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I scoff and wave him off. “You don’t have a leg to stand on. And you dragged me out here just to listen to your weak arguments and petty threats. What a fucking waste of time. Goodbye, cousin.”
I turn my back on him and shift, and my wolf’s emotions blast through me. His intense anger mixes with mine, merging into a restless need to get back to her. Gage is fucking psychotic if he thinks I’m giving Astra over to him.
Our muscles flex as we sprint through the underbrush. My wolves are on either side of me, spreading out, but they enjoy the run. I’m trying to stem the flow of underlying rage and panic.
We won’t let her out of our sight, I tell my wolf.
He doesn’t seem impressed by that. I know it’s not enough for him. This danger is very clearly present. Gage’s nature makes him unpredictable. And I do not like things I can’t foresee.
Seer, my wolf says.
Yeah, well. If we had a Seer, we wouldn’t have Astra.
I let him take more control and draw back, mulling it over. When I take Astra out of here, we need to go in the opposite direction of Gage’s territory. He wouldn’t risk my ire by crossing through mine, but he would seize every opportunity to take her on neutral land.
That went interestingly, Roman says when we cross back into Silver Ridge Pack land.
I glance at him. He thinks he has the upper hand. He’s only known our pack as an ally.
Our fathers made it that way. Said we could either drive each other extinct or figure out a way to coexist. The brothers did it. So have we…
Go figure he’d lose his cool over my witch.
The wolf chuffs in my head at the possession, and I grimace.
We slow to a nice lope before we break the tree line, and I sense a visitor at my house before I see her. We round the warehouse, and I sigh.
Jessamine camps out on my front porch. Her annoyance is broadcast loud and clear, even from here. It could be because Roman asked her to babysit the witch instead of accompanying us. She’s already barefoot, but she jumps to her feet as soon as she sees us, shedding her clothes.
“Run with me,” she says to Roman’s wolf.
She shifts before he or I can get a word in, trotting off with her tail swishing.
Just before my porch, I shift. I tug on the folded sweatpants my sister left for me and head into the house. The screen door slams behind me, and I immediately pause.
There’s a distinct smell of something burning.
My hackles go up. I glance around the space carefully, not wanting to miss a shadow—or an ambush. It’s not the sweet, rotting scent that always accompanies demons. I follow it into the kitchen, where the smell worsens. I have to pinch my nose shut and breathe through my mouth to even get through it—but somehow, that’s worse. The smell has a taste.
Thick black smoke pours out of the closed oven door.
An oven I don’t think I’ve used in years.
We eat in the lodge with everyone else. And if I don’t want to be social, one of my wolves delivers food to me. I keep some of it stocked in the fridge just in case.
“Astra,” I yell, turning off the oven before it erupts in flames.
She comes around the corner and stops short. She’s in a new t-shirt, one of the ones from her pack that I tossed at her last night, and jeans. Jeans that hug her curves and hips. Her hair is pulled over her shoulder in a braid that starts at the crown of her head.
The last thing I want to do is find her beautiful, but here I am. Struggling not to gape at her like a moron.
Her eyes widen. “What is that smell?”
“Did you turn on the oven?” I bark.
She wasn’t even in the room, and she almost burned the house down. A fire could’ve easily cut off her access to the stairs or the front door. She’s human. An injured one, at that. How would she fare jumping out of a second story window?
My wolf whines.
