Jane’s POVI hadn’t been able to face Hunter this morning when he’d come to get the boys for Alpha training. I still felt awful about how I’d behaved last night, but it had taken everything I had not to shatter in front of them. I’d tried to help them with their homework – not that they ever really needed it – but I’d ended up staring blankly at the piece of paper I’d been planning to use to map out my muddled thoughts.In the end, I’d not even told Ares and Owen that Colin had gone. If I’d started to tell them, I would’ve cried. They didn’t deserve to have their own mother sobbing about her problems to them. Everything was hitting me all at once. I felt like I’d survived the hits I’d taken so far, like I’d managed to bounce back after each and every one, but this was the final straw for me.Even Colin had been out for himself, out to get me. After sleeping on it, I knew I had to pull myself together – and fast. After training was over, I would demand Hunter told me everything he kn

Jane’s POVIt was my worst nightmare made manifest. ‘Nina, we have to find them. Is there any way we can track them without their scents? They must have been taken from here.’ I shook my head to myself. ‘But why were they out here? Was it training? I have to talk to Hunter.’I hated that, hated it more than anything. I didn’t want to rely on him, but I had to know more before I ran off, half-crazed, high on hope and desperation but with no plan in place. I’d wasted too much time already; my next move had to be deliberate, purposeful.Nina didn’t reply.‘Nina?’ I frowned. ‘Are you listening? We have to go, we have to find them–’Her loud howl eclipsed my words. ‘Nina?’ I tried talking to her again, but then I felt it, too.It was more potent than anything I’d felt in years. The faintest trace of an old smell, long forgotten but immediately remembered, filled my nostrils and then filtered down into the belly of my soul. It was woodsy, like pine sap and dew-damp moss, like the fresh sce

Jane’s POVI felt the hold Amy’s hypnosis had on me snap the moment Hunter bit down onto the curve of my neck. His teeth dug in; blood spurted from the wound; like a burst of bright white light, it flared and then vanished.Since Nina had come back to me, it felt like I’d been taken by the hand, led towards a deep, clear lake – and away from the clutches of the hypnosis. Step by step, I’d been eased away from its cruel grip. Then, when he’d marked me as his, I’d not only reached the lake’s edge but dived right in.It had washed away everything. My innate hatred for him was gone. My heart could feel as it chose now, and it chose him.He held me. I lay, serene, in his arms, embraced by the soft heat of the mate bond as much as I was by him. I palmed his muscular chest and listened to the gentle whooshing of our breaths. In and out. In and out. In and–My sons were missing.I froze.I’d forgotten about them. In the heat of the moment, I’d completely and utterly forgotten that they were g

Jane’s POVI followed Carl around to the back of the pack house. It was pretty, all rose bushes and trailing ivy, and made prettier still by the gossamer sunshine dancing across the myriad of leaves and flowers.I ignored all of that beauty. I could’ve been walking into a dark and dingy cellar for all I cared. My mind was too distracted, split apart into factions: my missing sons, my stolen daughter, Daisy herself, my mate bond with Hunter, and Nina’s arrival. Everything had happened so fast I’d barely had time to take a breath between it all. And now Carl was here. That was just great.But if I could be clever, and use my words carefully, and see if he knew anything about my taken sons, and daughter, I realised a painful heartbeat later, then this new distraction would be worth it. I hoped.My mind spun as I realised that not only my sons had been taken, but my daughter, too. In all of the hurt and betrayal I’d barely started to consider the real ramifications of Daisy’s deception.

Hunter’s POVI expected for my world to spin off its axis at those words – but it didn’t. In fact, I felt very little. Nothing at all.I’d never clicked with Obie. I’d always been drawn to Ava but never to him. In my mind, she’d been my daughter and Obie had been Amy’s son. Huh. Now I knew why.That was why I fixed Carl with a cold stare and said flatly, “I know.”Compared to the other revelations I’d been through lately – hell, even in just the last few hours – this barely made me bat an eye. Maybe it was because I cared about Jane and Ava and her sons, but maybe it was because, deep down, I really didn’t care about Amy or Obie. ‘Hunter!’ gasped Reg. ‘How can you think that about a poor, innocent baby?’‘That’s the thing. I don’t think anything about him. Anyway, he’s nothing to do with me. Not really. That takes the matter out of my hands, don’t you think?’Reg muttered under his breath that I was horrible and unfeeling, and that was probably also true, but I still couldn’t make my