by Coyote Starr
Closing his eyes, he let himself fall into the trance that allowed him to flow into his wolf form.
Nothing.
Frowning, he stared down at his still-human form. A frisson of fear shot through him.
What the hell?
He had barely enough time to finish the thought, when hard hands grabbed him from either side. Before he could overcome his surprise enough to shout, a dark SUV with tinted windows pulled up to the curb, and he was shoved into the back seat, followed by one of the men who had grabbed him.
Sitting in the seat next to him was another man, tall and still dark-haired despite his age, and on the floorboard, a wolf.
“Adrian?” Ethan asked, still stunned.
“What?” his mentor said as the driver in the front hit the gas. “Did you think we wouldn’t smell that abomination all over you?”
Ethan simply stared, open-mouthed.
“We know you’re pregnant with that deviant’s devil-spawn.”
* * *
Jamal waited until the door to Kamau’s suite had closed behind him and the other Alphas of the clan, then turned and raced back to the elevator, all but bouncing on his toes.
He was absolutely certain that down in the lobby, he had seen a flash of white-blond hair out of the corner of his eye—someone leaving the lobby, though by the time he turned around, it was gone, and the elevator had arrived.
He didn’t want to hope that Ethan had figured out he was pregnant and had come to tell Jamal, but he found himself considering the possibility, anyway.
And if he has, so what? a sarcastic inner voice asked him. You will request that this man you just met be your mate for life?
It was stupid, he knew that. Other than their sexual compatibility and the fact that they were going to have a baby together, Jamal had learned almost nothing about Ethan.
Then again, many successful relationships had been built on less.
I’m an idiot.
But a hopeful idiot, he thought as he dashed through the lobby and out the door, stopping at the sidewalk to gaze about in all directions.
And perhaps a disappointed one, as well. No flash of blond hair caught his attention. If it had actually been Ethan leaving earlier, Jamal had wasted too much time seeing Kamau to his room to be able to see him now.
Still, he sniffed the air, hoping to find a trace of him on the breeze.
Instead, he smelled something entirely different.
Wolf. One he didn’t recognize, and nearby, too.
He had just enough time to spin around to check his surroundings, when a dark SUV pulled up in front of him and the door swung open.
Rough hands grabbed him from behind, moving shifter-fast. He had only begun to struggle against them when he was shoved roughly into the SUV’s already-crowded back seat.
One that already held Ethan. Sitting next to another man who all but exuded Alpha pheromones.
Did I fuck a man who was working with the other pack?
Could Jamal’s intuition about him have been that wrong?
Surely not.
Ethan looked as unhappy to be in the car as Jamal did, his jaw clenched tight as he stared down the wolf in the floorboard.
Then Jamal saw the gun the Alpha had jabbed in Ethan’s ribs. He definitely wasn’t here by choice.
Of course, Ethan’s gaze wasn’t any more pleasant when it flickered toward Jamal than it was when he glared at the Alpha-wolf.
Jamal held his silence until they pulled up in front of some sort of warehouse several miles from the hotel. The wolves ushered them out of the SUV at gunpoint, and took them into a large, empty room. There, Ethan and Jamal were both chained to chairs and the chains run through bolts cemented into the concrete floor.
They remained silent for a long moment after the wolves had left them alone in the room, and he continued to glare at him steadily.
Stonily.
“Are you okay?” Jamal finally ventured. “Did they hurt you?”
“Why didn’t you tell me you’re a goddamned deviant?” Ethan hissed at him.
Deviant?
The word ricocheted around Jamal’s head until it made him dizzy with realization.
Oh, hell. Not only was Ethan not a Beta—he was from a het-pack, one of the ones that procreated heterosexually.
He didn’t know he was an Omega.
He probably has no idea that he’s pregnant, even.
Or maybe he did.
“What do you know?” Jamal asked, his voice more tentative than he had intended.
“I’m an Enforcer,” Ethan replied stiffly. “And I know that since I was a child, it’s been my sacred duty to remove the deviants from wolf-kind, to eliminate the abominations. To make the wolf-packs great again.”
Wait. What?
“Oh, holy shit,” Jamal breathed out. “You’re The Huntsman.”
“I’m a Hunter. The Huntsman is a myth—but yes, it’s based on us.”
“But you’re a shifter.”
Ethan stared at him, confused. “I’m both. I’m a shifter and a Hunter. Isn’t that why you chose me? Isn’t that why you turned me into a deviant, put this abomination into my belly?”
“No. Ethan, no.” Jamal found himself leaning toward his mate, straining against the chains. “I had no idea you were a Hunter. I didn’t even know you were an Omega. Much less that you were fertile.”
“Then why?”
“I was drawn to you. I still am. I want to protect you, protect our baby.”
“Did you know I can’t even shift?” Ethan demanded. “I tried, and I couldn’t change into my wolf form.”
Jamal nodded. “It’s standard with Omegas, to help them avoid hurting the baby. It’s why Omegas need Alphas to protect them.”
Tears welled up in Ethan’s eyes, and Jamal had to choke back his own.
They were still staring at each other when the werewolves who’d kidnapped them returned to the room.
“So,” said the Alpha. “The monster and his whore. Together. Glad we’ll be able to take you both out at once.”
Another werewolf in human form opened the door a crack and slipped into the room. “I found the Huntsm—the deviant’s car,” he said. “Right where you said it would be.”
He tossed the keys to the Alpha.
Ethan glanced from the Alpha to Jamal and back again, and then, without warning, began to laugh.
“You have no idea,” Ethan said. “You taught me everything you know, Adrian, and yet the instant you think I’m one of them, you act like I can’t fight back.”
Ethan’s glance invited Jamal to join in the joke, though he wasn’t entirely certain why. It seemed to disconcert the Alpha—apparently Ethan’s Huntsman trainer, Adrian—so he added his own cackle to Ethan’s wild laughter.
Then the chains securing him to the chair and to the floor exploded, and everything around them went to hell.
Chapter 7
Ethan wished he’d had a way to warn Jamal of what was about to happen. But the werewolf gave him the idea when he’d called Ethan a whore.
Apparently he can’t think of me as both a baby-maker and a Hunter?
He curbed the thought, with a glance at Jamal. Despite his emotional reaction earlier, and even to the news of his own pregnancy, Ethan found himself still attracted to Jamal, physically. And his very first words had been to make sure he was okay.
I’m so fucked.
So to speak.
Because for the first time ever, Ethan understood why the Omegas fought so hard to protect their cubs.
With Jamal next to him, the scent of him drawing Ethan in, he wanted this baby.
He could feel the beginning flutterings of life in his belly.
This wasn’t an abomination.
This was a miracle.
And he wanted to make sure this baby had every opportunity to thrive in the world.
Not that his change of heart mattered, if they couldn’t get away. He had no doubt that Adrian’s team would kill them both.
He had seen it in their eyes and was a little surprised that they hadn’t already done so. Clearly they wanted something from either him or Jamal.
In the meantime, they seemed to be waiting for something.
Ethan decided to take advantage of that wait, wiggling around until he got one hand into his back pocket.
If Adrian hadn’t slipped into thinking of Ethan as one of them, he would’ve been sure to check Ethan’s pockets and disarm him.
For the first time ever, Ethan thanked Adrian silently for having trained him to pack along back-up supplies rather than relying on his shifter abilities.
With a flick of his wrist, he scattered flare-powder in front of himself, closing his eyes as it exploded. Then he followed it with the confusion spell, holding his breath and counting to ten to let it take effect on the others while he ripped the bolts up out of the floor, first the one holding his chains down, then the one holding Jamal’s—the chains were strong, but he had already seen that the bolts were rusted, and his natural shifter strength, combined with his strength as a Hunter was easily equal to the task. Next, he smashed the chairs, once again breathing normally, but counting silently.
At most, he had thirty seconds to get them out before the confusion spell began to wear off and Adrian’s team figured out what was going on.
Thirty seconds to get to his car and either get them both out of there, or grab his broadsword—along with all the other supplies he kept in his trunk—and take a stand.
He would decide which when the time came.
“Come on.”
He grabbed Jamal’s hand and tugged, but Jamal resisted, as confused by the spell as the other wolves were.
“Shit. I don’t have time for this.” He placed his palms on either side of his face, stared into his eyes. “Jamal. It’s me. Ethan. From last night. Remember? I’m…” he paused before forging ahead. “I’m having your baby, and I need you to come with me.”
He didn’t know what he would do if Jamal refused—if the other man fought back, Ethan wasn’t sure he’d be able to pick him up and carry him.
Leave him behind?
And suddenly he discovered that he was absolutely unwilling to do that.
I am really and truly fucked.
Luckily, Jamal nodded and fell in behind him.
Ethan heard him muttering one phrase over and over as he followed him out the door: “Our baby. Our baby. Our baby.”
Ethan ignored his mutterings and pulled out his last spell packet. This one he sprinkled into his mouth, grimacing at the taste, then waited for the strength-enhancer to kick in.
When it flooded his system, he took the length of chain still wrapped around his hands and focused on pulling open one link, then another. When he was free, he slipped the chain through the handles and managed to bend it back on itself just as Adrian and the wolves on the other side began slamming into the door.
Only then did he look back at Jamal, who had used the time to shift into his wolf form. He still dragged chains from around his midsection, but up close, his animal shape was huge, reaching almost to Ethan’s waist, and heavy-boned. The white fur looked soft and thick, and Ethan had to fight the urge to bury his hands in it.
He’s beautiful.
There was no time for that now, though.
He reached out his hands to pry the chains away from Jamal’s midsection, and as the chains dropped to the ground, found himself rubbing his fingers through the gorgeous fur—it was every bit as soft as he’d imagined.
“Later,” he promised, though whether to himself or Jamal, he wasn’t certain. All he knew for sure was that the hinges on the doors were about to give, and he still didn’t have his weapon.
Scrabbling toward the car, he managed to open the driver’s door and pop the trunk, and by the time the doors fell outward from the frame to reveal three full-grown wolves, he and Jamal stood side by side, ready to fight.
* * *
They fought, Jamal thought, as if they had been built to work together. Ethan moved like a dancer, his broadsword flashing bright in the moonlight.
Jamal, used to hunting with his packmates, darted in and out, snapping at the wolves and using his sharp teeth to slash skin and heavy jaws to crush bones when he caught them. The first wolf he grabbed yelped once as Jamal cracked his foreleg in half, then went silent forever as Ethan cleaved through its spine with his weapon.
Dropping the dead wolf’s leg, Jamal turned to guard Ethan as he pulled the broadsword’s blade from the animal’s neck.
But the other wolves were leaving, turning to trot away into the night, Adrian clearly willing to let the two of them go rather than risk his own skin. But as Adrian backed away, too, he called out, “This isn’t over, deviant. We’re coming to get you.”
Jamal snarled at their retreating forms.
Ethan tilted his head as he watched them go. “Not if I can help it,” he whispered. He dropped one hand to Jamal’s head. The other slipped to his abdomen, caressing it unconsciously. “I think maybe we had better get out of here, find someplace safe to call your people from.”
Jamal yipped in agreement, and Ethan seemed to understand.
“Yeah,” he said. “Let’s go.”
He paused long enough to grab the clothing Jamal had stripped out of before shifting only moments ago. “I assume you’ll need these when you change back? And that you can change back sometime soon so we can talk?
Jamal yipped again, twice this time, and Ethan nodded, then opened the back door for the enormous wolf. Then Ethan hopped in, setting his broadswordin the floorboard of the passenger side in front.
They drove for a long, silent time. Ethan had no idea where in Charleston they were, but he didn’t really care.
Everything about his world was about to change.
He was going to have to reevaluate everything he thought he knew.
As soon as he felt certain no one was following them, Ethan pulled the car off onto a side street, then wound through as many turns as he could bring himself to make, just to be sure, before pulling over to the side of street and switching off the car.
Turning sideways, he stared for a long moment at the man—in human shape again, for now, and dressed in jeans, if nothing else—in the back seat of his car. Finally, he asked the first question that came to mind.
“How?”
Jamal narrowed his eyes, considering what to say—or maybe how to say it. “Omegas didn’t come out of nowhere,” he finally said. “We used to all be the same pack. We’re…different branches of the same evolutionary tree. And sometimes an Omega is still born among your packs.”
Ethan bit his bottom lip, worrying at it. “Will your people accept me?”
Jamal laughed out loud, the bright sound making Ethan smile in response. When he answered, though, it was in a soft tone. “They will love you. And our baby.”
After a long moment, Ethan joined Jamal in his joyful laughter, then leaned over the seat to pull him into a deep, hot kiss.
There would be more questions later, he was sure—many more, and some hard choices to make. But Ethan was certain that Jamal was right: if they stayed together and worked to protect their child, they could navigate what was to come.
They might not know what this was, or where it was going, but Ethan was absolutely certain he was going to enjoy the ride.
“Our baby,” he agreed, murmuring it against Jamal’s lips.
* * *
Six months later
“Oh, God,” Ethan groaned, clutching his stomach. “All the wolves I’ve killed. All those Omegas and their babies.” Bending over the edge of the bed, he vomited into the bag the doula held for him, heaving until there was nothing left in his stomach.
“You didn’t know,” Jamal tried to soothe him for about the millionth time. “You believed what you were told.”
“Is Adrian still hunting the Omegas? We didn’t catch him yet?” They’d moved Ethan out of sight for the duration of his pregnancy, though he’d been involved in
the new resistance against the Hunters by providing information about the men who tracked his new pack and their kind.
“Not yet.” Jamal kept his voice low. “But we will. You don’t have to worry about that now, though.”
The next contraction rippled across Ethan’s stomach and his face scrunched in a pain that took so much concentration that he couldn’t even scream. Sweat dripped from his face.
“This better be fucking worth it,” he gasped, glaring at Jamal, after the contraction passed.
“It will be. I promise,” Jamal said, leaning in to brush the hair off his life-mate’s forehead.
“It’s time to move to the birthing chair,” the doula said, his voice calm and soothing, as it had been through the entire fourteen hours of labor.
Jamal nodded, slipping his arm behind Ethan’s back and helping him lean forward. Ethan paused, gripping Jamal’s shoulder. “Look at me. Jamal. If something happens to me—”
“Nothing’s going to happen to you,” Jamal interrupted. “Everything’s going to be fine.”
“Listen.” He stopped, rocking with the pain of another contraction. When it passed, he gasped out, “If something happens to me, you must protect our baby. Keep him safe from the Hunters.”
Jamal nodded, his face serious now. “I will,” he vowed.
“Good. Now get me to that chair.”
Hours later, Ethan lay exhausted in their bed, Jamal next to him, baby Andre nestled in between them.
Looks like I was able to settle down, after all.
As he watched Jamal kiss the top of Andre’s head, Ethan finally understood, in a way he hadn’t until now—all that mattered was love. And this family he and Jamal had created was pure love. Not Alpha, not Omega, not Beta.
Just love.
Perfect love.
And he would fight—forever, if necessary—to protect that love.
* * *
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Love the Alphas. Protect the Omegas. Save the babies.
About the Author
Coyote Starr is the pseudonym of a New York Times bestselling author whose love of M/M stories couldn’t be contained by just one pen-name.