Chapter 5
Mason
I tried to ease my bedroom door open as slowly as I could, but it still creaked.
The sound cut through the quiet like a snapped twig in a forest. I froze, breath caught halfway in my lungs.
For a second, I just stood there, staring at the narrow crack of hallway I’d made, waiting for footsteps or someone to call my name. Nothing.
I pushed the door open another inch and leaned out, peering left, then right. The hallway was empty.
It had been like this the past few days, which made it very, very tempting to look around.
Daniel’s voice echoed in my head, calm and clipped like always.
Stay low for now. Don’t improvise. Find out more about the pack. Earn their trust.
Easy for him to say.
Yesterday morning, I’d tried. I really had. I’d woken up early, crept out just like this, heart hammering.
But all the doors had been locked, every single one.
There were no pictures on the walls either. No mail left on the counter. No receipts in the trash. Not even a stupid grocery list on the fridge.
The only thing I’d managed to “discover” was that there were no dairy products in the fridge.
I’d stood there staring at the empty shelf, wondering if they were lactose intolerant and whether that bit of information would be useful.
Would Daniel even want to know that? I doubted it.
I’d cursed him under my breath.
They never trained me for this. There were no infiltration lessons or spying techniques. No guide on how to blend in without looking like a complete idiot.
They’d just drilled the same story into my head over and over until it felt burned into my skull: the disappearing packless shifters. The call for help.
That was the only reason I’d managed to sit in Cooper’s office without bolting.
The way Cooper had looked at me… his sharp gaze, and how he seemed to weigh every word I’d said.
If the script hadn’t been burned into me, I would have shifted without thinking and run out of there with my tail tucked tight between my legs.
No. I wouldn’t have. I couldn’t. Daniel already has—
I swallowed hard and shoved the thought away before it could fully form. Not now.
Now, the house was quiet, and that was what mattered.
I stepped out into the hall, ignoring the other bedroom doors on this floor. I already knew they’d still be locked.
I went down the stairs slowly, placing each foot carefully, and still managed to slam my toe into a small cabinet at the bottom.
The pain shot up my leg so fast I nearly yelped.
“Son of a—” I hissed under my breath, hopping once on the other foot. My whole body went rigid as I listened.
Nothing. I exhaled shakily and forced myself to stand still.
I flexed my toes inside my slipper, which did absolutely nothing to help, and continued toward the kitchen with the faintest limp.
There was a door just past it. It looked newer than the rest, the frame reinforced. A small keypad sat beside it, with no doorknob in sight.
I’d noticed it on my first night here when someone came out of it, though I couldn’t tell if it had been Nico or Tony, whom I still hadn’t met.
I wasn’t exactly a tech guy, but I wasn’t blind either.
I’d saw the cameras outside when they first brought me here. Inside, the living room had been full of complicated wiring and more equipment than a normal house needed.
If my hunch was right, Tony and Nico weren’t just regular pack members. They probably had access to Pecan Pines’ security systems, patrol routes, camera feeds, maybe even internal communications.
If I could get even one piece of that, would that be enough? Enough to finally be done with all this?
The thought tightened my chest. Screw laying low and earning their trust. If I could get what Daniel needed now—
I leaned in and pressed my ear lightly against the door.
At first, I heard nothing. Then a faint, muffled sound, like the low whirr of a machine.
It carried strangely, hollow and distant, as if it wasn’t coming from a single small room behind the door at all, as if the space stretched farther than it should.
Was it leading to a basement?
My pulse picked up. I shifted my weight, trying to catch more of it.
Click.
For half a second, my brain refused to process what it meant. Then the door moved, and suddenly there was nothing holding me up.
It all happened in a blur of slow-motion horror. My body pitched forward, then overcorrected backward, my heel slipping against the tile.
My back hit the edge of the kitchen counter first, knocking the breath out of me, and then my head smacked into the upper cabinet. The sound that followed was a dull, solid thud.
I did not want to know if that noise had been my skull or the wood. For one horrible second, all I could hear was ringing.
“Oh my God—are you okay?!”
I blinked my eyes open. Nico stood in the doorway, eyes wide. He dropped to his knees beside me so fast it startled me more than the fall had.
“I’m fine,” I croaked automatically. I was not.
Tears pricked at the corners of my eyes from the sharp, blooming pain at the back of my head.
I tried to glance past him into the room, but he’d already stepped forward, blocking most of my view. The door had swung close behind him.
I groaned softly, and it wasn’t entirely from the pain.
“Don’t move,” Nico said quickly. “Just hold on.”
I tried to sit up anyway. The world tilted slightly. I was not fine at all.
“Here,” he said, sliding an arm under my shoulder. “Let me help you.”
He guided me upright and into one of the chairs by the kitchen table. I sat down slowly, one hand rubbing the back of my head.
“I didn’t know you were right outside.” Nico hovered in front of me, clearly panicking. “I swear I didn’t hear you.”
That made two of us.
He darted to the fridge, grabbed something, frowned, shoved it back, opened the freezer, and finally held out a frozen bag of fries.
“Here. Put this on it.”
I took it carefully. “Thanks.”
I sucked in a breath through my teeth as the cold seeped through the plastic the moment I pressed it against the sore spot.
I probed around the area gently with my fingers. There was already a small bump forming, but nothing felt wrong.
There was no blood, no dizziness beyond the initial shock. I was probably just more startled than anything.
Nico crouched in front of me. “I really am sorry. I should’ve checked if anyone was on the other side.”
I shook my head. “No, it’s my fault. I shouldn’t have been standing so close to the door.”
That much was true. There was a small pause.
The hum from behind that door had gone quiet. Nico’s eyes flicked toward it briefly, then back to me.
“So,” he said a little too casually. “What were you doing there?”
I blinked at him. He gestured toward the door. “Did you need something?”
Think.
Think. Think.
I bit the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste copper.
“I was looking for the laundry.” I swallowed. Why did that sound fake even to me?
The words kept coming anyway, tumbling out in a nervous rush. “I didn’t bring a lot of clothes. I might run out soon. And I couldn’t find you. I didn’t know who else to ask.”
I forced myself not to look away.
Nico looked surprised at first, then his expression softened.
“Oh! Right. Laundry.” He let out a small huff of breath. “We usually just go to the laundromat in town, but—”
He stopped abruptly.
A flicker crossed his face, like he’d almost said something he shouldn’t have.
“But,” he corrected smoothly, “we do have one here. A washing machine in the house. I’ll show you later.”
He stood up, brushing off his hands. “We might not have detergent, though. I can grab some for you when I head out.”
“Thank you,” I said quickly, offering a small smile.
Still, something tightened in my chest. I’d assumed I’d be able to come and go, walk into town if I needed to. But maybe that wasn’t how this worked.
I lowered the bag of fries from my head and held it out again. “You can put this back. I’m okay. Really.”
He frowned. “No, keep it on. It’ll help with the swelling.”
I didn’t want to argue, mostly because he was right, and because arguing over frozen fries felt ridiculous when my mind was spiraling somewhere else entirely.
I’d almost gotten into that room. Almost found something useful. And just like that, the door had opened and reminded me exactly where I stood.
They’d given me a room, fed me, treated me like a guest.
But that didn’t mean I wasn’t being watched here too.
Nico suddenly snapped his fingers. “Hey! It’s past lunch. Have you eaten?”
I blinked, dragged back into the present. I shook my head.
He brightened. “We’ve got leftover rotisserie chicken. And—” he glanced at the bag in my hands and grinned faintly, “these fries are already halfway there.”
A laugh escaped me before I could stop it.
“Yeah,” I said, a little sheepish. “That sounds good.”
Nico stood and started pulling containers out of the fridge. I watched him for a second before pushing myself up from the chair. The bump on my head throbbed faintly, but it was manageable now.
“Do you need help?” I asked.
He glanced at me, surprised. “Oh. Yeah. Could you make a salad? I think there’s some stuff in the fridge you can use.”
I nodded. Helping felt easier than sitting around doing nothing. I stepped up to the fridge and opened it.
The top shelf was full of takeout boxes. He probably didn’t mean those, so I crouched and pulled open the vegetable drawer.
Inside was a bag of shredded cabbage that looked tired, limp at the edges, and just slightly translucent in a way that definitely didn’t seem ideal.
Next to it was a pack of baby carrots. Several had gone wrinkled and spotted brown.
I lifted both items out slowly. I must’ve made a face, because Nico leaned over my shoulder to see what I was looking at and burst out laughing.
“They’re fine,” he said, waving a hand. “Just give them a good wash and pick out the browning bits.”
I stared at the carrots. There were a lot of browning bits.
“Do you mind if I make a stir-fry instead?” I asked. “It’ll be quick.”
And taste significantly better, I added silently.