NIKOLAIWhen I stepped into the gym Saturday morning, ready to take over training from Sasha, I immediately noticed something was off. Half the group was missing.I scanned the room, my brows knitting together. “Where are the women?”Sasha barely looked up from adjusting the wraps on his wrists. “Your girl took them.”I stilled. “My girl?” I repeated, leveling a pointed look at him.His lips twitched into a smirk. “Theresa.”I exhaled sharply, rolling my shoulders to keep from reacting. I wanted to smack that look right off his face, but I held back, reminding myself that I’d promised myself to be a better friend.“Ha. Funny.” My voice was flat. It wasn’t funny. Not even a little. “Where are they?”“Outside.”Without another word, I turned on my heel to figure out what was going on. I pushed open the heavy entryway door and was greeted by a chilling wind biting the exposed parts of my skin. It was certainly not warm today. I followed the tracks in the snow to what was likely a field d
NIKOLAI“Are you okay?” Terri’s touch on my arm jolted me back to reality. I hadn’t even realized how far my thoughts had drifted. “You seem…” She studied me, her brows drawing together. “Angry? Sad? I’m trying to figure it out. Maybe… jealous?”My head snapped up. “What?” I barked, taking a step back.Her eyes widened slightly, and she winced. “Sorry. Sometimes I speak without thinking.”I exhaled through my nose, forcing myself to steady my expression. “Why do you think I feel that?”She hesitated, glancing down at her hands. “I don’t know. I just… sense it.”Sense it? A muscle in my jaw ticked. “What does that mean?”“Never mind.” She let out a nervous laugh. “Forget I said anything. I’m obviously just being crazy.”Crazy? No.Because if I was honest with myself, she was right. The thought sat heavy in my chest, a truth I wasn’t ready to confront. I considered pressing her further, demanding how she knew, how she saw through me so easily. But that would mean admitting what had been
GINGERWhen Tyce dropped me off on Sunday morning for another day of training with Sara, I was greeted by a rare smile.“Do I have a surprise for you!” She practically squealed.“More sparring?” I deadpanned.“Better!” she replied in earnest. “Come come. I’ve been saving him all night for you!”“Him?” I questioned. Was she going to make me fight one of her warriors? Maybe I’d have half a chance for once.“Oh yes. Found him about fifty kilometers outside your pack. Clearly waiting for someone to go out for a little run. But I caught him!” She smiled wide, displaying all her perfectly maintained teeth. She looked almost maniacal, with an evil glint in her eyes. And oddly peppy.“What do you mean you caught him?” I swallowed.She winked at me and pulled open a heavy metal door that I’d never noticed before. Probably because it was at the end of a dark hallway I’d never gone down previously. Suddenly I was very aware of my breathing. I tried to keep it even, not to give away the bad feel
GINGERI took a deep breath. My mind was blanking. What was I supposed to ask him? He looked so pathetic at that moment. I almost felt bad for him.“He. Wants. To. Murder. Your. Mate,” Sara emphasized.“Why do you want to murder my mate?” I blurted out, feeling put on the spot.He stared at us and didn’t say anything. Sara chortled.“Thinks being silent will save him and his pack.” Sara stepped forward. “Dumbass.” Before I could process what she was saying, she had her knife shoved so deep into his stomach her hand was practically inside it. High pitched shrieks echoed off the walls, floor, and ceiling. I clutched at my stomach as blood spluttered out of his. “First time you’ve been penetrated, eh?” Sara said as she pulled the knife out. “It’s okay, after the first time it only gets better and better.” She chuckled. “At least for me.”At first, I just felt cold. An unnatural cold, one that seeped into my bones despite the warm basement air. Then, my head started to ache, a dull throb
GINGER“Now your turn,” Sara said.Could I refuse?Her dark eyes burned into me as she waited for me to take the knife.What had I gotten myself into?“Take it, Gigi. Do it for Tyce.”My hand shook as I extended it. I forced myself palm to wrap around the handle. I was trembling so much, I almost dropped it, barely able to get a grip on it. I wrapped my other hand around the first just to make sure I wouldn’t.“Now, ask him something. If he answers, we can give him a break. But if not…” She smiled widely at him, leaving his fate unspoken.“Are you trying to take over my pack?” I asked. Please answer, please answer, please answer.But he didn’t. He continued to hold his silence.“We’ve got a stubborn one,” Sara said. “My absolute favorite.”To be fair, it did seem he was starting to relent. When I’d first entered the chamber, he’d seemed tougher. He was a tall, robust man. But something in his face showed the uncertainty he saw about the future of this exercise. I could see why someone
NIKOLAIEarly on Tuesday morning, I jumped into the hot shower before it was time to leave. They say a full moon can make one do crazy things. And in our culture, we were especially affected by the first full moon of the year—the wolf moon. It was days away. And there was no reason to believe that a sunrise couldn’t affect us much the same. Especially after having lived in persistent darkness for so long. I’d practically forgotten that there was a time in my life that I’d walked under the sun’s rays.As planned, I met Terri at the dining table that morning, munching on some buttered toast. “Shh, don’t tell my mom.” Terri winked at me and giggled. I stared at her, not sure what she expected me to tell her mom. That I was taking her on a private adventure? Her mother would be elated at the news.I continued into the kitchen, where I heated up a pre-prepped breakfast sandwich that Tasha always had on hand for the alphas when we’d be up early for training. I fumbled with the fancy Nespres
NIKOLAI The wind whipped around us, lifting fine dust from the snow and swirling it in the air, obscuring the path ahead. But I pushed forward, relying on my nose instead of my eyes. From when I’d first gotten my wolf, I’d always had a strong sense of direction. Once I traveled a path, the scent stayed with me, etched in my memory like a map. My mother had been the same. Something hitched in my throat at the thought of her. Although I had remained calm that morning, Terri had ascertained correctly that it was difficult to hear of others' mothers and to be reminded of her. What I wouldn’t give to hear her strong opinions today, as much as they had always annoyed me. Terri came closer and whimpered. My attention instantly went to her. What had happened? Was she okay? Nothing seemed amiss. I tilted my head at her in question. But she just looked at me with puppy eyes, as if she could sense what I had been feeling and her own mood sobered correspondingly. It was eerie. But I pushed it
NIKOLAITerri pranced along the perimeter of the summit, radiating pure joy. It was infectious. A force tugged at something buried deep within me. Slowly, a rare smile crept across my face, waking muscles that had lain dormant for ages. Then it hit me—a realization so startling it shocked me to my core. I was happy.I couldn’t remember who started it—whether it was an unspoken agreement or some shared, instinctive understanding—but before long, we were play wrestling each other, rolling around in the snow, barking and growling with delight. I nipped at her dark fur—fur that was full and glossy under the sun’s rays. Absolutely stunning. She licked at my face and I returned the affectionate gesture. Before long, our tongues were touching, licking at each other as we lay on our sides. Our paws rested against each other’s faces, and our hind legs tangled. Heat radiated throughout my body, but I refused to advance things further. Especially when she couldn’t verbally confirm it was what sh
NIKOLAIThe warriors continued to battle the terrible conditions well after Tyce and I had given up, working late into the night. But, in the end, they had no better luck than we had. Any scent of a werewolf that may have existed at some point was wiped away by the storm. Sophia was gone, vanished along with her scent.“You look like shit,” Tyce remarked the moment I stepped into his office the next morning.I dropped into the chair across from him with a heavy sigh. “I haven’t slept in two nights.”Tyce lifted his head, finally making eye contact. His sharp gaze flickered over me. After a long pause, he leaned back and folded his arms across his chest. "You really do care about her, don’t you?"I nodded in confirmation.Silence settled between us as we both sank into our chairs. Tyce lifted his coffee mug, taking a slow sip. I drank mine too—more out of habit than necessity. The caffeine had long stopped working, but at least it gave my hands something to do.Tyce finally broke the s
NIKOLAITyce’s hands trembled at his sides. His shoulders rose and fell unevenly, like he was barely keeping himself together. For a moment again, he looked young and lost, like a boy whose world was unraveling piece by piece. But he quickly shook his head and straightened his shoulders."I’ll do my best. I promise." Tyce’s voice was raw, quieter than before. His fingers flexed at his sides before he turned away, blinking hard. I recognized the move. The sheer, bone-deep exhaustion of trying to keep it together when everything inside you was falling apart. Finally, he turned back and said, “Give me something with her scent on it. Alpha Nikolai will help too.”Sophia’s father rushed back into the house, returning seconds later with a winter hat. He handed it to Tyce, who passed it straight to me.I took a deep breath, inhaling the Sophia’s scent, locking it into memory before handing it back.I was sure Tyce felt the same as I did. Someone had reached Sophia before we could. And now, s
NIKOLAIThe silence between us stretched thick and suffocating, broken only by the rhythmic tapping of Tyce’s fingers against the wooden desk and the occasional muffled sound of a voicemail message cutting in and out.Every few minutes, he tried again. Calling. Mindlinking. His expression flickered between frustration and outright fury every time the connection failed.Each passing minute felt like an hour.Tyce was relentless. Again and again, he dialed, pressing on the chosen contact of the moment, only to be met with the same voicemail box recording. Calling and mindlinking like a maniac.I couldn’t deny I wouldn’t have done the same. I just didn’t have the same means to attempt contact. So, I determined, my job, albeit impossible, was to attempt to keep him calm.Honestly, I wasn’t doing any better. My mind screamed for action, but all I could do was sit there, forcing myself to remain still. I kept blocking out the worst-case scenarios. If I let myself think about Terri in the ha
GINGERAs I woke, I fought against a dull, aching exhaustion pressing down on me like dead weight. My eyelids felt impossibly heavy. My mouth was dry, my head pounding. Every muscle in my body throbbed with soreness, as if I’d run a marathon the day before.This has to be the worst hangover of my life.Slowly, the fog in my mind began to clear. I inhaled the scent of crisp air and wet earth. Was I outdoors? I groaned, trying to roll over. A sharp clink echoed through the silence.My eyes snapped open.Coldness nipped at my skin—no, at my fur. My stomach dropped as my sluggish brain scrambled to make sense of it.The room—was it even a room?—was cloaked in darkness, the only illumination coming from the faint glow of my red night vision. The outlines of my surroundings took shape: cold, empty space, stone walls, and metal bars blocking the only exit. The scent of damp earth and frost hung heavy in the air.I tried to move, but the harsh clink of metal stopped me short. I looked down. M
TYSONI finally understood what it meant to straddle the edge of sanity and madness.I hadn’t slept in days. The world around me felt surreal, like I was walking through a dream—or nightmare. Every time I bumped into a wall or grazed a piece of furniture, I’d catch myself wondering why I hadn’t just passed through it. I felt like a ghost, a shadow of myself. Losing Gigi was like losing my purpose. Without her, what was the point of any of this? I scrolled through our old messages, rereading the last text she sent me:Gigi: Love you, send you some snaps laterAs if the words might change. As if they could tell me where she was now.But the screen remained the same. No new messages. Just a string of my frantic ones.They say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Well, here I was, proving it. I must have called and texted both Gigi and Terri a thousand times. At this point, my fingers were moving on autopilot. The result
NIKOLAIAs feared, by the next morning, Tyce still hadn’t heard from Gigi or Terri. The thick and suffocating dread was settling in. It was looking to be less and less a case of a couple of lost cell phones.While everyone else was at the morning temple service, Sasha and I met Tyce in his office, where he was seated in the same spot I’d left him the night prior.Tyce looked exactly how I felt, like hell. His eyes were bloodshot, shadowed by dark circles. His hair was even more disheveled than it had been the prior day. Overgrown stubble dusted his jawline. He appeared a ghost of his former self—an alpha taken down by his biggest weakness.He arrived in the same clothes he’d worn the prior day, now wrinkled from his clearly sleepless night. The muffled sound of a generic voicemail box rang through the air.He let out a heavy breath and rubbed his temples before running a hand through his hair. “Flight conditions are still a no-go,” Tyce muttered in a voice that was rough with exhausti
NIKOLAITyce leaned back in his chair, dragging his hands back and forth through his dark hair. The movement left pieces of it sticking up in all different directions.“I just wish…” He trailed off, exhaling sharply. “I just wish I’d marked her.” His voice cracked. “I wanted to. But she was adamant about waiting until marriage. She didn’t want to look bad in front of our parents.” He let out a bitter laugh, shaking his head. “That shit’s so outdated. It’s not like they don’t already know what we’re up to.”His shoulders sagged as he let out a heavy sigh. The weight of his regret was palpable. “If she were marked,” he rasped in a raw voice, “I’d at least know where she is. I could feel her. I’d know she was safe. But…” His voice faltered, splintering into something dark and helpless.Crack! With a strangled roar, he slammed his fists against the desk. The violent sound shot through the room.I flinched. Not at the outburst, but at the raw emotions and vulnerability it exposed. I knew e
NIKOLAI“I don’t understand! Where the fuck is she?” Tyce’s booming voice echoed down the hallway as I stepped through the front door on Sunday evening, sweat still cooling on my skin after hours spent pushing my body to exhaustion. I walked further into the packhouse and his voice became louder as I proceeded. “We need to get that plane out tonight. I need to go to Anchorage immediately.”I followed the sound of his shouting, rounding the corner, to find a red-faced Tyce with bulging eyes in the common area, fists clenching and unclenching at his sides.Across from him, Beta Liam stood firm, arms crossed, with a calm but unreadable face.“Tyce, it’s not possible,” Liam said with a measured tone, a stark contrast to the storm raging inside the alpha.Tyce’s chest heaved. His nostrils flared. “I don’t care if we crash the fucking plane,” he snarled. “I have to get to her. Do you understand? She’s out there, and we’re just standing here, doing nothing!”Liam’s jaw tightened, but his voi
GINGERShe walked off, joining the line for the bathroom down the hall. I was about to take a seat when Grace appeared beside me.“Hey, can I get you something else to drink?” she asked.“Oh no, I’m good. This is probably my last one,” I replied.“How’s your friend?”“She’s fine. She just went to the bathroom.”“You’re not leaving, are you? We just got here!”“No, no, she wants to stay,” I assured her. “I can introduce you when she gets back.”A man approached us and stood next to Grace. I struggled to remember his name. Bill? Brian? Ben? Something with a B.“Hey, do you wanna?” he asked, tapping his right nostril meaningfully.“Gigi, have you tried it before?” Grace placed her hand on my arm in a friendly gesture.I shook my head.“Oh, you have to. It’s amazing—it makes you feel so good, like you don’t have a care in the world. You’ve gotta try it!”The idea was tempting. I’d missed out on trying coke at my bachelorette party, which I’d always hoped would have been much wilder than i