Ryan pushes at the mindlink, but I block him out. Ineedto run. Ryan keeps pushing, so I finally let him in. It’s only going to keep distracting me otherwise. Plus, we might be friends, but he’s still my alpha. “Lunar Eclipse has been your home for your whole life, Jack. Same as me and Luca. I understand how important the pack is to you.” I don’t respond, there’s no need to. Of course the pack is important to me. It’s my home and I’ve rarely left. Why would I want to go anywhere else anyway?
Ryan keeps talking through the mind link about how he gets it. We have something special here. Something worth protecting. “You don’t need to tell me that,” I snap through the link. “I might have fucked up before, to an almighty level, but I’ll never let anyone threaten the pack again.”
“I know you won’t. But I want you to realize you don’t have to kill yourself to do that. We haven’t had an attack since that night. We have the best trained warriors on the entirewest coast, thanks to the time you have put in. But at some point, you’re going to have to take a step back from this schedule you have yourself on.”
I don’t reply.
How can I? He doesn’t get it. I can never allow myself to get complacent. Never be responsible for anything like what I brought to the pack seven years ago.
I’m about two hours into my patrol when I pick up an unfamiliar scent; sharp, sweet and delicious, and definitely not belonging here. I mindlink Ryan and Luca, warning them that the pack borders have been breached and we need to prepare for the worst.
As Alpha, Ryan is caring and worries about everyone, including other packs. He is always trying to build alliances and lately he has been visiting other packs a lot more. He is most likely to know where she is from. Luca, our other best friend and pack Beta, is gruffer and a hell of a lot less friendly to outsiders. He balances Ryan’s almost too kind approach.
My mind races through all the possibilities as my wolf leaps into action, galloping toward the scent. It’s mouthwatering; sweet and altogether too enticing. But I’m not going to let myself get distracted from finding its source just because the scent is so damn appealing.
It doesn’t take long for me to find what I’m looking for because right in front of me is a tiny white she-wolf. She’s so small that she could pass for a regular wolf. I recognize her scent is juvenile now that I’m closer, which means she’s under twenty-one. Shit, she’s so little, she must be a child.
A child shouldn’t be a threat to the pack, but they also shouldn’t have made it inside the pack borders without the warriors noticing. What is she doing here? It could be a diversion or a trap. With a surge of urgency, I send a mindlink to the warriors, demanding increased vigilance against any outsiders who might be lurking. There will be hell to pay tomorrow when I tear into them for letting a fucking unknown child onto the pack lands. But we need to the determine the level of threat first.
I’m on high alert, but I don’t sense any other unfamiliar threats around. I bring my attention back to the wolf in front of me.
She’s not in good shape. Her white fur is a mess of dirt and dried blood. Her back leg is mangled, dragging uselessly behind her. My wolf is whimpering at the thought of her out here, alone and injured. I can’t comprehend how, but something about her makes him certain that she’s not a threat to the pack.
My wolf is telling me she needs our help. I inch closer to her and notice her looking all around. Her eyes are wide, and her fur is standing on edge everywhere it hasn’t been matted with blood. She’s a shifter, but I’m going to treat her as a wounded animal because she’s that, too.
Luca and Ryan arrive and toss me a pair of shorts, so I dip behind a tree to shift into my human form. Sometimes nudity can’t be helped for shifters but we usually try to keep it to a minimum here.
The little wolf’s panic seems to have gone through the roof at the arrival of a beta and alpha wolf. She emits a high-pitched whining noise. Even if she’s still a child, she can sense their dominance, and she's shaking violently under the weight of it. The idea of her being any real threat shrivels and dies the second I see her trying—and failing—to stand her ground. She must know she hasn't a hope. Instead, she lowers her body, tucking her tail, and gazing at the ground, avoiding eye contact.
My wolf part wants to take care of her, but the human part of me is perturbed. What if she’s a distraction? Shit, what if it’s a trap and now I’ve got the Alpha, Beta, and Delta of the pack here and away from the more vulnerable members? I mindlink Ryan with my thoughts, but he shakes his head.
“Excuse me, miss, are you okay?” Ryan calls out.
“I don’t like this,” Luca says. He is looking around and scenting the air. He shares the same suspicions as I do.
The little wolf can’t even look at them and she won’t be able to communicate by mindlink in wolf form because she’s not from our pack. That thought sobers me again. I don’t know her or her motives for being here. But I can’t afford to get taken in by her lost puppy act.
My fists clench, the frustration burning in my veins, as I wrestle with the conflicting emotions of protective rage and bitter mistrust. I see her looking around and backing away from us. I can’t let her leave. Either she’s dangerous or she needs our help, and we need to find out which. I’m sure Ryan will let me take the lead on this. As Delta, pack security is my responsibility. Something I’ve learned to treat very fucking seriously at all times.
“You’re going to need to come with us. We can take you to our pack doctor and get that leg looked at,” I encourage. Hopefully, I sound helpful rather than suspicious regardless of my suspicions. “Can you shift into your human form so we cantalk?”
She shakes her head and continues to back away, but she’s dead on her feet. One of her back legs drags behind her at an awkward angle. There’s no way she could run away from us.
“We need you to shift, sweetheart,” Ryan says, voice soft but firm. “You can’t communicate otherwise and we need to talk to you.”
As Alpha, his instincts drive him to help those weaker. He has shown over and over that he struggles to see any level of suffering without stepping in. It’s part of what makes him an amazing alpha, but right now, it’s making me anxious. I just feel like he needs to look at other possibilities, too. He glances at Luca, and I can see the frustration he is feeling in his eyes. The little wolf trembles but she shows no signs of shifting into her human form.
“Just do it, no point killing time,” Luca growls. Ryan rolls his head from side to side. He’s weighing up the options.
“Shift, now,” Ryan says, applying his alpha command. It’s only a hint at his full aura, but I can see the impact viscerally as it crashes over her.
She shakes and twists, trying to resist, but there’s no point; in less than a minute, she shifts into her human form. Sitting on the ground, she wraps her arms around her chest and draws her good leg towards her. I cringe as I realize this is an attempt to cover her body. Her tiny, but definitely not childlike, body. And fuck, we’re three ranked male shifters standing around a tiny omega.
A tiny,nakedomega.
“Shirt,” I growl at Luca while moving to block her body from my friends. I’m taking a risk putting my back to her, but this isn’t right. She deserves dignity even if she could be a threat.
“Shit, sorry. I’m an asshole,” Ryan sighs while rubbing his hand down his face.
