جميع فصول : الفصل -الفصل 40

ETHANThe bullet was meant for me.I knew it the second I saw the angle of the wound. Whoever had fired was positioned to the left, and I'd been standing in front of Freya, but I turned away from her for exactly one second when she said my name. One second was all it had taken.She'd moved into the path of the bullet without knowing.I picked her up and ran.I didn’t even remember most of the run to the vehicle. I remember my hands were soaked and the world felt like it was going by very slowly while I was moving very fast through it. I remember my men flanking me without a word. I remember Orin's voice somewhere behind us telling someone to clear the way.The hospital was twenty minutes from the arena, but I made it in twelve. The next few hours were the worst of my life and that was saying something because I'd had a lot of very bad ones.I sat in a corridor outside the surgical ward with blood drying on my hands and while my wolf was absolutely furious at the walls between him and

ETHANThere were twelve wolves in the trees, maybe more that I couldn't see yet.I was already running through options and none of them were great. Fighting our way out meant leaving Freya exposed. Waiting meant letting them tighten the circle until we had no room left."The tunnels," Freya said from behind me.I turned."The old tunnels your grandfather built. They go from the cellar out past the trees, don't they?" She was already walking to the kitchen, moving toward the cellar door. "Are they still usable?"I hadn't been through them in about three years. "They should be.""Then let's go."I grabbed what mattered, which wasn't much. My phone on the table, the small blade in my jacket pocket, Freya's coat from the hook by the door. She took it without saying anything and pulled it on over her hospital clothes, and we went to the cellar.The hatch was under the kitchen floorboards, exactly where my grandfather had put it forty years ago. I pulled it up and the smell of old earth cam

ETHANI knew the letters were fake from the moment I picked one up.I didn't say that in the hearing room because saying it without proof just made me look defensive. But I knew. The sentences were slightly off. David Morgan had been a very precise man, and I'd read enough of his public communications to know how he wrote. The letters Brian presented were close but not quite right, as if someone had studied him carefully and still missed something small.The question was proving it.The Norwood Pack had their own analysts. Whatever we produced, they'd counter. We needed something original and undeniable.Which meant the archive.The Morgan family archive was in a building that had technically been controlled by Norwood Pack for the last three years, but it fell under the neutral territory, which meant both packs had the right to access it.I arranged to access it that evening for two hours, with a Northern Pack representative present.Freya had barely spoken to me all day.She'd been

ETHANI tripled security within the hour.My men were everywhere including all entrances to the ceremony grounds, the trees, and the main road. I pulled in twelve additional wolves from the Northern Pack's inner guard and put two of my best fighters in plainclothes at the edges of the crowd. I walked through the whole place myself twice before I was satisfied.Almost satisfied."You're going to wear a groove in the ground," Fen said beside me. He was my head of security and had been for three years. He was very dependable and very good at pretending to look relaxed when he wasn't."Someone got a note into her apartment," I said."I know. I'm looking at that.""They got past four guards.""I know that too," he said, less comfortably."Find out how. And find out who wrote the note because they might be on our side."He nodded and moved off. Then I went back inside.Freya was fully ready when I went to her.She was wearing a dress in the Northern Pack’s deep blue color. It was so beautif

ETHANThe first attack came before noon.Three of the wolves at our border sent an alert from the eastern edge of the territory. A Norwood scouting party had crossed the line, six wolves in total, moving fast and in an organized formation. Brian wasn't wasting any time."Gear up," I told Fen. "I want ten wolves at the eastern border in the next twenty minutes. Non-lethal if possible. I don't want to be the one who draws blood first.""Understood."Freya was already in the main hall when I came out, dressed and armed, with her hair pulled back and that look on her face that I'd come to recognize. She was calm on the outside, but her mind was working really fast underneath."I'm coming," she said."Freya—""I'm your Luna." Her voice was completely steady. "I know I have a fresh bite on my shoulder from last night but I'm still standing. So I'm coming."There were about fifteen pack members in earshot, and I watched every single one of them react to that. She said it simply, without try