathroom, the only place I can think to go. I climb into the bathtub because there’s absolutely nowhere else to flee to. It’s not like there are any places to hide in this hell.
When I hear the doorknob jiggle, my blood runs cold. I could shift and attack them but there’s a huge part of me trying to remind myself that I don’t know if they’re actually doing something wrong. They honestly could be looking for me for some other reason, but I just can’t bring myself to trust them. Once I get back to Graham, he’s going to tell me I’m being foolish.
Yes, that’s what he’s going to say.
This room seems so ridiculously small without him in there and being tucked back in the darkness doesn’t help. I step up onto the edge of the tub and press myself against the curtain while using the wall to steady me. If he looks into the tub, it’s not going to be difficult to find me.
The door creaks open and I hold my breath as I cling desperately onto the side, willing my body to stay as still as it possibly can.
It’s hard when the room is closing in on me and I feel like I can’t breathe.
No, no. I need to stay focused. I need to keep calm.
Thoughts of Graham fill my mind. He generally calms me down, even if I’d never admit it to him. Light spills in from the main room before I see a beam from a flashlight flicker into the tub as the person walks in. I keep myself as still as I can, knowing that even the slightest movement will make the curtain flutter.
I see his hand grab onto the edge of the curtain as I prepare myself for what I’ll do. Attack? Or give in?
“Got anything, Rob?” someone farther back says.
“Nothing,” the man replies as he lets go of the curtain and turns around. I listen to him walk from the room, but still, I don’t move. I can hear them moving around as they continue down the hall, checking rooms. Are the other shifters already gone? Is that why there are so many empty rooms? If they were already allowed to leave then why the hell are we still here?
After what feels like an hour, I slip out of the room, listening carefully before hurrying down the hallway to Graham’s room. I yank open the door and rush for his bed…
Only to find it empty.
“Graham?” I ask in a panic.
I turn around and run for the bathroom. “Graham?”
Silence.
Did he leave me?
Did he wake to find me gone and leave to search for me? Did they take him?
Panic fills me as I rush for the window and quickly tug on it, but it won’t open. I need out. I have to get out. I need to get away.
I grab the metal rod of the lamp and swing it hard at the window, but the lamp immediately bounces off. Quickly, I climb onto the bed and knock on the window, listening to it as I realize it’s not glass at all. No… it’s reinforced, like the ones Stone used to use. Do they have a way to remotely lock them? Or is this window stuck closed? That seems unlikely since I just went through it not long ago.
There’s no fucking way out of this room beyond the door and who knows what lies out there. Could Graham be out there? Could he be wandering around looking for me only to tell me my worries are childish?
No…
Something’s not right. And I’m all alone.
Again.
OceanofPDF.com

CHAPTER TWENTY 
     
QUINN
The shrill alarm sounding from my phone wakes me immediately. I’m up and out of bed in an instant, grabbing for pants as Rowan turns on a light.
“What’s going on?”
“The security alarm has been set off. Enzo must have done it,” I say, since I know he’s on duty.
The alert is set to send out to the phones of all of the villagers in the case of a full-on emergency. Otherwise, Enzo or Trenton or whoever is in charge of security at that point messages me directly. Since this one isn’t a message directly to me, I know something bad is going on.
So this is concerning.
I don’t bother with a shirt in case I have to toss it off to shift. Instead, I grab my coat as I stuff my feet in my shoes. Rowan’s right behind me as I send a call to Enzo, trying to figure out the level of threat or what I’m even up against. It’s weird he hasn’t called or messaged me directly. Is something going on so he can’t?
Thankfully, we’ve run through this as a drill multiple times, so my pack knows they are to remain in their homes behind locked doors until further notice. But why haven’t I heard anything else from Enzo or someone else on security?
“What’s going on?” Rowan asks.
“I don’t know…” I say, not sure where I’m going or what I’m doing.
I decide to head toward the security room for starters, since whoever hit the alert is probably in there. The pack members who are part of the security team but not in the security room are wandering around, looking uncertain. When they see me, they spread out to make sure no one slips into the village while we’re trying to figure out what’s happening.
I send another call to Enzo’s phone, in case he can manage to pick up. “Enzo’s not—”
I still as I hear the sound of Enzo’s phone ringing in the distance. It’s dark out, but not too dark to see as I creep forward, looking for the location of the call. Rowan is right by my side as I follow the sound while the others hang back, knowing their job is to keep anyone from entering the village. As I reach the town hall, I can see that the door is hanging open, but what I notice more than anything is the blood sprayed across the ground.
“Fuck, get the security team out here now,” I say as I hand Rowan my phone. I pull my jacket off and toss it in the grass as I step around the side of the building, only to see a body lying on the ground about two feet before the building ends.
The ringing of Enzo’s phone is coming from the body. It stops a moment before I see a monster slip around the edge of the building and set a massive paw on his chest before dragging the person out of view. I rush forward but Rowan grabs me.
“Quinn, no. Wait for help,” he urges, but I can’t. I know it’s foolish to rush into a fight, but I can’t just leave one of my pack members.
“What if he’s still alive?” I ask.
I throw off the rest of my clothes then shift and rush forward, the smell of blood thick as Rowan yells after me. When I step around the building, I see Enzo’s body lying on the ground, blood pooling out around him as the mutated shifter hovers above him.
Seeing me, he snarls and swipes out as he steps down on Enzo’s chest, like he’s claiming the body as his own. He snarls again as Rowan rushes up beside me as a snow leopard.
“Fuck,” he says. “Quinn, you can’t help him. Come on, please.”
But the shifter’s attention turns away from us. He seems to be fixated on something other than us as he moves toward a large old maple tree. His gaze shifts up as I slowly move in close to see if anything can be done for Enzo.
The smell of blood is thickening as I keep a close eye on the shifter, not able to make a single mistake. That’s when I realize there’s something up in the tree he’s gunning for.
“Leave,” I growl at the shifter as I finally realize what has his attention. It’s a lion shifter cowering down on a branch. It must be Harper, she’s the only lion shifter in the pack, but why is she out here alone? And what does the monster want with Harper?
I hear a noise behind me and turn, but relief fills me as I realize it’s Trenton and Logan and not far behind them are others coming to help.
“Do you want me to shoot it?” Logan asks.
“I think it’s Ethan,” Rowan says.
Startled, I look at him before shifting my attention to the monster. He’s coated in blood from Enzo’s body and completely fixated on the lioness as he leaps up. When he realizes he can’t climb that high, he turns his head toward us.
“Ethan, shift back,” I command.
He spins on his haunches and rushes back for us as I give Logan a nod. I want to tell him to try not to kill him, but I’m not sure Ethan’s going to stop if he doesn’t.
Sudden movement pulls my attention forward as I realize it’s Addie, Trenton’s sister, rushing onto the scene in her bear form. She and Ethan had been close before his disappearance, and if anyone can get him to listen it’d be her.
“Ethan, please!” Addie says and Ethan turns to her.
For a moment, I think he’s reacting to her and is going to listen… and then he lunges at her. He grabs her by the throat, driving her to the ground. Thankfully, as a brown bear, she’s large but he still shoves her down and with the hold he has on her throat, he could easily kill her.
I lunge in, grabbing his neck to try to get him to release her. She jerks back and I’m afraid he’s going tear her throat out. Trenton, in a panic, charges in to help his sister. With both of us on Ethan, he releases Addie. Rowan yanks her back out of the attack but Ethan rushes after her.
Logan’s first shot hits Ethan’s chest but it doesn’t even make Ethan hesitate. It’s like he didn’t even notice it. Logan gets two more shots out but Ethan’s not slowing down; he’s apparently determined to kill anyone he can get ahold of. Logan’s bullets are doing nothing, and it’s almost as if Ethan’s immune to pain. His coat is already coated in blood from the wounds inflicted on him, but he shows no signs of stopping.
I rush toward him, having no intention of letting him get near the others, as Trenton lets out a roar and charges forward. He barrels into Ethan, tearing him to the ground, but Ethan reacts quickly. He shows absolutely no hesitation as he flips around and sinks his fangs into Trenton’s side. He tears him to the ground with ease as I rush in and grab onto Ethan.
He’s fast. Faster than Raylon. Hell, I don’t even know if Emery is this fast. I sink my fangs into the back of his neck, but I know if a large bear can’t keep him down, I’m not going to have much luck.
“Ethan, submit to me. We want to help you. We don’t want to kill you.”
He lets out a growl and spins hard as I draw myself back, pulling him off balance. Trenton tries to get back in but a swipe of Ethan’s claws tears into his side. The issue is not that Ethan’s a better fighter than us. It’s that without brutally killing him, I’m afraid we’re not going to get him to stop. No matter what we do, he won’t stop fighting. No bite, shot, or scratch even slows him down.
Rowan, unable to stay out of a fight I’m involved in, rushes to help but he’s way better with a gun than his claws so the moment Ethan turns on him, anger fills me. I grab him by the throat and tear him down as Logan rushes forward and at point-blank range shoots him in the chest. It was about the only way he could keep from shooting one of us if Ethan moved.
Still, he won’t stay down. He just keeps struggling and fighting, twisting and turning. Even as his body begins to weaken, he just won’t cease. If he’d just stop, there’s a possibility we could save him, but not like this.
When he starts to draw still in my arms, I pull back, hoping he’ll stop fighting and give in so we can help him. But he lunges at me and swipes my side, cutting right through my fur.
“Get back from him. See if he’ll stay down,” I say as I watch Ethan sink down. But every time, instead of giving in, he keeps pushing himself, keeps coming after us, though at least we can stay out of his path with him slowed to this point. “Ethan, you’re going to kill yourself if you don’t stop. Just stop.”
He refuses and when he goes down the next time, I’m positive he’s not getting back up.
“Katalina?” Harper says from behind me, and I’m startled as I realize that it’s not Harper in the tree but Katalina. Is that why Ethan attacked them? But how would he even know she’s here?
Katalina hesitantly jumps from the tree as the realization hits me that Ethan had to have made it out of the infirmary to get out here and attack Enzo. Ethan’s eyes are open, unblinking, body unmoving, and it pains me that we have killed one of our own, but I need to keep anyone else from dying tonight.
Addie shifts back and tries to rush for Ethan but Trenton holds her back. “No! No, no…” A sob escapes her and I feel awful about what’s happened, but blood is running down her torn throat. He would have killed her too if we hadn’t stopped him.
I tear my eyes away from her sobbing form as pain fills me, and instead look to Rowan. “Keep Katalina from leaving, I have to check on Dr. Lambridge,” I say before bolting.
I rush back with Ari by my side as I reach the house with the door hanging open. Just inside, there’s blood smeared across the floor, already painting a macabre tale.
I shift quickly and look around. “Doctor?”
I hit the lights and see the doctor had pulled himself into the corner where he sits slumped down, eyes closed.
No, no, no.
“Is he dead?” Ari asks from behind me.
I rush over and check for a pulse. For a moment, I feel nothing. I move my hand around, trying to get a better spot, before I can feel the thumping of his heart.
“Ari, get Gina. She’s the closest we have to a doctor and we need to get him to the hospital.”
Ari nods and runs off as I pull open Dr. Lambridge’s shirt. His entire side is torn open and as I try to check the damage, a groan escapes him.
“It’s okay, it’s going to be okay,” I tell him.
Quickly, I drop his shirt and look for something to slow the bleeding.
“Ethan,” he whispers.
“Yes, we… we stopped him.”
“He heard the alarm go off and just… lost his mind,” he says. “Attacked me.”
Did the alarm trigger it? So that means Enzo set off the alarm before this. It must have been because of Katalina. Maybe he saw her and thought it meant Stone and Mercer’s shifters were here?
He falls silent and I beg that he’s not losing too much blood. By the time Gina and Ari return, I’m on a call with a 911 operator in the hopes help can reach us shortly. She doesn’t want me to move him but is also aware it’s a thirty-minute drive to the nearest hospital with no clear area for Life Flight in this thick forest, so I tell her we’re going to meet them halfway.
Gina secures the wound as best she can before Logan picks him up and puts him in the back of the car where I see Trenton trying to drag Addie over to us.
“No! Stop!” she screams as she fights against him. “I can’t leave him.”
“You’re hurt, Addie. There’s nothing more you can do.”
“It’s my fault!” she says with a sob, and I ache just knowing what this has done to my pack. Knowing that I let one of my members be taken from me and… this is what happened.
“It’s not. You need to go to the hospital,” Trenton begs.
She shoves and hits and pushes on him before sinking to the ground and covering her face in her hands.
I walk over and kneel in front of her. “Addie, this is… this is the most awful thing that could have happened to this pack, but right now our concern is the wounded. So please, you have to go. Okay?”
She slowly nods and lets her brother guide her into the car but I’m positive it’ll be a while before I can get her cries out of my head.
“Trenton, go with them,” I say since he’s actively bleeding.
“No,” he says. “I’m fine.”
I want to force him to leave, but he looks like he’ll be alright and I’m afraid to send off even more of my good fighters. “Trenton… just… get the bleeding under control or you’re going.”
“We should get you looked at too,” Logan says but I wave him off. My scratches will heal. I have my pack to worry about. Clearly knowing me well enough to accept how stubborn I am, they get prepared to leave. As Trenton watches the car go, I find myself making the solemn walk back to the location we’d fought Ethan.
My eyes are drawn to his body as I walk onto the scene, but I don’t know what I could have done differently. I suppose I never should have let him loose or be alone without a guard. But the thought of keeping him locked up when he was already so broken never crossed my mind. I never imagined something like this would happen.
I kneel next to him. “I’m sorry,” I whisper, not sure what good it does. But two of my pack members died tonight and I can’t stop feeling guilty about it.
When I stand, I find Rowan trying to settle everyone. Trenton is with Enzo’s body, another I didn’t manage to save.
“Trenton, could you find something to cover them with? We’ll… contact Deke… or something to figure out what we’re supposed to do, but I can’t just leave them lying out here like this,” I say.
Trenton nods and hurries off as this overwhelming sense of defeat consumes me. How could I let this happen?
“Quinn?”
My attention is drawn away from the bodies and to Harper who is standing near Katalina. They’re both in their human forms watching me. Katalina looks shaken up but the moment she sees that Harper has my attention, she rushes for me.
“Q-Quinn, I know you want nothing to do with me since I went with the others, but I have to talk to you. There’s been so much chaos, I managed to get away from them to tell you what’s going on. As soon as I could I drove here in the hope of warning you. Deke, the man who was helping us… Stone said he was pulled in by this law enforcement group that deals with federal emergencies. He acted like they were implementing an emergency elimination of all shifters who were involved in Stone and Mercer’s research,” she says.
“What?” I ask, unsure of what she’s saying.
“Stone said that they have Raylon and Diego and the others, and that they’re going to kill them… They’ve been ordered to euthanize anyone whose DNA has been tampered with.”
Her words sink in as I mull them over for a moment. “No… they’re helping us.”
Katalina shakes her head, looking absolutely desperate. “I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t know what’s going on, but they’re all going to die if we don’t do something.”
Emery and Graham and Brennan are there. I can’t lose them. Not when I finally have Emery and Graham back. And they’re safe… they’re safe. Why would I even trust Katalina after she betrayed us?
“They wouldn’t. That’s just…” Rowan falls silent before turning to me. “She could be lying to get us away from here so Stone can parade in but if she’s not… my brother and Emery.”
“Emery’s with them?” Katalina says as a look of horror crosses her face. “Why’s Emery with them?”
“How do we know we can trust her?” Rowan asks.
Katalina bows her head. “I know… I know you have no reason to trust me. But I had a reason I had to go. You have to understand… they told me they could fix my brother.”
“I thought your brother was dead?” Harper asks.
Katalina takes a deep breath. “I… I have a lot to explain. But… just… If Emery is there, you need to go get him now.”
I honestly don’t know what to do. One of my main members of my security team is down. Katalina, who left us, who betrayed us, wants to get us two hours away from here. It could be a ruse to leave my pack alone and without their alpha.
But…
Trenton walks up and sets a hand on my shoulder. I’m glad to see he’s no longer bleeding. “We’re fine,” he says. “Even if she’s lying to you and trying to set you up, we’re fine here. There are over a hundred of us. We can stand strong for our alpha while he’s gone.”
“I’m not…” Katalina looks hurt, but there’s no way she can blame us for struggling to trust her. “Please, I wouldn’t do that to you. I might have left you, I might have lied to keep you guys quiet, but I wouldn’t send you off to die or to make the pack suffer.”
Harper’s lips are drawn in a straight line, but she turns to look at me. “It might not be much coming from me, but I know she wouldn’t do that.”
“We could call Deke,” Kaiya says as she walks up.
“But if we call Deke and Katalina is telling the truth, he’d turn us away. Whereas if we just show up, we can get them out,” Rowan says, clearly anxious over his brother. I don’t blame him, my own is still there, and there’s no fucking way he’d sit quietly and let someone take Emery from him. “We could try calling and asking for Graham.”
I nod, deciding we’ll do that on the way there. “Okay. Rowan and I are going. Trenton and Kaiya, I need you two on security. Keep everyone calm and safe, and call me immediately if anything happens.”
“Will do,” Trenton says as I realize just how much he’s grown these past few months. How much all of my pack has had to grow. And while I hate that they were thrown into it, I feel like they’ve done a phenomenal job of stepping up and moving forward.
“Thank you,” I say as I pat his shoulder before turning to Rowan. “Let’s go.”
“I’ll go with you,” Harper says.
“Me… too?” Katalina asks, seeming hesitant. She’s looking at Harper, but Harper refuses to meet her eyes.
“Fine. You’re going to explain everything and if I find out you’re lying, you’re going to regret it more than you’ll ever know. Let’s go.”
Rowan rushes off, and when he returns, he has a small bag. I don’t bother asking what’s in it as we get in the car and Rowan starts it and begins driving. I call Deke, in the hope I can make up some reason I need to talk to Graham, but he never answers.
After the third try, Rowan hands me the bag he’d brought. “Inside is a medical kit. Can you get yourself cleaned up or maybe Harper can help?”
“I’m good,” I say as the two women sit in the back seat in silence. “Katalina, what the hell happened with Ethan and… Enzo and everything?”
She looks a bit shaky as she clears her throat. “I-I’m guessing Enzo saw me enter the village on the security camera. I don’t know if the alarm set Ethan off or what, but as Enzo was coming out of the building, I walked toward him when I heard a noise. Enzo told me to get back and I rushed off as it looked like Ethan was heading toward me. I climbed the tree to get away. I never… I never meant to cause any of that. I didn’t know…”
“I know. Ethan was unstable. I guess we should have done things differently, but it’s too late now,” I say, that sinking feeling returning to me. “But I want to hear everything, Katalina.”
When I look back at her, I see her nodding. “Okay… when I was younger, I had two brothers and we did our best to pretend we were human. We were all we had, and we knew that if we were to survive, we had to be like everyone else. This was before I joined the pride. I was young when one night my brothers went out, and I guess someone found out what they were and attacked them. They beat my one brother to death and left the other for dead. My second brother… he was in a coma for months. They never thought he’d wake up and it was at that point I was guided into the pride.” She takes a deep breath, and I can tell it’s hard for her to talk about it.
“When he finally did wake up, he couldn’t remember anything. Couldn’t talk. He was like a husk, just moving and functioning but never really there. It was so hard to face him, knowing what happened to him, knowing that my brother would never really be my brother again because of fucking humans… It killed me…”
She’s silent for a moment before starting again. “Mercer… Mercer knew that. He played into my insecurities. He played into my hopes that my brother could be my brother again. He told me he could fix him, that he could save him from being constantly stuck in his own mind. And… I wanted to believe it. I felt fucking guilty over what happened to my brothers because I… I was the reason they were out that night. I was sick and they wanted to get me something. And instead… I lost both of them. So I thought… if Mercer can do all this other crazy fucked-up shit, why can’t he save my brother?”
“Why didn’t you tell me that?” Harper asks.
“Because… I just… a part of me knew it was fucking stupid, and I knew if you showed me any reasoning behind it, I’d… I’d be forced to see how stupid it was. And I was still beating myself up over my brother’s death. Another part of me was afraid that if I didn’t play the asshole, if I told you the truth, you’d go with me. And I wanted you as far from Mercer as you could be. So I knew if I was a bitch, you wouldn’t come. And even though I wanted you to, I begged you to, it was in a moment of selfishness. It was… I’m sorry. I thought that once Mercer fixed my brother, I’d come crawling back to you and beg you to forgive me. I’d show you my fixed brother and you’d understand it all and let me back. It took me longer to get away than I thought. But when they started to shift facilities there was so much chaos, I managed to get away.”
I can see Harper slowly nodding in the rearview mirror. “I’m not… I’m not sure I can forgive you right now when you could have just… talked to me.”
Katalina nods, looking sad but like she understands.
More than anything, I want Katalina to be wrong about this. I want her to be confused about what’s happening.
But a part of me knows that this is why they told me Emery needed to stay for medical attention and to not give in when he asked to come home.