Chapter 19
Sean/ Beau
SEAN
My legs were cramping, lungs barely pulling in air, and my side burned from where he’d clawed me. But something primal surged beneath my skin, deeper than panic.
Deeper than fear. Something older. Wilder. My wolf.
It snapped awake with a fury I hadn’t felt in years, clawing at the inside of my skin like shift, dammit, shift now.
I stumbled to a stop, heart hammering as I spun around. Vito was only a few yards away, already smirking like he’d won.
Then I let go. Bones cracked. Fire lit through my muscles. I screamed as my limbs twisted, tore, reshaped.
My vision blurred, and the pain swallowed everything, but I didn’t stop it. I embraced it. Welcomed it. Needed it.
Fur burst through my skin, paws slamming into the dirt. I barely had time to finish my transformation before Vito laughed, low and gleeful.
“Oh, now we’re talking,” he said.
His form exploded into a blur of muscle and fur. His wolf was massive, larger than most I’d seen. Golden-blond fur streaked with dark gray, those same yellowing teeth bared in a feral grin.
He completed his shift before I could even stabilize my footing. Still mid-shift, aching and disoriented, I did the only thing I could. I lunged.
My smaller frame crashed into him, momentum my only weapon. I twisted and sank my teeth into his shoulder.
He yelped, more from surprise than pain, and bucked me off with a violent twist. I hit the ground hard but scrambled up again, shaking leaves from my fur.
I didn’t have his bulk. But I was faster.
I darted to the side, skirting around him, feinting like I’d run again. When he lunged to follow, I turned and struck. My claws raked across his ribs. Blood sprayed. Not much, but it was something.
He snarled and retaliated, jaws snapping inches from my throat. I barely ducked in time, his claws slicing across my flank. Pain seared down my side, but I kept moving, forced myself to.
Beau knows where I am. He’s coming. I just had to hold out.
Vito charged again, this time faster, less playful.
I tried to sidestep, but he anticipated it. He slammed into my side with his full weight and pinned me hard to the forest floor.
I yelped, paws scrabbling for purchase as his teeth snapped at my neck.
I twisted violently, managing to rake his belly with my hind legs. He yowled, giving me just enough space to roll out from under him. I dragged myself to my feet, panting, bleeding.
Everything ached. My breaths were ragged. My wolf was still new to this kind of fight, untested. But I wouldn’t give up. I wouldn’t let him drag me back to Orin.
I crouched low, tail bristling, teeth bared.
Vito’s eyes gleamed red in the filtered light through the trees. Blood speckled his muzzle. He looked hungry. Then he lunged again. So fast!
His shoulder slammed into mine. I went down hard. The wind knocked out of me. Pain shot up my spine as his teeth sank into the scruff of my neck, just shy of the jugular.
He held me there, growling, heavy and hot on top of me. I thrashed, kicked, did everything I could, but he was stronger. Too strong.
I could feel the blood pooling beneath me. My vision blurred. I couldn’t keep this up. Beau, I thought desperately.
Vito let go just enough to bark a laugh in wolf form. The sound was low and guttural. He didn’t want to subdue me anymore. He wanted to kill me.
Orin probably wanted me alive, but Vito looked past caring. He was blood-crazed now, lost in the thrill of it.
I wished I had my human voice. I would’ve shouted. Would’ve told him that Orin would tear him apart if he did this. But in my wolf form, I could only growl and snarl and bleed.
I was starting to black out when a sharp voice cracked through the trees.
“Enough, Vito!”
Vito froze.
And so did I.
A shadow stepped through the woods with slow, controlled steps. A man in a sleek black coat, dark hair swept back, and fury carved into every line of his face. Orin.
His eyes snapped to me. I was panting and bleeding, and his jaw tightened with something that looked almost like rage. But not at me, at Vito.
“I told you I wanted him alive,” Orin snapped.
Vito growled low in response, refusing to back off. His stance said everything. I almost had him. Why stop now?
“I said,” Orin repeated, voice cold and dangerous, “step away from him.”
Vito hesitated.
And in that hesitation, I saw it. The shifting of power. Vito growled again, reluctant, and stepped back, but only just. His eyes stayed locked on me, furious and hungry.
I tried to stand, legs trembling beneath me. I wasn’t out of this yet. Orin was here. And he was worse than Vito in his own way.
Then a thunderous growl ripped through the woods.
The trees to our left exploded.
A wall of fur and fury came barreling through, a blur of dark brown and righteous rage.
Vito didn’t even have time to react. Beau slammed into him like a meteor.
The force of impact lifted Vito off the ground. He flew backward, crashing into a thick tree with a sickening crack. His wolf form crumpled and hit the dirt hard. Unmoving. Unconscious.
Orin took one step back, his eyes narrowing, calculating. Beau stood between us, his massive form snarling over my crumpled one like a wall of teeth and muscle.
I collapsed fully then, relief and pain dragging me down into the dirt. Blood matted my fur. My breath came in short, shallow gasps.
But I was alive. Beau was here.
BEAU
I didn’t remember running. All I knew was the moment I scented Sean’s blood in the woods, the world flipped on its axis.
The bear in me surged to the surface, savage and hot with rage. Logic drowned in it. The trees blurred. My bones cracked mid-run, tearing through clothes, skin, humanity.
I was already shifting before I hit the tree line. Nothing else mattered. I found them by the river’s edge. Sean was collapsed, fur matted in blood. A fully shifted werewolf stood over him.
I didn’t think. I didn’t have to. I hit him. He flew like a rag doll, crashed into a thick pine with a sickening crack, and slid down in a heap. Unmoving.
Good. If he wasn’t dead, he’d wish he was when he woke. I barreled past Sean, throwing myself between him and Orin.
Orin’s eyes landed on me. Then Sean. Then Vito’s crumpled form.
He didn’t flinch. Didn’t hesitate. His lips curled into something too smug, too calm for someone about to die.
“I was hoping you’d arrive,” Orin said. “I can deal with both you and Sean.
Rip. His coat shredded. Clothes tore. Bones snapped. Orin shifted like lightning, too fast for most wolves. Wicked fast.
He lunged. I didn’t wait. We collided in a storm of claws and teeth.
His fangs grazed my throat. Mine snapped at his snout. His claws raked down my shoulder. I caught his hind leg in my jaws and twisted.
He yelped and went rolling.
My grizzly was howling in my skull, drunk on adrenaline. All I could see was red. All I could smell was Sean’s blood in the dirt.
Orin came back, mouth open in a snarl, foam at the corners. We smashed into each other again. Dirt kicked up. Trees cracked. My jaws found his side and bit down hard, drawing blood.
He writhed under me, claws slicing my ribs, but I didn’t care. Couldn’t care. I wanted him to scream. I wanted him to pay for every nightmare Sean had ever had. For every bruise.
For the way Sean flinched when someone raised their voice. For making him run.
Orin writhed, snarled, fought. But I was heavier. Stronger. Fueled by fury and something deeper, something ancient. My grizzly. I pinned him to the earth.
He thrashed under me, but I planted a paw on his chest and held him. My jaws closed around his throat. He stilled. This was it. This was justice.
One squeeze. One bite. And the threat would be gone forever. My teeth pressed against his pulse.
“Beau!” A voice. My mate’s voice.
I turned my head just a fraction.
Sean. Back in his human skin. Blood streaked his arms, his side. He looked terrible. Sean was pale and trembling, but he was upright. Somehow.
“No,” he said again, voice cracking. “Don’t do it.”
I growled deep in my throat. I didn’t want to look away from Orin. Not when I had him.
“Beau, please.”
He stepped forward, limping, dragging one leg behind him.
“I know what you’re feeling,” he said, hands out like he was trying to calm a wild animal and maybe he was.
“I do. He deserves it. But this—” Sean motioned to the other unconscious wolf, the blood, the fury still vibrating through my bones “—this isn’t you.”
My grip on Orin’s throat tightened slightly. Sean’s voice broke. “You think killing him will solve all our problems?”
I let out a growl that shook the ground. My claws dug into the earth on either side of Orin’s ribs. Sean didn’t back away. He came closer.
“What about everything we’ve built, Beau?” he asked, chest rising and falling fast. “Bear and Bun. Sugarpaw Springs. The peace we’ve fought for. The family you’ve made. Are you gonna throw it all away just to spill his blood?”
My muscles trembled.
“What about me?” Sean’s voice cracked.
That got through. His eyes, big and vulnerable and fierce, locked with mine. Not afraid. Not of me. Just begging me not to give in.
“I’m still here,” he whispered. “I’m still here. But I need you to come back. Please.”
"Live and love," I heard Levi’s voice in my head.
The rage started to slip. Slowly. Just enough for the man inside me to crawl back to the surface. I blinked. The forest wasn’t red anymore.
It was green. Cool. Sean was right there in front of me, swaying from blood loss, still reaching for me. I looked down at Orin.
He was still trying to wriggle, but his strength was gone. His eyes rolled in his head. A snarl barely made it out of his throat. Not worth it.
I slammed his head into the dirt instead, hard enough to knock him out cold. His body went limp. Sean let out a breath like a sob and collapsed to his knees.
The rage still simmered inside me, but the edge was gone.
I stepped over Orin’s unconscious form and shifted, muscles creaking, fur pulling back into skin, blood sticky on my ribs. My knees hit the earth with a thud.
Sean crawled the rest of the way to me. His arms wrapped around my neck, tight and desperate. I clung back just as hard. He was shaking. So was I.
But he was alive. I pressed my face into his neck, inhaling his scent, grounding myself in it.
“Thank you,” he whispered, voice hoarse. “For coming.”
“I almost didn’t stop,” I rasped. “I was so close, Sean…”
He cupped my face in his hands, warm and bloody. “But you did. You came back. That’s what matters.”
I pulled him into me, not caring how much it hurt, not caring how wrecked we were. He was alive. And he still believed in me, even at my worst.
I held on to him like he was the only real thing left in the world. Because right then… he was.