Chapter 2

I don’t have time to react. One second he’s there, the next he's gone. I hear growling and snarling a few feet away. I have to do something, but I’m frozen with fear.

What can I do? I don’t have a wolf to protect me. I need to run.

Before I can roll over, someone else yanks me out of the truck bed by my arm. I hit the ground hard with a startled yelp.

I’ve had enough junior warrior training to know if I can’t run, I need to defend myself until help arrives. I jump up as quickly as I can. As soon as my feet touch the ground, I throw a combo of punches, combined with a knee kick, into a monster’s bloody ribs.

The thing expertly blocks every shot. It’s as if it already knew I’d come out swinging, but it doesn’t hit back. Why isn’t it hitting me back?

“Leni, what the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Familiar eyes shine through the dripping blood with a snarl.

The monster grabs my wrist before I can pull back from a hard strike to its neck, and twists my hand painfully, bringing me down to my knees.

Wait. How did it know my name?

“OOwwwW!” I howl in pain and glare at the monster. “Let me go!”

It takes a beat for me to look past his bloody appearance. Those eyes. I know who this fucker is.

The coagulated blood he’s covered head to toe in isn’t blood at all. It’s the red mud of the Blood River. The natural iron deposits make the water blood red. It’s so potent that it turns the mud on the river banks blood red as well.

“Bronx?!” I gasp at my brother. “What am I doing? What the fuck are YOU doing?”

“They assigned us a shift as guards for this sector and we heard… noises.”

His scowl tells me everything I need to know. I feel my face flush. My brother caught me having sex with my boyfriend. How can I get out of this?!

“We?” Who else is he talking about?

I turn my attention to a playful growl behind Bronx and gasp. Bronx’s best friend, Milo Stone, has Marco in a headlock on the ground a few yards away.

Marco has his hands raised in surrender. Milo, a perpetual dunce, looks like he’s having a blast trying to choke Marco out. Marco outweighs Milo by at least fifty pounds, but Clash won’t let him attack his Beta Scion.

“It’s time to go home, Leni.” Bronx impatiently secures the blanket from the truck around my body and tugs on my arm again, bringing me back to standing. 

“No! Let Marco go and leave us alone!” My embarrassment fades, replaced by anger. “Milo! Get off of him!” 

I pull my arm away from Bronx and jut my chin out. My brother intimidates most people. Not me though. He can kiss my ass. “Why are you harassing us? Don’t you have better shit to do?”

“Saving my little sister’s dignity hardly counts as harassment, Leni.” He snarls and wipes his hands over his face to clear mud from his eyes. “You don’t even know if he’s your mate.” 

My jaw drops. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me, Bronx! My DIGNITY is none of your damn business!”

“Well, Dad is on his way. He’ll probably disagree with you.” Bronx folds his muddy arms over himself. 

“YOU MINDLINKED DAD! You’re an asshole, Bronx. Grade A, capital oh, asshole.” I shove him, but I may as well have hit a brick wall. I’m five feet ten inches tall, but Bronx is six foot six inches. He has well over a hundred pounds on me. 

“Leni, knock it off. We’ll deal with Sanchez. It’s time for you to go home.” 

“Fuck off, Bronx.” I rush over to Milo. He's laughing like a damn hyena at Marco, who is struggling to break free of the choke hold before he passes out. I pull on Milo’s arm, getting leverage with my foot against his ribs. “Milo, let Marco go! NOW!”

Milo slides off Marco’s back and leans back on his hands casually, as if he wasn’t trying to murder my boyfriend for the fun of it two seconds ago. He keeps his leg draped over Marco’s back and bobs his foot in the air like he’s bored.

“Leni, why are you always so damn serious?” He smirks at me. “We were just fucking around. Marco can take a joke. Can’t ya, big guy? Nothin’ wrong with gettin’ your dick wet now and then. Right?”

Marco groans and coughs, grabbing his throat as he sucks in fresh air. There’s conflict in his eyes. If Milo wasn’t a future ranked member of our pack, he would already be dead.

Have you ever wanted to punch someone in the face? No warning, no explanation, or justification needed. Just haul off and throw your full weight into it? Enough to feel the satisfaction of bones crunching under your fist? That’s how I feel right now.

My wolf’s not awake yet. There’s no one to stop me. I step toward Milo, but Marco climbs onto one knee and grabs my hip through the blanket. “Leni, don’t. Let’s just leave.”

“Go fuck around somewhere else, Milo.” I help Marco off the ground and turn for the truck, but it’s too late. I can already hear the heavy paws of Dad’s wolf. “Shit! Marco, come on!”

“Why? You in a hurry, Leni? Mace is gonna be here any second. I bet he’d hate to miss out on seeing ya.” Milo wags his finger at me with an annoying grin.

I feel myself go pale as Dad’s wolf charges out of the woods into the clearing. I take a step back, but I can’t run. He would catch me in three strides.

“Mace, this isn’t what it looks like. Bronx has it wrong. I swear. Nothing happened.”

“Leni-” Marco steps forward, putting himself between me and Dad’s giant gray wolf.

Mace lowers his head with a rumbling growl, making all of us bow and show him our necks in submission. My knees shake under the blanket when I hear him shifting into human form.

“Alpha, sir, it’s not her fault. I br-”

“Shut it, Sanchez. Bronx, Milo, get him out of here.” Dad’s gruff voice booms. “Lieutenant Fortier is at the bottom of the mountain waiting for you.”

I don’t dare lift my head up. Dad’s anger hits me like a tidal wave, warning me to be still.

Marco’s bare feet walk away silently, except for the crunching of twigs below him. The sounds of people shifting to wolf form fill my ears. I swallow hard when I hear them take off down the mountain. The silence in the space between my father and me could hold galaxies.

My mind races so fast it feels like it might short circuit. What if I never see Marco again? My heart constricts. Nine months. What if he never makes it back? I’ll never forgive my brother for this. Never.

“Get in the truck.” Dad’s tone is deadly calm. He grabs Marco’s shorts out of the bed of the truck and puts them on, then opens the passenger door and waits for me to move.

I finally look up at him. “Dad, I-”

“Get. In. NOW!” 

Shit.

I climb into the passenger seat and tighten the blanket around my body, trying to make myself as small as possible.

Dad slams the door so hard it makes me jump. I keep my head down, but flick my eyes up. He stomps in front of the truck and gets in the driver’s side, slamming his door closed. I can feel his anger when he revs the engine before he pulls out of the makeshift parking spot, down the unpaved path.

Disappointing my father is one of the worst things I can think of, yet here I am. If I open my mouth right now, I would choke on the tension in the air. It would be less painful if he just stabbed me through the heart.

After an uncomfortable minute of silence, I finally speak. Otherwise, it’s going to be a excruciating twenty minutes back to the packhouse.

“I’m sorry, Dad.” My voice sounds tiny under the noise of the engine. He doesn’t even blink. I shift uncomfortably in the seat and clear my throat. Maybe he didn’t hear me. “Dad, I said I’m sorry. Please say something.”

He doesn’t look at me, but he rubs his hand over his face and half snorts, half growls through his nose. The truck stops short, making me throw my hands out to catch myself. Dad puts it in park and gets out. I watch him stomp to the passenger side door and swing it open.

He points into the woods. “Out.”

“Out?” I look behind him into the dark, thick woods suspiciously. “Here?”

He puts his hands on his hips and leans on the edge of the door, raising his eyebrows dangerously. “Would you like me to MAKE you get out?”

“No, Sir.” I lower my head and slide off of the seat.

As soon as my feet touch the ground, Dad grabs my upper arm and drags me down a non-existent path into the thickest part of the woods. He pushes me down onto a large, flat boulder. “Sit.”

I let myself fall onto the rock and look at him with a furrowed brow. He has never grabbed me like that. I get that he’s mad, but he’s making a huge deal out of this. He paces for a moment, then fixes his glare on me. His stare is full of daggers, making me turn my eyes down.

“Is there any chance that you’re pregnant?”