Masuk**Stella's POV** Shawn opens his mouth to respond to me but then suddenly goes down fast and heavy the way a person goes when their body has simply stopped negotiating, and he hits the floor before I've finished processing what I'm seeing. "Shawn." I'm on my knees beside him in an instant. "Shawn." I put my hand on his face. His cheek is cold in a way that has nothing to do with the room. "Hey. Look at me." Nothing. I shake his good shoulder and his head lolls and his eyes stay closed. He does not move the way a conscious person moves. "Shawn. Hey." Still nothing and then I hear footsteps behind me. "Mommy?" Maya is standing at the end of the hallway with Maria behind her, both of them drawn out by the sound of him hitting the floor. "What happened to the kind man?" Maya's voice is small. I don't turn around. I keep my eyes on Shawn's face. "Maria." My voice is level. "Take Maya to the kitchen. Feed her. Give her whatever she wants. I will be there soon."
**Stella's POV**"Hi, Mommy." Maya's voice is smaller than I remember. Or maybe I've just been missing it long enough that hearing it again makes everything else go quiet.I cup her face in both hands. Turn it gently left, then right. The mark on her chin is a bruise, fading but there. There's also a small scrape along her jaw I didn't see from a distance.My heart constricts with rage I don't show on my face."Are you okay?" I ask. "Does anything hurt?"She shakes her head."Your chin.""It doesn't hurt anymore."I look at her for a long moment. She holds my gaze the way she always has — straight on, even when she's nervous. That part hasn't changed."Are you hungry?""Yes.""Cold?""No."I smooth her hair back from her face. She leans into my hand the way she used to when she was small enough to carry, and something in my chest folds quietly in on itself."Okay," I say. "Okay."I continue doing inventory on her body to check for any more bruises, then — something that isn't tirednes
**Stella's POV** I glance at my phone screen and see my dad's name flashing. I answer before the second buzz has finished. "Hey Dad, if this is about Rose," I say quickly, "I already handled it. She's gone and I'm upgrading the security system first thing tomorrow." "It's not about Rose." He sounds surprised. "Then what—" "Shawn is on his way to you." I sit up because now he has my full attention. "Okay. But why is he—" "Remember the errand I sent him on this morning." "Yes." "He found her." "Found who?" I frown at the statement. "Maya." He says her name gently. My heart skips a beat. "What did you say?" "He's bringing her to you." I am on my feet before I realize I've moved. Noah looks up at me from the sofa — sensing something has shifted without knowing what. "Say that again," I say as my eyes fill up. "Stella—" "Please." My voice cracks on the word. "Say it again." "Shawn found Maya. She is safe. She is unharmed. And he is bringing her to yo
**Stella's POV** The elevator doors open to my apartment and I stand in them for a moment longer than necessary. I can't believe today's events that I take a long breath in and hold when suddenly the elevator starts to beep at me for holding the doors. I exhale softly, step out and smell her before I see her. What is Rose doing here? I swiftly walk straight to the living room. It arranges itself in front of me and I take it in the way you take in a scene that is wrong before you have identified specifically what is wrong about it — the lamp on, the television off, the cushions disturbed — and then I find it. Composed. Crossed ankles. A small smile that she has been wearing since before I walked in. And on the floor in front of her, sitting with his building blocks arranged in the particular serious configuration of a one year old who has decided architecture is important— "Noah." I say his name and he looks up with a smile. "There she is." Rose's voice fills the room
**Shawn's POV** Sabrina closes her eyes for exactly one second. When she opens them, the mask is gone. "Shawn." Her voice drops low. "You're a rogue. You know what it is to need something and have no clean way to get it." Her arm tightens around Maya. "Cole needs that contract. The pack needs it. And the only way Stella signs is if she gets this pup back from someone she's grateful to." She tilts her head slightly. "Help me do this the right way." I look at her and I think — she is manipulative, no wonder Stella never stood a chance against her. "Let her go," I say. "We can work this out—" "Let her go, Sabrina." "You don't understand what's at stake—" She takes one step back, deeper into the trees. "I will disappear with her. I know this territory better than you think and I have rogues who will be here any second—" I smirk, "You had three rogues." I take one step forward. "They aren't coming." The silence that follows is absolute. Something crosses her face. Just
**Shawn's POV** The wood splinters around the frame and the door swings hard into the interior wall and I am already through it before the sound has finished happening. The room snaps into focus the way rooms do when your body has shifted into the rescue mode that makes everything slower and sharper and more specific than ordinary life allows. I find three men. One by the table — big, heavy through the shoulders, already rising from his chair. One by the back wall reaching for something at his belt. One between me and Maya, which is the one I move toward first because proximity to the pup is the only geography that matters right now. Sabrina immediately grabs Maya and she screams. "Let me go!" "Go! We'll handle him." The man by the table shouts it at Sabrina and she is already moving — Maya under her arm like cargo, headed for the back of the room where a second door sits slightly ajar. The first one reaches me in two seconds. He is big and he knows how to move and
**Stella's POV** My wolf snarls. 'You are not their maid or nanny. They are your pups. You carried them. You bled for them. No one replaces that.' Yes, she is right. I'm their biological mother, I deserve that moment too. I walk forward. “Give him back,” I say calmly. Sabrina looks up, surprise
**Cole's POV**I don't make a single fucking sound.I'm crouched behind a thick oak tree about hundred yards from the clearing, my wolf's hearing senses straining to catch every word of Sabrina's conversation with her mother.And what I've heard makes my blood run cold."Send someone to make Noah d
**Stella's POV** Before I can answer, I hear heavy footsteps behind me. "Step away from her. Now." I turn to see Joe and another guard, rushing toward us. Joe's hand is already reaching for something at his waist—probably a weapon—and the other guard moves to flank Dimitri from the other side
**Stella's POV** Sabrina immediately pastes on a smile, but I can see the panic in her eyes. "Maya, sweetheart, come show your mother your beautiful drawings—" But I'm not done. I turn to Sabrina, and I let her see the challenge in my eyes. "You think Maya loves you more than me?" I say quie







