Rhiannon’s POVI stormed up the stairs to Alpha Caleb’s office, rage brewing like a growl of thunder in my belly. I was a hurricane made manifest; I was anger and wrath; I was– ‘Cool it, Hurricane Rhiannon.’ Tiger snorted. ‘You need to keep your head if you want to get the answers you need.’I took a moment to gather myself. ‘You’re right,’ I agreed reluctantly, slumping down on the arm of a sofa on the first floor. ‘Wow, agreeing with me on the first try? You really must be worried,’ she said, her voice light and teasing but undercut with a gentleness I recognised as the first strains of pity. I knotted my hands together and sighed. ‘I am. What if…’ I blinked back tears I hadn’t expected to cry. ‘What if Dad was the wolf who was poisoned?’‘I don’t know,’ she said simply. My breathing sounded disturbingly moist. I clenched my hands into fists and stood up. Sitting around thinking wasn’t going to get me anywhere good. I needed to act. ‘Come on,’ I muttered, searching for the spark

Hyacinth’s POVIt was when I saw them all at breakfast, Flint, Calcus, Bella, and Holly, that I knew. Dad should be back. He should be here – but he wasn’t. Maybe Rhiannon wouldn’t want to go and try to see Alpha Caleb again, but it was the only option I had left. Dad would have told us he was going somewhere. Dad would have left a note. Dad would have –‘Your dad would never have done this,’ Dolly said with a huff. ‘Come on, queen! You march straight in there and give them what for.’I managed a small smile. ‘What for?’She nodded sagely. ‘You’ve got it!’I applied my strawberry lip balm, then popped my lips at myself in my bedroom mirror. “I’ve got this,” I said aloud, and Dolly cheered in my head. I straightened my clothes, layering pink over pink, and jogged down the stairs after tucking my short hair just-so behind my ears.Stephen poked his head out of Rhiannon’s bedroom as I was about to leave. “Hey, Cin?”My heart leapt. I spun around eagerly – too eagerly – and beamed at him

Hyacinth’s POVI shuffled back until my back pressed against the wall. “All of it?” I joked weakly. “So unicorns are really real?”“Cin,” she sighed. I bit my lip. “I heard the two of you together. I thought it was the Luna, but then you came out…” I looked up hesitantly. “What about Stephen?”“Goddess, I know.” Rhiannon dipped her head, strands of silver falling over her face as she sucked in a rasping breath.“He’s your mate,” I snapped, my own pain morphing into righteous anger. “How could you do that to him? How can you even look at another guy after feeling the mate bond snap into place? I thought–”She cut me off. “Because Stephen isn’t my real mate.”And I felt like my world imploded. What in all of the goddess’s green earth was that supposed to mean? I’d been there when they’d felt the mate bond join them together forever. I’d seen the way they’d been ever since: barely able to keep their hands off each other, staring at each other with those huge, adoring, puppy-dog eyes, g

Stephen's POV‘I’m going mad from hunger,’ I mindlinked to Brian, pacing back and forth across my family’s kitchen. I opened and closed the same pantry cupboard for the hundredth time, my stomach growling at me when it realised, as I already had, that there was not a scrap of food in the house. Not one single, solitary scrap.I’d had to get away from Rhiannon and Hyacinth for a little while. I’d felt awful leaving them – but it was for the best. I was losing my gosh-darn mind and being closed in on all sides by my mate and her sister had only been making things worse. Besides, they’d seemed happy enough to comfort each other. They shared a pain I would never wholly understand.‘You’re going mad because you’re a little rascal,’ retorted Brian, sniffing disdainfully at me. ‘The hunger isn’t new. Your infatuation with Hyacinth is.’“Oh, darn it all to heck.” I groaned, doubling over and scrubbing my hands over my head. I wished there was enough hair there for me to pull at. Anything to o

Rhiannon’s POV“I think we should move in together.”I gaped at Stephen. ‘He what?’ said Tiger, her eyes boggling as she stared at him. 'No, seriously, what did he just say?'‘My thoughts exactly.’ I’d just been sat in the cold with my dead dad, crying over his lifeless body, preparing mentally for his funeral tomorrow – and Stephen, the guy who had always known exactly what I needed when I needed it, was asking me to move in with him? Now?I opened and closed my mouth a few times, struggling to find the right words. I wasn’t sure where the fuck the balance between are you stable and thanks but no thanks was.Something sharp tugged on my heartstrings. I’d longed for this moment, once. Stephen and I had discussed getting our own little cabin in the Omega Quarters, how we’d share the cooking and cleaning, how we’d always have fresh flowers on the kitchen table, how he’d dance while he mopped the floors and how I’d sing while I scrubbed the dishes. It had been a beautiful dream, before.