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Audrey’s face glowed from Margo’s genuine gratitude. “Hey, don’t thank me. Tori, Ridge, and Clawson got us out of there. All I did was carry your mom out to the car and watch her sleep at the hotel. You should be proud of her. She was fierce. They were too scared to enter her cell to subdue her and had to do it from a distance. All she wanted to know was that you, Tori, and Ridge were safe.” She paused for a moment and snorted. “My mom would’ve never done that. She’d have sold me out for her own freedom.”
There was a hint of sadness in her voice. She wasn’t wrong. Christie Greenthorne wasn’t capable of being selfless or caring about anyone other than herself.
“Are you injured, Mom? Do we need to go to the hospital for a check-up?” Margo pulled Diana into her arms and held her, swaying from side to side.
“I’m fine. Tori fixed me up with some hunter super-medication. I’m not injured, I promise.” Diana caught my gaze and frowned. “Don’t you dare be stewing that this is your fault. The only people at fault are the hunters. You don’t need to worry about me. I’m good.”
Margo stepped out of her mom’s embrace, and there was a hardness in her eyes that hadn’t been there before the kidnappings. She scoffed. “After the last few days, I think I’m always going to worry, especially now that hunters know about Blackwood Creek. Anyone could disappear, thanks to those bastards. I’m going to make sure they never get close to you or anyone I care about. If the hunters were frightened of you, wait till they meet me.”
I couldn’t stop my thoughts from wandering to Clawson and his newest prisoner. How would Margo react when she discovered there was a hunter in the jail, and he was my brother? I wasn’t even sure how I felt about him being here. Thankfully, I wasn’t at risk of bumping into him in the diner or wherever, but I’d have to face him eventually.
The idea of Margo going into battle with the hunters terrified me. Not because I didn’t think she was capable. She’d put up a fierce fight, but hunters fought dirty. Thoughts of them hurting anyone in the town we cared about strengthened my resolve to ensure Ridge was equipped with all the information I could give him.
The stress of everything going on, combined with Ridge, our fake engagement, and my brother’s presence, befuddled my brain. I was tired, and my wolf was restless. She wanted to be with Ridge. His sudden disappearance after we finally had him back had thrown her, and she was making me nervous. When we’d finally fallen asleep in the hotel the night before, in his arms, my wolf had been more settled than since I’d smelled his blood at the hospital.
I needed to distance myself from him. My wolf and I needed to learn to be calm without him. He wouldn’t always be around, and when the time came for me to leave town, I’d have to no longer pose a danger to others without him by my side.
Despite that, she was fighting me tooth and claw to go seek him out.
I reminded my wolf we’d see him at the town hall. But she had to see him before she’d believe it.
Chapter38
Ridge
It was tough to walk away from Tori after we’d been reunited. I wouldn’t have been surprised if it took me decades to manage to be apart from her without constant worry gnawing at me. It didn’t help that Clawson’s conversation from earlier kept playing in my mind like a song stuck on repeat.
Last night had been intense. Waking up without her this morning was very disappointing, especially when I wanted another opportunity to be inside her and make her scream my name. I should’ve felt bad about waking her up to selfishly whet my appetite a couple of times throughout the night—not that I’d heard Tori complain, only scream or whimper my name in ecstasy—but the driving need to be connected with her had me in a tailspin, and there was no getting out of it.
That morning, it hadn’t taken me long to panic over her whereabouts. But before I could look for her, there was a knock on the door.
Opening it, I saw Clawson’s uneasy face staring back at me. Why the hell was he here?
“Tori?”
“She’s fine. She’s with Audrey, watching over Zander and Kyle.”
The tension in my body loosened. My mate was safe. She was right next door.
“If Audrey’s in your room with the other two, does that mean Diana’s awake?”
Clawson nodded, and insurmountable relief flooded through me.
I pulled on my clothes. “Okay, spill it.”
With all the shit we had to deal with and our solid friendship, there wasn’t much we couldn’t take from each other. Well, except for my fake engagement and his having been with Margo. But those things aside, we were solid.
Clawson paced the room, his hands planted firmly on his hips. “Look, I don’t want to cause problems with your engagement, but at the expense of our friendship for the safety of others, I have to say this.”
I stopped in the midst of tying my shoe and looked up at my friend, schooling my face into a neutral expression.
“Shit, man, it’s pretty fucking clear that Tori’s involved with the hunters somehow,” Clawson began. “She knew exactly where to go and what to expect when we got there. I take no pleasure in saying this, but there’s a possibility that she can’t be trusted.” He threw his hands up in the air and dropped them. “There, I said it, but it needed to be done.”
My wolf snarled, wanting to rip out the sheriff’s throat for accusing my fated mate of being in league with the hunters. We trusted her more than anybody else in this world. She’d been put through shit, lived on the road alone, and had faced her worst fear by coming to our rescue while recovering from a near-fatal wound.
My body thrummed as I waited to hear what else he had to say and wondered what he’d do. I was about ready to attack Clawson if he issued a threat toward my mate.
“Ah, shit.” Clawson exhaled and leaned against the wall, his eyes intent on me. “She’s your fated mate, isn’t she?”
