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Chapter Twelve
Kane
“Clearly, you’re all nuts.” Charlie’s voice quivered, but she pushed on. “You must have the same delusional hope that my father had.” She paced toward the door. “You’ve seen me in my werebeast form, but not when I’m fully pumped up and lost to it. I’m a monster! Not in control. It’s not normal. It’s definitely not desirable. You don’t want to mate with a woman who can rip off your head with one swipe.”
There was a hollowness to her words that rang like insecurity mixed with disbelief. She knew her werebeast was glorious, but somewhere along the way, self-doubt had mixed into her psyche. She’d convinced herself that no male werewolf could want or handle her.
Of course, she was wrong. So, so wrong.
She huffed, forcing out a bitter-sounding laugh. “I know wolves like you, rogues and fighters, clawing your way to the top ruthlessly. You pound on your chests and bare your fangs, choosing might over brains. Your pack would never bow to a woman. There are too many fragile egos.” She was raving, ramping herself up so her body heaved. “Wolves die under my leadership.” Her voice cracked, but she pushed through. “I don’t know what kind of fucked up game you’re playing, but I’m not going to be part of it.”
Every werewolf in Canada had heard the story about Charlie and her uncle’s pack, but Levi had done more digging than the surface-level gossip that made Charlie out to be the bad guy. She’d connected with those wolves on a soul level, and they’d died for her, not because of her. It was loyalty that she’d inspired in them, and it was right that they’d stepped up to have her back in the face of her uncle’s demands. That was the kind of leadership that got things done. It was the kind of leadership our pack needed. We were desperate for it to achieve our goals. We needed her kind of power, inspiration, ability to unite.
But not if she was consumed by self-doubt.
Not if she was scared of her werebeast, which she was—and it showed.
Charlie continued toward the door, but she wasn’t walking fast, like she was daring one of us to stop her.
Levi let her go. Johnny tensed up but didn’t make a move to stop her. My legs vibrated with pent-up energy, the wolf in me wanting to tackle the stubborn woman before she made a huge mistake and left the compound. I pulled out my ace card instead and went for the gut.
“Sal killed your mother.” These were words that could only be said as bluntly as I’d said them, no sugarcoating now. “It was covered up by the family, not—” I raised a hand as she slowly turned, her glare like razors. “Not your father. He had no idea. I’m certain of that.”
Her fists were clenched and teeth grinding so hard that I could hear the movement of her jaw like saws against concrete. She was fighting to keep control, and part of me wanted to push her just to see the werebeast version of Charlie explode. Another part of me, the smarter half, knew that taunting her beast side out would be a death sentence.
“What proof do you have?” she growled, her eyes dark, shadowed by her fury.
“He did the same thing to our mother and orphaned us as pups.” Levi stepped forward to meet her head on. “Which we witnessed with our own eyes.”
She had been teaching us to hunt on a sunny summer day. Her dark fur had glistened in the pools of light that cascaded through the canopy of the woods. It was supposed to be all fun and games. And it was, until Sal came out of nowhere. Even though he was still a youth, he was also this big, black beast that chased her down, giving her no time to react or defend herself. He broke all the covenants that day when he ravaged her body. We thought he was a rogue wolf, insane with bloodlust. We had no idea at the time that he was the son of one of the most powerful alphas in the country—a werewolf who knew better.
We three cowered in the brush, watching the horrific death of our mother, who beseeched us with her eyes to stay hidden, who used her own abilities to speak in our thoughts to tell us that we were brave and that she loved us, despite the pain she must have felt as Sal gorged her guts from her belly and rolled in her blood. In the end, she was unrecognizable. No longer a wolf, her soul long gone.
It would take me ten years to find out the identity of that black wolf. By that point, he’d been ousted from his clan and was untouchable, if only because he was untraceable. But now he was back, and I, like my brothers, had a personal mission to ensure that he paid for what he’d done.
“My mother died when I was a child. Sal would have been seventeen.” Tears wet her eyes, but she didn’t let them fall. Instead, she roughly swiped her fist across her face. “They found her in the woods, as a wolf, her body mangled.” She gulped down the quiver so her next words were forceful. “You’re saying my stepbrother did that to her? Right under my father’s nose?”
“Charlie, Sal killed his own mother, too.” Levi’s voice was calm and matter-of-fact. “He has always sought ways to torture and humiliate the strongest female wolves. He’s the kind of wolf you’re talking about when you say ‘fragile egos’—the kind that won’t accept a female alpha.”
She couldn’t deny Levi’s words. We all knew that Sal was exactly the kind of wolf who couldn’t stand to have a female reigning over him in any way. He was all about forceful dominance, and that stemmed from fear. He’d made a lot of enemies over the years with his gruesome and barbaric behavior.
“When your father ousted him for killing those tourists, it was after he’d learned that Sal had been hunting female wolves for sport. Sal was on such a hunt when he stumbled on those humans—definitely wrong place, wrong time—and was so caught up in bloodlust that he attacked.” Johnny was moving closer to Charlie, taking small steps, as if to corral her. “Your father knew Sal was dangerous. Dominic may have had suspicions about the murders close to home, as well. I believe that’s why he kicked Sal out, although he never said so out loud to anyone.”
“There was never an investigation, from what I’ve found in my research,” Levi added. “But the M.O. fits. The positioning of the bodies, the way they were hunted and killed. Sal had opportunity and motive. He hates women, especially strong, born-female werewolves.”
It was obvious that our words were sinking in. Charlie’s eyes flicked back and forth like she was searching her mind for confirmation, clues that what we were saying was true. Some must have hit, because the tension she was carrying started to unravel, and her eyes lost their heat. She slumped a little, her muscles deflating enough to show that her beast was standing down for now.
“We have a plan,” I said, boldly stepping toward her. “A way to bring Sal down and put an end to his murder streak, because it has never stopped, Charlie. He’s continued to take down female wolves for sport.”
She locked eyes with me, suspicion cold as ice slicing into my soul. “Let me guess. It involves me taking your mark.”
Just the suggestion of that had my fangs aching. Hell yeah, I wanted her to take my mark, and I knew my expression conveyed that. I wouldn’t hide it from her. She was a lone wolf, an unmated female, and I now knew for certain that she was the one the prophecy said would change our world.
Never mind what Levi had said, that she’d been calling us to her for years, that somewhere in my brain were intimate memories locked up and hidden from my awareness. I wanted her, always had, from the moment I’d first seen her as a teen—the both of us at a grand party, her as daughter to the greatest alpha of all time and me, the muscle for the lesser alpha I would soon overthrow. There had always been a magnetic pull between us—or maybe I’d always been drawn to her because I knew, in my heart and soul, that she was destined to be all powerful, even without the prophecy saying so.
“Not just mine, Charlie.” I swept my gaze to my brothers, who maybe could look a little less like infatuated puppies as she followed my line of sight with her eyes.
“You beckoned all three of us into your dreams,” Levi said. “There’s a reason for that.”
She barked a laugh. “And that reason, according to you, is that I want to bear your marks, all three of you? That’s insane! That’s not how it’s done.” She balked. “Imagine if a female wolf took multiple mates. She’d be—” Here she stopped, her eyes growing wide.
“She’d be all powerful,” I growled with a fist pound to my chest.
“She’d dominate the masses and rule the clans,” Johnny said, his signature grin hard to ignore.
“She’d be unstoppable,” Levi stated with a hand out to Charlie, daring her to take hold.
