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047 | SALT IN THE WOUND
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Alpha Ares 048 | BIG BLUE
I was about to knock on the door to my parents’ office when I heard voices. I didn’t know what made my fist still a hair’s breadth from the wood, but I froze at the sound of that familiar, deep, honey-and-gravel voice.Etta had eventually tired and gone home. Needing a distraction and some reassurance, I’d come to find Ares. I couldn’t stop thinking about her going back to her empty house, but she’d insisted – quite bluntly, which had made the knot of emotion in my chest ease ever so slightly – that she wanted to eat dinner alone.“It’s hard for me, Big Blue,” Ares was saying, and his use of my dad’s nickname sent a jolt of shock through me. It was too familial for a man like Alpha Ares.“As it is for Haile.” There was a hint of sympathy to Dad’s tone, but not half so much as if Ares were part of Blue Moon. Or even if he hadn’t tried to kill me.“I know. Of course it is. And I… I haven’t always made things easy for her.”“I’ll level with you, Ares, from one Alpha to another.” I could
Alpha Ares 049 | A GLIMPSE OF HIS SOUL
I stared at one of the lush green plants in its terracotta pot, my mouth moving over silent words that kept getting lodged in my throat. Nothing about this room had changed, from the heaps of messy parchment on my dad’s desk to the organised piles on my mum’s, but I felt too still, too awkward, as I shifted my weight on the sofa. Like I belonged in this room, but not in this time. Dad had eyed me knowingly as he’d left, shoving his feet into his sandals and shaking his head at me fondly before he’d slipped out – no doubt to find Mum and tell her that he’d caught me eavesdropping. Well… He had been the one giving the Alpha of our enemy pack a free therapy session, so we both had things to answer for. I picked at my cuticles and waited for Ares to say something. My gaze darted from the plant to the wooden shelves, to the coffee table with two fresh mugs of tea on it, both untouched. Ares had had plenty to say before, so…“How much did you hear?”Even though I’d been waiting for him to
Alpha Ares 050 | BEGIN ANEW
Ares told me everything. As night fell around us, he had bared his soul to me. The darkness and the light in him merged, a heady jumble of duty and respect and fear, until I could no longer pick apart the good from the bad. There was just him and I, sat with a slim gap between us, and I –I had closed it.All I had ever wanted was his honesty.And, in the two months that had passed since, I felt as though we had begun anew. There were no secrets between us – well, except for one, which I would take with me to the grave. I wasn’t sure why I had kept my parents’ plan from him, but something had stopped me from being wholly honest with him. I had been overwhelmed in that moment, in the face of his blunt truth, and it had suddenly felt so irrelevant. So small. So small, in fact, that it had been all but forgotten. It had not been an immediate fix. Trusting Ares was still hard at times, but with every day that passed I believed in what he'd said a little more. His actions aligned with hi
Alpha Ares 051 | WINTER
The scream rang out, crisp and clear. Without stopping to think I hauled on Ares’s hand and yanked him towards the sound. It was not hard to find the source of the noise. A group of Omegas were clustered around an open door, their hands clapped over their mouths to hold back their cries.“There was no wood for her fire last night,” sobbed a young woman from just inside the room. “I told her to stay with me, but she told me to stop fussing. Stars–”“What’s going on here?” Ares’s voice lanced through the noise and silenced it immediately, save for the wet, sticking breaths of the Omegas.“She died!” wailed the woman, digging her nails into her palms. “My grandmother. From the cold…” she dissolved into sobs. Ares and I pushed past her. The room was much like the hovel I had been put in when I’d first arrived at Winterpaw. It was windowless, with a single bed, complete with a lumpy mattress, one thin blanket, and one thin pillow, and a decaying dresser at the foot of the bed. There was
Alpha Ares 052 | THE HAND THAT REACHES
“Max,” I hissed, grabbing his wrist and yanking him into step beside me. I pointed with my other hand, proud to see that my finger did not tremble.“Shit,” he breathed. “Okay. Oh–”“Hello?” I called, cutting him off. “Can you hear us?”The fingers twitched, but there was no change.“They can’t be alive, Haile. That snow… It could have been on top of them for hours.”I ignored him. “Click your fingers if you can hear us.”Slowly, shaking violently, the fingers clicked.Max’s eyes went wide. “Okay. Okay. Okay.”“It will be,” I said, dropping his wrist, “if we get them out of there. Come on.”I grabbed the hand sticking out of the snow. It was frozen, and the fingers were stiff as I bent them around my palm. Max shifted into his roan wolf form and started to dig, flinging sheets of ice and compacted snow up into the grey sky. I tightened my hold on the frozen hand, willing my fragile warmth to pool into their skin. “We’ll get you out,” I said, with more confidence than I felt. “You’ll b
Alpha Ares 053 | THE FIRST WARRIOR WOLF
“Me?” I arched an eyebrow at her, forcing my face to remain otherwise cool and expressionless. Her bared teeth were making me uneasy, but I held her cold stare nonetheless. I would bow to no-one – least of all a woman who would be dead if not for me.She sat up straighter, a grunt of effort straining from her throat. The grimace on her lips faded, her mouth drooping down slowly as she searched my eyes for – something. I narrowed them back at her, and a tiny, hardened part of me wondered if I should’ve left her in the snow.Things had been okay. For months, I’d had only to deal with the problems that Winterpaw had always faced. There had been no attacks, no murderous plots, no nothing. I had the horrible feeling that that was all about to change with whatever came out of her mouth next.She pushed back thin, blonde hair that had stuck to the sides of her pallid face. “Yes. I am here for you.”“How convenient,” drawled Ares. I could feel the tension radiating from his frame from where I
Alpha Ares 054 | BLIZZARD
“It’s too dangerous, Haile. You can’t go.”“I have to, Ares. It’s my pack. My family.” I ran my hands through my hair, helpless in the face of what Aliana had told us. I leant hard against the windowsill, digging my palms into the cold rock and focusing on the dull spike of pain the rough surface caused. Outside, the blizzard was so thick I could barely see the mountains beyond. Six Warrior Wolves. Six.And I only knew the identity of one of them.“If the cold doesn’t kill you, then one of Greyhide’s wolves will.”“They can’t be out there. Not in this snow storm.”“They’re used to the harsh winters here. You aren’t.” His tone left no room for argument. He sighed as he crossed the room, winding his arms around my waist and pressing a soft kiss to my temple. “You know I would go with you if it were possible. But to make the journey to Blue Moon now… It’s suicide.”My throat worked on a swallow. And then, slowly, I nodded. I didn’t like it, but Ares was telling the truth. But… “But wha
Alpha Ares 055 | HAILE AND ARES
“No,” Ares said flatly. He crossed his arms over his chest, and I was sure he did it just to distract me with his muscles. It wouldn’t work this time, though.“But why not?” I jutted my chin out, aware that I looked – and sounded – like a child, but unable to stop the petulance wheedling into my tone. “It makes sense, Ares.” I fixed my gaze on the fireplace behind him, letting the embers of it fuel my own fire.“Do you have no sense of self preservation?” He laughed, but it was cold and unamused. “Aliana has literally said that Greyhide Canyon are out to kill you. Whether we can trust her or not, that is too much of a risk to take. So no, Haile – you can’t run home to Blue Moon and gather up an army.”I huffed, annoyed at being spoken down to. “I understand the risk.”“I can’t lose you!” he roared, crowding into my space, but his touch was gentle, so gentle, as he cupped my cheeks with his large, warm hands. His bottom lip quivered and his chin dimpled, and he swallowed hard before sp
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