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I walked into my apartment after sixteen hours in the emergency room, the kind of shift that seeps into your bones and refuses to let go. I never thought I’d make it out, patients kept pouring in, one after another, blood, panic, flatlines. It never stopped.

I sorted through the mail with numb fingers and found a letter from my brother, Adam. I set it on the kitchen counter, unopened. It looked official, too official, and I was too exhausted to deal with whatever it meant tonight.

The bed was calling to me. I stripped off my clothes as I walked, each step heavier than the last, and collapsed beneath the blankets. I barely had time to sink into the pillow before my phone rang.

I ignored it. It rang again, then went to voicemail. I glanced at the screen. Adam. I hadn’t spoken to him in two years. Now he kept calling. “Tomorrow,” I muttered, already drifting. “I’ll deal with it tomorrow.”

Sleep didn’t come gently. It never did. I tossed and turned as the dream dragged me under sharp, vivid, suffocating.

I was fifteen again, sitting in the passenger seat of an SUV. Lisa was driving. We were heading home from the clothing store where I worked, the sky already dimming as the moon began its slow rise.

The tire blew with a violent crack.

Lisa cursed under her breath and pulled the car to the side of the road. Gravel crunched beneath us as the vehicle lurched to a stop. She grabbed her phone immediately, dialing from memory.

“Good evening, Alpha. We have a flat tire. Your daughter is going to be late coming home… Yes, sir.” She hung up and glanced at me. “He said to stay with the car. Roadside assistance is coming. The Beta is on his way to pick you up.”

I rolled my eyes. “Of course he is.”

Lisa smirked. “Aww, I know the Beta is your favorite person.” Her sarcasm barely landed. Something already felt… off. She opened the door.

“Where are you going?” I asked, a knot forming in my chest.

“I’m checking the tire. Maybe I can get enough air in it to get us out of here.” She paused, scanning the dark tree line. “I hate being on a back road with a full moon rising.”

The words barely left her mouth before the howls started. Close. Too close. Lisa froze, her body going rigid as she turned toward the woods. My heart slammed against my ribs as shadows moved between the trees. Then they stepped out. Four wolves. Large. Silent. Watching.

“Lotty, lock the doors. Do not leave the car.” Her voice was sharp, commanding.

I slammed the locks down just as she shifted her body twisting, bones snapping and reforming in a sickening chorus of cracks. Fur burst through skin as she dropped to all fours, a warrior in an instant.

The wolves lunged. The impact was brutal snarls, teeth, claws tearing through the night. Lisa fought like a storm, ripping into them, blood spraying across the gravel in dark arcs. One wolf yelped as she tore into its throat, flesh splitting under her jaws. But they didn’t stop. They weren’t holding back.

Three more wolves burst from the trees. One of them caught my breath. It was massive. Towering over the others, its presence alone felt suffocating. It moved slowly, deliberately, as if it already knew how this would end.

Lisa staggered. Actually staggered. Like something was forcing her down. The massive wolf growled a deep, vibrating sound that seemed to shake the air itself. And then they all attacked at once.

It was chaos. A blur of fur and blood. Lisa disappeared beneath them. The sound, God, the sound. Wet tearing, bones snapping, a choked, guttural cry that cut off too quickly. I squeezed my eyes shut, clamping my hands over my ears, trying to block it out, trying not to hear the way her body was being ripped apart piece by piece.

Then, silence. Suddenly. Absolute. I forced my eyes open.

The massive wolf stood at the driver’s side door, staring directly at me. Its eyes glowed gold. It scratched at the door, claws screeching against the metal, leaving deep grooves. The entire car shook with the force of it.

I screamed, my voice raw, desperate, hoping praying it would scare him off. He didn’t stop. He howled wild, unhinged, the sound of something that enjoyed the hunt. And then, just as suddenly as it began, he turned. The wolves vanished into the trees.

Moments later, another group burst into the clearing. Relief crashed into me, familiar wolves, shifting quickly into human form. The Beta rushed forward, pounding on the window.

“Lotty! Open the door!”

My hands shook so badly I could barely unlock it. The second it clicked, I stumbled out and into his arms, clinging to him like he was the only solid thing left in the world.

“It’s okay,” he said quickly, turning my head, trying to shield my view. “Don’t look.” But I did. Just one glance. Lisa. What was left of her. Her body was torn open, barely recognizable. Flesh shredded, bone exposed, blood soaking into the dirt in a thick, dark pool. One arm lay several feet away, twisted at an unnatural angle. The scream ripped out of me before I could stop it.

I woke from the dream still screaming, the sound ripping out of my throat as I bolted upright. My chest heaved, lungs burning like I’d been running for miles. Sweat clung to my skin, soaking the sheets, tangling my hair against my face. For a moment, I didn’t know where I was. All I could see was blood. Torn flesh. Golden eyes.

I dragged a shaky hand down my face, forcing myself to breathe. In. Out. Slow. Steady. The familiar walls of my apartment slowly came back into focus, grounding me in the present.

“It’s not real,” I whispered hoarsely. “It’s over.” But it never really was.

I threw the blankets off and stumbled toward the kitchen, my legs unsteady. The floor felt cold beneath my feet, a sharp contrast to the heat still clinging to my body. I yanked open the fridge and grabbed the first cold drink I saw, pressing it against my forehead before taking a long swallow. The chill helped barely but it was something.

That’s when I saw it. The letter. Still sitting exactly where I’d left it. From Adam.

My jaw tightened. Of course. That had to be why the dream came back so vividly, the past clawing its way forward the moment he decided to reach out. A reminder of the night everything changed. The night I was sent away from the pack “for my safety.” Or at least, that’s what they told me.

I set the drink down and picked up the envelope, my fingers hesitating for only a second before tearing it open. The paper inside was crisp, official. I scanned it quickly at first… then slower. Then again, just to make sure I wasn’t imagining it. Adam, Alpha of the pack, was offering me a position. Head of Emergency Medicine at the pack hospital.

A hollow laugh escaped me, sharp and humorless. “You’ve got to be kidding me…” After two years of silence, this was how he reached out?

I ran a hand through my damp hair, my mind racing. Memories, anger, confusion, it all twisted together into something heavy in my chest. The phone. Right.

I grabbed it off the counter and checked the voicemail. Adam’s voice filled the room, calm and steady, like no time had passed at all.

“Call me after you read it.” That was it. No explanation. No apology. Typical.

I glanced at the clock on the stove. 4:30 a.m. Too early for normal people. But Adam was never “normal,” and neither was any of this. I stared at his number for a long moment, my thumb hovering over the screen. Every instinct told me to throw the phone across the room and forget the whole thing.Instead, I exhaled slowly… and hit call.

The phone rang twice before he answered. “Hello?” His voice was steady. Calm. Controlled.

It instantly made something in my chest tighten. “You’ve got five seconds to explain why you think I’d come back.”

Silence. Just long enough to be intentional. “Good morning to you too, Lotty.”

My grip on the phone tightened. “Don’t. Don’t act like this is normal.”

“It’s not,” he said evenly. “That’s why I sent the letter.”

A sharp laugh slipped out of me. “A job offer? That’s your grand way of reaching out after two years?”

“I needed to make sure you’d read it.”

“You could’ve just called.”

Another pause. “I did.”

My jaw clenched. “Not two years ago, you didn’t.”

His voice dropped slightly, still calm but heavier now. “I wasn’t Alpha then.” There it was. The shift.

I leaned against the counter, my pulse still not fully settled from the dream. “No. You weren’t. But you were still my brother.”

“And you were still a target,” he shot back, faster this time. That made me pause. “You think I don’t know why they sent you away?” he continued. “You think I agreed with it?”

“They did send me away, Adam,” I snapped. “Funny how you never came after me.”

“I couldn’t.” The words were quiet. Firm. Not defensive, final.

Something in my chest twisted, but I shoved it down. “Right. Couldn’t. Convenient.”

“Lotty…”

“No,” I cut him off. “You don’t get to ‘Lotty’ me like nothing happened. I was there, Adam. I saw what they did to Lisa.”

The line went dead silent. For a second, I thought the call dropped. Then, “I know.” His voice was different now. Lower. Rougher. Not Alpha. Brother.

I swallowed hard, my throat tightening. “Do you?” I didn’t wait for an answer. “They tore her apart,” I said, the words coming out sharper than I expected. “I can still hear it. Every time I close my eyes, I hear bones snapping and skin…” I cut myself off, breath hitching.

Silence stretched between us again, thick and suffocating. “I should’ve been there,” he said finally.

The admission hit harder than anything else he’d said. I closed my eyes briefly, steadying myself. “Yeah. You should have.”

Another pause. Then he shifted again back into control. “Things are getting worse,” Adam said. There it was.

I let out a slow breath. “There it is. The real reason.”

“The Dark Mountain Pack has been pushing our borders for months,” he continued. “What started as small skirmishes… isn’t small anymore.”

My stomach dropped slightly. “How bad?”

“They’re not just attacking patrols,” he said. “They’re targeting civilians now.”

Images from my dream flashed blood, tearing flesh, golden eyes. I pushed them down.“And your hospital can’t handle it,” I said.

“It’s overwhelming.” Of course it was.

“We’re short on trained trauma physicians. The ones we have…” he hesitated, “…aren’t enough.”

“And you think I am.”

“I know you are.” The certainty in his voice made my chest tighten again but not in the same way as before. “You built a reputation out there,” he continued. “Sixteen-hour shifts in human ERs. Mass casualty experience. You’ve been preparing for this whether you realize it or not.”

I let out a quiet, humorless breath. “So what I’m your last resort?”

“You’re my best option.”

That landed differently.I stared at the letter still sitting on the counter, the official seal of Edgewater Falls Pack staring back at me.

“You said civilians,” I said slowly. “What aren’t you telling me?” Another pause. Longer this time.

“They’re organized,” Adam admitted. “More than they should be.”

A chill crept down my spine. “And?”

“And we’ve reason to believe Dark Mountain isn’t acting alone.” There it was. The bigger threat. Something shifted in the air between us, even through the phone.

I rubbed my temple, exhaustion mixing with adrenaline. “So you want me to walk back into a war zone.”

“I want you where I can protect you.” The words came out sharp. Immediate. Alpha.

I straightened. “I don’t need your protection.”

“Everyone in my pack does.” There it was again, that command buried in his tone.And for a split second… my instincts reacted to it.I hated that.

“I’m not in your pack,” I said coldly.

A beat. Then, quieter, “You are by blood.”

That hit deeper than I wanted it to. I looked at the clock again. 4:42 a.m. Sixteen hours of work. A nightmare soaked in blood. And now this. War. Family. Home.

“I’ll think about it,” I said finally.

“That’s all I’m asking.” But I could hear it in his voice. It wasn’t. “Lotty.”

I hesitated. “What?”

“…I’m glad you answered.”

I didn’t respond. I just ended the call.