3. Kate
Trusting my instincts hasn’t let me down yet.
Trez talking to me last night could’ve been my imagination. I’ve never had to deal with grief before. We never knew our mother. She died within minutes of delivering us.
My brother is the first person I’ve ever mourned, so there’s a chance I’m wrong, but there is also a chance he’s alive. After telling me to run, to go to Kane, I had to sneak into my father’s house first. I wanted the urn that my brother’s ashes were in, and then I made a detour before crossing the border.
I had to be quick. Once Dick saw the urn missing, he’d know it was me that took them. My bike is fast, and I left five hours before anyone would be awake, but that didn’t mean I had that much of a head start before he’d send his wolves to hunt me down.
Before he sent Henrik…
Anyone could have been awake and seen me leave. My father likely has alarms around the perimeter of the pack that would have alerted him, but I had to scout the area where Dick said Trez was killed.
If Trez had been in the area recently, his scent would still linger. If blood had spilled, I’d know if it was my brother’s. I also needed to know if my immediate distrust of Dick after he told the pack Trez was dead held merit. I’ve never trusted my alpha, and like Trez, I distrusted our beta even more.
I found nothing.
Not my brother’s scent and not Henrik’s either.
At that moment, I was glad I’d had enough forethought to steal the urn because something was amiss.
By the time I made it to Moonwake, Oregon, the sun had dropped below the horizon of the Pacific Ocean as far as the eye could see.
As I pull my racing bike into the parking lot of Ashleigh’s bar, I’m exhausted. The bike isn’t made for long-distance rides, which is why every place on my body aches. But it was fast, and I was racing against Dick or any male shifter in my pack who my father could have sent after me. Then again, maybe Dick was glad I’d left and hustling was for nothing.
I turn the bike off and take off my helmet. After snatching my key from the ignition, I toe the kickstand to the gravel rocks on the ground. Forcing my stiff muscles to move, I swing my leg over the rear and slip the key into my back pocket.
I’d stuffed the eight hundred bucks I had in cash from winning a bike race last weekend into the front pocket of a backpack, as well as a change of clothes while my brother’s urn was zipped inside the main compartment.
Cracking my neck, I pull out the remaining six hundred dollars I have left after refueling and stash the bills in the front pocket of my pants before hanging the backpack from the handlebars. I’m not worried about it being stolen. Those who aren’t afraid of Ashleigh’s wrath wouldn’t dare cross Kane, humans who frequent the dive bar included.
The bar doesn’t have an official name. Patrons call it ‘the bar’ or Ash’s place. There isn’t a sign on the building either, but you get the idea of what’s inside when the music hits your eardrums. Ashleigh purposely keeps it loud so that shifters can talk freely without worrying about humans overhearing something they shouldn’t.
I square my shoulders and head for the door, the rocks crunching beneath my boots. Out of all the scents hitting me at once, I can always single out Kane’s, smelling grease and dirt and the faintest new rubber smell from the tire inventory he keeps at his body shop.
I knew he was here before I’d pulled off my helmet. If I hadn’t smelled him before I parked, I would have gone to his pack land instead, but I knew this was where he liked to wind down after a long day of working on cars. It’s where his friends would be, where some of his pack members would be.
I reach out, grasping the door handle in my hand and yanking it wide open. My eyes connect with Jag’s Nordic blue irises in less than a heartbeat. His eyes have always been such a contrast to his thick, black hair. There’s something familiar about Jagger’s eyes that put not only my wolf at ease but me too.
Kane isn’t standing or sitting at the table where Jag is, but his beta will know his whereabouts. Though, I’m not sure I’m ready to find him now that I’m here. I know women fight for his attention. I used to be one of them, even if I’d never admit that fact out loud.
Stepping forward, I walk toward Jag. He’s perched atop a picnic table with his boots on the wooden bench and his elbows on his knees like he’s the center of attention. He stops whatever conversation he’s in the middle of to track my every step until suddenly, my view of the Bloodmoon pack’s beta is blocked as a burly man steps into my path.
I don’t remember his name, but I’ve seen him before. He’s a wolf shifter from Kane’s pack, but he’s an older man. He’s older than Dante, Kane’s dad and former alpha, with only a touch of gray in his strands of dark hair. He has a couple of inches on my six-foot height, but I don’t have to look up to meet his angry stare.
“The stench of a silver doesn’t belong here,” he spits in my face, the smell of cheap beer and tobacco coating my lungs as I inhale, making my nose wrinkle. “Get out of here, little girl.”
A silver wolf—his enemy. My pack has all gray wolves, but we’re called silver because of the shimmering tattoo of a wolf’s head that Dick proudly adorns on the top of his right hand. The alpha is the only one allowed permanent ink in the Marked Crest pack. It’s forbidden for the rest of us.
“Last I checked, you don’t own this establishment, so unless Ash sold it to you in the last few months, get the fuck out of?—”
He snatches my black leather-covered bicep in his unnaturally strong grip, yanking me closer as a snarl forms on his upper lip while disgust seeps into his navy eyes.
My wolf growls from within me as I react, not giving the first fuck about where I am or the other shifters in the bar. I knee him between his legs, which loosens his grip. That allows me to twist out of his hold and swing my body around so that my elbow connects to the side of his face. I sweep his feet out from under him, and when his ass and back hit the ground, I tower over him, looking down and daring him with my gray eyes to get back up.
When I’m sure he isn’t going to accept the challenge, I turn my back on him and step in front of Jag.
“Where’s Kane?” I demand in a tone that tells the rest of the shifters and even the humans I’m not scared to go toe to toe with anyone who wants a piece.
“Probably getting a blowjob from one of the many alpha groupies sniffing around his dick.” Jag smirks as he jumps off the table to crowd my personal space by towering over me with his six-foot-six-inch height. He’s taller than me, but the half-of-a-foot difference isn’t the slightest bit terrifying like I’m sure it is to others.
He isn’t telling me this to be an asshole to the enemy wolf. He knows anything to do with Kane and other women gets under my skin, it riles up my wolf, and if there is one thing Jagger takes pleasure in, it’s rubbing my attraction to his best friend in my face.
I know about his missing sister being Kane’s fated mate. Damn near everyone in the Bloodmoon pack except Jagger has made it their mission to make sure I know I don’t stand a chance with Kane ever since I turned eighteen and my wolf got restless.
Knowing his mate is out there somewhere should’ve dampened how I feel about him, but it hasn’t; not in the slightest. If anything, every time I’m here, my desire for Kane grows stronger to the point I’m not sure how much longer I can put myself through the ache of him not being mine.
Every wolf shifter I’ve ever heard speak about fated mates wants to find theirs, but many never do. No one in my pack has found theirs. Me? I don’t want a higher being to deem who I’m supposed to be with. What if they’re a douchebag, or worse, a cruel person who takes pleasure in physically or mentally hurting another?
No, thank you.
I want a partner who has my back the same as I will have his. I want someone I can trust wholly, a man who doesn’t see himself as superior to others, even if my chosen person ends up being the alpha of a pack. Because let’s face it, that’s the only shifter that’ll be able to handle all of me.
As much as I yearn to live in Moonwake rather than on Rivermoon Mountain, I wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t felt the desperation in Trez’s voice. The more I visit, the harder it is to leave. This is where I want to be when I’m not here.
Balling my fists, I peer up at Jagger. The smirk he’s wearing is taunting me to react, but I’m tired, and I don’t have time for his stupid games, so I do what I do best. Being as quick as possible in my current state, I grip the belt looped through his jeans to hold him in place, and with my other hand, I punch him in the gut as hard as I can muster. He doubles over to my right side.
“Where is he?” I all but yell.
“Behind you,” he chokes out.
Whipping my body around, I see Kane in his rugged attire and all his six-foot-eight-inch height. His long, dirty-blond hair is pulled back into a hair tie, revealing his sinfully, neatly-kept beard and those penetrating amber eyes. A heartbeat later his long fingers close around my throat. His claws push through the nail beds of his fingers as if to warn me not to make any sudden movements.
“You better have a good fucking reason for being here, Kate. That’s two of my wolves you’ve put your hands on tonight.”
His eyes visibly brighten as he brings his wolf closer to the surface. His alpha strength somehow paralyzes me, but it’s different from my father’s controlling power. Kane doesn’t have to work up a sweat to force me into compliance. I don’t even know how this is even possible. I’m not one of his wolves. He isn’t my alpha.
The blood moon glow of his eyes though…
Calling on my wolf, I yank her close, pulling on her strength to fight Kane’s power. It’s the exhaustion. It has to be that I’ve worn my body down to the point I’d submit to another alpha if he demanded it of me.
“Trez,” I choke out, but my brother’s name causes the tips of his claws to sink into the flesh covering the back of my neck. It should be painful, but it’s not. Instead, it sends a ripple of pleasure down my spine, all the way to the tips of my toes, making them curl. My thighs clench together while my core coils.
“What about Trez? Why isn’t he with you?”
If fatigue wasn’t threatening to buckle my knees, I think I’d enjoy the sensation of those claws wreaking havoc on my system. Kane’s hold on me is the only reason I’m still standing and not bowing before him like the submissive, weaker wolf, and that pisses me off. So, I do the only thing I have the ability to do in this predicament. I use the alpha strength I know resides inside me to force my arms to move. Wrapping both hands around his forearms, I push my claws into his skin and say, “He’s dea...”
I know my words fail me, but just before my eyes close and my body goes limp, I see the surprise in those brilliant eyes of his. My wolf retreats into the farthest corner inside me, pulling me with her into a coma-like state, forcing me to sleep.
I don’t have the strength to fight it.
Darkness comes.
Then silence.
Then nothing.