This den has taken care of me and helped me from day one, but foreboding builds a fortress inside my chest and locks me up. For a second, I don’t see the room anymore, panic making me blind. My lungs compress and I have to force a shuddering breath through them.
Twenty fucking days, or I’m stuck as a crazy monster forever.
I scoff and shake my head, trying to dislodge the dread crawling up my throat. No. That isn’t an option. I won’t let myself be stolen by magic I didn’t even know I had a week ago. Which means I know where this path is going to lead.
To them.
Whether I like it or not.
The sad thing is, I was starting to like it, and I don’t know how this messed up revelation is going to change that. Will it?
Maybe I should just get it over with already.
“Noah,” Gannon’s voice invades my ears, and I whip my eyes over to him, already on the defensive for whatever surly bullshit or snarky comment he’s about to lob my way.
But I stop short, puzzlement trickling through me when I see he’s trying to hand me something.
“Here,” he offers, extending his arm even further. I look down and see a small dragon snow globe clutched in his hand. He must have snagged it when he went to his room and got dressed.
“Your screwvenir,” he reminds me, and my brow furrows.
“But we didn’t…” I trail off, looking from him to the other guys, who are watching us intently.
Gannon shrugs and that smug smirk sneaks back across his face. “One way or another, that kiss screwed you, so I figured it counted,” he jests as he shakes his hand, urging me to take the trinket from his outstretched palm.
I don’t know if I’m offended or endeared by his gesture.
“If nothing else, it’s been good luck for me. It belonged to a girl I once knew, in the pack I was in before this one. We were just kids, but I think Addi would have wanted you to have it. She was a pistol, just like you.”
It’s the tiniest crack in his voice on the last word that does it. It pulls me from the haze of my own trepidation and allows me to peer into his. His motions are casual. His words are nonplussed. But there’s something in his eyes that tells me all of this matters more than he’s letting on. That I matter.
Maybe it’s the antagonistic nature of our relationship so far or that I can tell that Gannon hates feeling vulnerable as much as I do, and I suddenly feel protective of that. Either way, I cock an eyebrow and level him with my own taunting grin.
“Did the kiss screw me, Gannon, or did the kiss screw you?” I bait, and I like the challenging glint that enters his eyes, much better than the sad, uncertain shadow that was just there.
He shakes his head but he doesn’t confirm or deny anything.
“Oh please, don’t get shy on me now. You called me sweetheart earlier and were all come hither when it was just us outside.”
Gannon’s smirk falls and he tosses a bewildered look my way. “What are you talking about?”
I roll my eyes. He’s fucking with me again, but I’m not letting him get away with it. If I have to face my shit, he does too.
“It’s fine if you got so overwhelmed by my presence that you dropped your shield. It happens to the best of us,” I joke, poking him about the first conversation we had about mindspeak and how judgy he was about my lack of control.
“No, really, Noah, what are you talking about?” he reiterates, only this time he looks genuinely concerned.
My grin melts away, and I look from him to the others and then back again. “On the deck earlier. I heard you. You called my name. You said come here, sweetheart. I asked you about it, and you said it was you, that you’d been out on patrol.”
He shoots up out of his seat, standing, and I’m hit with a violent scent that’s as potent as bomb smoke. “I was out on patrol, but I didn’t mindspeak with you when I was. I didn’t say any of that.”
“Well, someone did,” I argue, turning to the other guys expectantly.
And then my stomach drops.
Someone did, but not them.
Ellery is up off the couch and striding to the open doors that lead out to the deck before I even know what’s happening. Ruger is right behind him.
I’ve hardly had time to stand before the pair of them leap off the deck and start combing through the woods. Their eyes are trained on the ground as they make pass after pass through the surrounding trees, not caring about their nearly nude states, unbothered by the chill in the air.
My chest gets tight and my pulse thunders.
Perth comes to stand next to me. He doesn’t say anything, but when he holds out his arm, I lean into him and let him tuck me in close to his side.
Minutes roll by as Ruger and Ellery search, and I start to believe that they won’t find anything.
Then I watch as Ellery crouches and studies a particular patch of mud. His finger dips down to trace over a shape on the ground. Fear crawls up my throat and starts to pound in my head as he looks over at me.
I can see the words etched in his furious features before they spill out of his mouth. I want to shove my hand over his lips and keep him from once again shattering my reality, but I know it’s useless.
Ellery’s bright blue eyes harden with promises of pain and punishment. “There was someone here. They left their boot tread in the mud.” His words reach my ears easily, though he’s standing nearly one hundred feet away.
Perth pulls me closer and I cling to him as Gannon steps in front of me, as though his presence can shield me from the horrible truth.
Ruger hurries through the trees to join Ellery, to see what the sheriff is talking about with his own eyes. Ellery searches the forest around him as though the trees will whisper who it was, but the woods stay quiet.
A vicious snarl spills out of the celestial, and his glowing blue eyes land on me. “Someone was definitely watching you, and just like your room at the inn, there’s not a trace of scent to tell us who.”
24
RUGER
“Your alpha lives in a Bass Pro Shop?” Noah stares up at the massive stone and wood cabin in skeptical awe.
Ellery’s neck goes brick red. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone compare his parents’ grandiose home, which has four distinct wings, to a giant human sporting goods store—but there’s a first time for everything.
I swallow a snicker as my gaze rolls over the house, which is built of gray stone at the base and has wide round wooden beams running across the top and lining the pitch of the roof. With giant gables and two-story windows galore, I’ve always thought of it more as a Swiss chalet on roids, but I can see her point.
Ellery tries to explain away the opulence of the ten car garage when her eyes turn to look at that part of the house, which connects to the main home via a covered skywalk. “It’s a bit much. But a lot of pack business goes down here—meetings with betas and enforcers, pack gatherings, parleys with other packs and eerie representatives, things like that.” Ellery shrugs.
“Alpha Morgan is king of the castle, and our boy Ellery here is the prince. Our beloved celestial,” Perth declares as he slings an arm around Ellery’s neck and winks at Noah. Gannon trails behind and rolls his eyes.