I don’t place it at first. It registers somewhere at the back of my skull as I surface through the dark, and for a moment, I’m just aware of weight and warmth. Ethan tucked against my side. The slow rise and fall of breathing close by. My hand resting on Miranda’s waist.
Then the second howl comes.
One note, long, cut off, and clean.
I’m out of the bed before it fades.
That’s the alpha’s call.
Ethan stirs and resettles. I check him first, pulling the blanket up over his shoulder. Then I look at Miranda. She hasn’t moved. Hair across her cheek, breathing deep and even, still folded into the same position she fell asleep in.
It’s seven in the morning. I grab my phone from the nightstand.
The screen lights up, and I go still. Fourteen missed calls. Eleven from Coach Ramirez. Three from a familiar name. It’s the law firm that handled my divorce from Vanessa. The timestamps start at four in the morning.
I pull the door shut behind me and bound down the steps, pulling on my shirt. As soon as I enter the kitchen, I see Alpha Ramirez on the porch, shirtless, the remnants of a shift stillvisible in the tension across his shoulders. He’s not alone. Next to him is another shifter, Sterling Blaine, my divorce attorney. He’s dressed in a suit, not a hair out of place, his hands in his pockets.
My stomach twists at the sight of him. This cannot be good.
I unlock the door, and as I slide it open, Leon hits me on the back of the head before I can get a single word out.
“Eleven calls,” he growls. “What were you? Dead?”
I wince, rubbing the spot. “I was asleep.”
“You were asleep.” He says it like I’ve just told him I was on the moon.
“It was a long day, Coach!” I glare at him. “What are you doing here so early in the morning?” My gaze settles on Sterling. “I was hoping to never see you again. What’s happened?”
Sterling gives me a wry smile. “I wasn’t planning to come here in person, but since you weren’t answering your phone, I contacted Alpha Ramirez. We have a situation.”
“What kind of situation?” I ask slowly.
“Have you seen the news this morning?” Coach demands.
“I just woke up,” I grumble. “I only saw your missed calls and came down here.”
“Then you need to look at this.” Sterling holds out his phone.
It’s a news article with my name in the headline. Below it is a photograph.
I recognize it instantly. Not the photograph but when it was taken. The day I ran into Miranda at the park. I’m holding Ethan in my arms, the baseball cap over his head. Miranda is standing next to us. Ethan’s face is visible, as is mine, but Miranda has her back to the camera.
My body tightens like a bowstring.
Somebody photographed my child. My son who is supposed to be invisible to this world for six more years.
“How did this happen?” I demand harshly. “I don’t take him anywhere with foot traffic. I’ve been careful ever since you told me to expose him to the human world, Coach. No crowded spaces. Even the park was easy to be invisible in since there were so many kids.”
My alpha grimaces. “Vanessa.”
I go completely still.
“There are more photographs. She has been having you followed for a while now. There’s no doubt about it. She fed the photos to three separate news outlets last night. Our contact at the news desk confirmed this morning that it came from her.”
I stare at him, trying to process all this.
I had just been drafted for the pack’s hockey team when Vanessa began pursuing me. We were married for two years before Ethan came along and she decided I wasn’t good enough for her. She hasn’t contacted me since the divorce, not even to ask after our son, although that part doesn’t surprise me. She wasn’t exactly the most doting mother even though she was good at presenting herself as such.
