MasukEthan's POVI dropped the bastard's lifeless body onto the tile, not even bothering to look down as I kicked his corpse toward the stairwell. His frame went tumbling down the steps, clattering against the metal railings before landing with a dull, wet thud below.My lungs burned like I had swallowed hot coals. Blood—mostly theirs, some of mine—coated my knuckles and dripped from my torn sleeves onto the linoleum."Behind us!" Marcus barked, spinning around on his heel.Phfft-phfft!The suppressed cracks of Marcus's sidearm hissed through the smoky corridor. Two Nightfang shooters who had just kicked through the fire escape door jerked violently, silver rounds drilling into their chests before they could even level their submachine guns. They slumped against the metal frame, sliding down in heaps of twitching muscle and gear."Clear on the rear!" Marcus yelled, reloading his magazine in one smooth, practiced flick of his wrist.A searing heat pulsed through my left shoulder where a sil
Ruby's POVAnother vicious cramp tore across my lower stomach, blinding. A choked gasp ripped out of my throat as my knees gave out, sending me sliding down the side of the hospital bed."Ruby!" Emily gasped, darting across the room to catch me under my arms."I'm okay, I'm okay," I wheezed through clenched teeth, pressing both hands flat against my belly.I wasn't okay. My body was shaking uncontrollably, drenched in a cold sweat. The terror flooding my bloodstream was throwing my uterus into full-blown panic mode, tightening like a vice around my baby boy. Every rapid beat of his little heart thudded in my ears, erratic and terrified.Right through the drywall, another deafening burst of gunfire erupted. The acoustic vibrations rattled the picture frames on the wall, raining plaster dust onto our hair."Help me move this! Now!" Emily yelled, her eyes wild with panic.She grabbed the edge of the steel examination bed, her boots skidding against the tiles as she shoved it with all her
Ethan's POVThe rain had been pounding against the roof of our surveillance van for hours, loud and relentless, drowning out almost every sound in Oakhaven. I had been sitting in the cramped passenger seat with my arms crossed, staring through the windshield at the distant gate of the Whitefield medical wing.My chest had been tight all morning. Not because of the silver burn on my ribs—that was just a dull, stinging nuisance at this point—but because my wolf had been pacing back and forth behind my ribs like a caged beast. He was restless, whining in low, erratic bursts that made my skin prickle.Then—BOOM!The muffled, violent roar of an explosion tore through the pouring rain, rattling the van's side mirrors so hard they vibrated.My head snapped up."What was that?" I barked, my voice jagged, my hand instantly dropping to the knife strapped to my thigh.Marcus leaned over the bank of scanners and monitors set up on the center bench. His fingers flew across the keyboard, frantical
Ruby's POVThunder cracked right over the roof, so violently loud that the windows shuddered in their frames. A second later, heavy, freezing rain slammed against the glass, drumming with this weird, heavy rhythm that made my skin crawl.I hated days like this. Days where the sky looked bruised and ugly, churning in shades of dark charcoal and sickly green.I shifted on the examination bed, biting down on my bottom lip as another dull, dragging ache rolled through my lower abdomen. It had been like this since five this morning. Not sharp, but heavy. A dense, throbbing kind of pressure that felt like someone had tied a bag of wet sand right around my pelvis. Every time I tried to take a deep breath, the muscles across my belly pulled so tight I had to grip the edge of the mattress just to keep from groaning out loud."If you squeeze the bed frame any harder, you're gonna bend the steel, babe," Emily said from the armchair.She was casually peeling an orange, tossing the rinds into a cu
Author's POVThe air inside the mountain stronghold of the Nightfang Pack was damp, cold, and reeked of stale blood and iron. Built directly into the jagged rock face of the northern ridges, the fortress felt more like a slaughterhouse than an Alpha's seat. Torches flickered along the stone walls, casting long, grotesque shadows across the cavernous hall.Damon was thrown face-first onto the stone floor, his knees slamming hard against the uneven rock."Get up, rat," a hulking Nightfang sentry barked, kicking Damon roughly in the ribs.Damon whimpered, clutching his side as he scrambled to his knees. He was trembling from head to toe, sweat plastering his greasy hair to his forehead. He had run straight through the night, barely escaping Silverlake territory with his life, and now he was kneeling before a monster.Sitting on a throne was Alpha Garrett.Garrett was a towering brute of a werewolf, his chest crisscrossed with jagged scars from decades of border massacres. One of his milk
Ethan's POVMy desk looked like a disaster zone. Folders, border patrol reports, financial audits, and council petitions were piled high, practically burying the surface. For the past forty-eight hours, I hadn't slept more than twenty minutes at a stretch. Every time I closed my eyes, my head spun with the fallout from Vivian's trial, the elders' endless whining, and the sickening memory of Ruby looking at me like I was dirt beneath her boots.I rubbed my temples, groaning as the sting along my ribs flared up again. The silver burn was slowly knitting together, but the toxic ache went straight down to the bone.The doors of the war room banged open without warning.Marcus marched in, his face dead pale, completely skipping the usual formalities. He tossed a tablet right onto the center of my desk, knocking over a stack of memos."Ethan, we have a massive problem," Marcus said, his voice clipped and breathless.I straightened up, my Alpha senses instantly on high alert. "What happened?
Ruby’s POVI looked at the ceiling, staring at a water stain that shaped itself like a broken heart. It was funny, really. Or maybe it was just pathetic. My hands were resting on my stomach, pressing down hard as if I could somehow force the emptiness inside.The doctor had just left. His words we
Ethan’s POVI rubbed my temples as Vivian’s sobbing echoed through the speaker of my phone. She had been crying for the past twenty minutes, her voice high and breathless as she went over the details of what happened at the hospital again."She literally had the guards throw me out, Ethan," Vivian
Ruby’s POVA gasp tore out of my throat, and my hands flew to my mouth as the tears started flowing all over again. But this time, they weren't tears of grief. They were tears of shock.Emily let out a loud squeal next to me, her fingers squeezing mine so hard she was practically cutting off my cir
Ruby’s POVI didn't think. I just pushed the door open, the heavy wood swinging back until it hit the wall with a sharp thud.The sound cut through the room, and both of them froze. Ethan turned his head first, his dark eyes narrowing slightly when they landed on me. He didn't let go of Vivian righ







