ログインMaraBy two in the morning, someone had covered the broken front window with plywood.I hated it. Not the plywood specifically, but the fact that I noticed every creak it made when the wind pressed against it.The clinic smelled of disinfectant, blood, fire extinguisher powder, and wet fur. Three guards were stable, and Selene’s shoulder had already begun healing. Tessa refused to leave. Alden had resumed his position outside like the world’s largest, most attractive security camera.And I had cleaned the same section of counter six times.“Mara.”I kept wiping.“Mara.”The disinfectant cloth squeaked against the laminate.Selene took it out of my hand, and I stared at her. “That was rude.”“You’ve cleaned this spot enough to perform surgery on it.”“That sounds useful.”She tossed the cloth into the trash. Someone had found her sweatpants and a sweatshirt, and neither fit properly. The pants were too long, and the sweatshirt said WORLD’S BEST DOG MOM across the front.Tessa claimed i
CassianMy left wrist was bleeding badly enough that Mercer had stopped laughing. I sat against the concrete wall with both arms pulled behind me, silver biting into my skin every time I moved.My wolf was barely there now, a weak pulse and a distant growl, nothing like himself.I had spent years believing I understood silver. I had watched Kieran recover from it and seen injured warriors survive it. I had known intellectually what prolonged exposure did. But knowing was not the same as feeling your strength drain away hour by hour while your own wolf slowly disappeared into silence.I flexed my left hand, and pain shot up my arm. Good. Pain meant I still had sensation.Mercer stood across the room speaking into a burner phone while the other hunter paced near the doorway.We had moved twice since the cabin. This place smelled of oil, mold, and old concrete, some industrial building with no windows in the room, one steel door, and one chain. Mercer’s voice sharpened. “No.” Silence.
KieranI should have been driving back to Mara. Every instinct I had screamed it. My wolf had been pacing beneath my skin since Tessa answered Mara’s phone and told me Selene had ripped a hunter’s throat out inside the clinic.Mara was bruised, the clinic was destroyed, and my guards had been hit with silver. And I was still standing in a basement miles away from her, with the damp cold of the concrete seeping through my boots.I stared at the three letters Cassian had scratched into the wall.TES.He had known. He had tried to warn us. That did not erase anything else, and it only made everything harder.Rhett stood near the stairs, staring at the same message. “We should move.”I looked at him. “You think I don’t know that?”“I think you’re deciding whether to go back.”He knew me too well.Cyrus crouched beside the chain bolted into the concrete floor. “Your mate told you to find him.”I turned on him. “Do not use Mara against me.”His expression didn’t change. “I wasn’t.”“Could h
TessaThe clinic was dark. That was the first thing I noticed. The second was the broken front window.“Alden.”“I see it." His voice had changed. There was no velvet in it, no teasing, no confused questions about dog treats. It was just cold, controlled, and dangerous.He pulled into the parking lot so fast I grabbed the door handle, and the SUV barely stopped before I unbuckled.“Tessa." I was already opening the door. “Tessa, wait.”“Mara!”I ran.Alden swore behind me. One of Kieran’s guards was down near the edge of the building, and another lay beside the side entrance.I stopped. “Oh my God.”“Inside,” Alden ordered.I spun toward him. “What?”He was already crouching beside the closest guard. “Breathing.”Relief hit so hard my knees weakened.“Go inside. Find Mara.”I didn’t argue. I ran through the shattered front entrance, glass crunching under my shoes.“Mara!”No answer.The clinic looked as if a tornado had gone through it: cabinets overturned, supplies everywhere, a fire
MaraThe howl came again, closer. The hunter turned toward the broken front windows, and I tightened both hands around the kennel door.“That,” I said, “would be my boyfriend.”Except the second the wolf came through the shattered entrance, I knew I was wrong. Not Kieran. Kieran was enormous, with black fur and gold eyes, and I knew his wolf now.This one was smaller, lean and fast, a blur of fur and teeth that launched across reception before the hunter had enough time to fully turn. He shouted, and the wolf hit him square in the chest, and they crashed into the reception desk. I stumbled backward.“What the fuck?”The hunter swung hard, and the wolf twisted away, fast, too fast. He reached for his gun.“No!”I grabbed the kennel door and shoved it aside enough to squeeze through. The hunter got the gun halfway free, and the wolf lunged, teeth closing around his forearm.He screamed, and the gun hit the floor, and I kicked it beneath the exam table. The hunter drove his fist into the
Mara“Come find me, asshole.” My voice sounded steadier than I felt.The hunter laughed somewhere near reception, and that pissed me off more than anything. He thought this was funny. He thought I was trapped.Maybe I was, but this was still my clinic. I knew every door, every hallway, every stupid cabinet Tessa complained about sticking. He didn’t.I backed into treatment and switched off my flashlight, and the darkness swallowed me. The footsteps stopped. Good.“You really want to do this the hard way?” he called.I moved quietly toward Exam Two. “Yes.”“That was not a question.”“Then stop asking stupid ones.”Silence, and then footsteps, closer. I slipped into the exam room and pulled the door mostly shut behind me, my heart hammering so loudly I was convinced he could hear it. Maybe he could. No. Human. Just human.Dangerous human, which was somehow worse. The footsteps passed the doorway, and I waited. Three seconds. Four. Then I shoved the door open hard, and it hit him squarel







