by Cecilia Lane
Her shoulders slumped and she shrank away from his anger and judgment. She knew there was another side to him, knew he couldn’t keep up the facade of dedicated male. He had ordered her to stay away from her family, and now he wanted to lob accusations at them.
Except... her cat was quiet. No snarls emerged from the beast. No doubts or anger. Even if the pride wasn’t responsible for all the other attacks, could Everly really believe Wade had nothing to do with hurting the Strathorns?
Her former alpha’s entire demeanor about the day of her wedding rubbed her wrong. His demand for her return, his claim on her before they were mated under the moon, his insistence on forcing her into action or leaving with him all screamed of a man unwilling to let her go. He wanted her to breed little black panther heirs.
The next day would bring the full moon. What better way to spook her into returning than a blast targeting her husband and his clan?
She didn’t want to believe, but she couldn’t rule it out, either.
“You believe me, don’t you?” He inclined his head. His eyes were hard, but he gave her his neck.
Complicated, messy, confusing man. He pushed and pulled, took and gave, and it left her with jumbled thoughts and instincts she didn’t understand.
“I don’t know,” she answered honestly. “We’ve been near those places. We’ve been near hundreds of others without incidents, too.” Her hand shook as she reached around his back and rubbed his scars through his shirt. “Are these from your people? Are these why you said I’d die if I stayed with mine?”
“My father,” Sawyer cleared his throat and looked away. “My father was alpha. Our clan stayed hidden, more than others. Our changes were private and not to be shared with others. None of us talked about our beasts. We were a picture of dysfunction, but it got worse when my father died in an alpha challenge.”
“Oh, Sawyer,” she murmured. This felt big and important. His words felt like secrets he never shared.
“The victor took my mother that night. He claimed her as his spoils, but he wasn’t happy to be saddled with me. I was a reminder of what he fought against. So he beat me, put me down at every turn. Cut me open and wouldn’t let me shift to heal. I needed to build up my strength, he insisted. I wasn’t worthy of being an alpha’s son.”
Everly gasped, hand covering her mouth. “Your mother let that happen?”
She already knew the answer. None of the females in the pride would speak out against their mates. Daring to talk back to Wade was doubly more painful. And Sawyer had already told her what had happened when he predicted her death if she went back.
“She tried, at first. He ate at her resistance and killed her spirit slowly. There was nothing left of her smiles or light by the time I turned eighteen and he had had enough of me. I was given a choice: leave or die. I was stupid enough to try challenging him for alpha. I thought I could fix them.”
Sawyer shoved off the table and paced in the small room. He hardly needed three steps to get from one end to the other. Agitation rolled off him and filled the air.
“But... you’re alive.” Alpha challenges were to the death. Maybe that was something else she had wrong. Maybe bears did it differently. Only one cat survived when a challenge was made.
He jammed his hands into his hair and snarled. “He wouldn’t kill me. He didn’t want to give me that honor. He left me broken and alone and forbid anyone from helping me.”
Pieces slid into place and Everly’s picture of the man Sawyer was solidified. Protective at his very core, but he shied away from others as required by his upbringing. She must have triggered all the instincts he couldn’t use when he saw her as bruised as he remembered his mother.
She reached for him, needing to calm him. She needed it as badly as she needed to breathe.
His rattling snarl quieted the moment her palms touched his skin. He turned right into her arms, buried his face in the crook of her neck and nuzzled her skin.
“What happened? To your clan?” Everly tried to focus on the words. Her eyes fluttered closed. The scratch of stubbled cheeks felt too good. Her cat’s purr blocked out all the swirling objections of her logical side.
His jaw tightened. “I don’t know. I don’t care. I closed that door the day I set my own bones and crawled away.”
She knew she should back away and put distance between them, but her feet wouldn’t move. She only clung to him tighter.
Sawyer’s hand slid across her waist and to the small of her back, drawing her closer still. Instinctively, she splayed a hand over his heart. The rapid beating didn’t give her pause. She knew hers thumped the same rhythm.
She lifted her head and met his eyes. Pure gold watched her with an unreadable expression. Hunger, agitation, tension. She didn’t know which dominated him. Only that they could quench each other’s deeply buried pain.
He paused with his lips barely touching hers. Testing her, she thought. When she didn’t move, he leaned forward the last bit to sip gently at her lips.
He tasted as strong and powerful as she imagined. The earthy scent of a storm clung about him and invaded her nose with each pull of her lungs. He was hot and male and made her knees go weak.
There was a sadness to him, too. Her cat purred and stroked against him, and Everly submerged herself in every part of him. That sadness echoed her own. The feeling of never quite belonging, thinking she was the problem, letting flaws and pains slide to make life easier—Sawyer had already passed through that fire and come out strong on the other side.
If a mate existed for her, if she gave in to the harping from her cat, he would be her perfect match.
She gasped, and he took the parting of her lips as an invitation. His tongue stroked against hers, twining and tangling as she met him in a passionate dance. He had her full attention, and her world narrowed down to his taste and his hands holding her tight against him.
The door banged open, and Everly jumped out of Sawyer’s arms. Heat flushed her cheeks, and she didn’t know if it stemmed more from embarrassment or from a kiss that curled her toes.
Sawyer had no problem recovering. He passed a hand over his face and asked the intruders, “Callum?”
Cole looked from Sawyer, to Everly, then Sawyer again. The other firefighters crowded behind him. “Leah’s in with him now. He’ll live, but he’s in rough shape. He caught the brunt of the blast. There’s silver in his arms, face, and chest. Old man Reed kicked us out so he could get to work.”
Sawyer gestured to the forgotten tray and tweezers. “Everly’s been cleaning me out.”
“I... um. I need to finish before you can shift again,” she said unsteadily. Damn the man, and damn her smug panther.
Sawyer took his spot on the table and held out his arm. He didn’t just watch her. No, she was convinced that he consumed her with his eyes.
“I’m all yours,” he said.
Chapter 12
Becca cleared her throat and raised her flute full of water. She insisted on having a proper toast, even if she couldn’t drink with the rest of them. “I have called an emergency session of our brunch bunch to welcome Everly into the family, get Leah out of that clinic, and because I’m as big as a whale and I’m allowed to do this.”
Leah cracked the briefest of smiles when the glasses were clinked together. Everly felt an echo of her pain. It was hard not to. The woman had marshaled the others into accepting her and now needed to force herself away from her mate.
Callum healed, but it was a slow process. The silver embedded in Sawyer’s skin was nothing compared to the damage Callum took. He was closest to the blast, and not all the slivers were easy to find or remove. He still hadn’t shifted, and so the burns and other damage were healing only slightly faster than a human’s would.
The one redeeming factor, if it could be called that, was the bomb didn’t go off as intended. Everly didn’t understand all the lingo Sawyer used when he explained it or everything Cole said when he stood up at an emergency town meeting, but the i
nvestigation found evidence of malfunction.
Everly felt sick to think what could have happened. Death, most likely. Just like the other attacks. Worry and fear were so thick in the enclave she thought she might choke on it.
The introduction faded quickly to nothing as they all sat with the complicated emotions of the trying days. Across from her, Becca tore at the hunk of bread the owner of Pierre’s had provided as an appetizer. She seemed to pour all her frustrations into mauling the snack.
Meghan, at one end of the table, drummed her fingers against the wood and switched her attention between the menu and empty space. The smell of fur swirled in the air around her, and her eyes melted into a brilliant green with her inner animal’s agitation.
Rylee watched Leah from under her lashes. They’d both witnessed the woman refusing to leave Callum’s side until the entire crew of mates bundled her away with orders from Cole to make sure she ate. They’d seen the nearly untouched takeout boxes, too.
Everly resisted the urge to rub at her heart. She hurt. Sawyer’s accusations raised too many questions she wasn’t ready to consider. Her cat was all out of sorts at the possibility of him laying in a bed next to Callum. She swore she could feel an echo of Leah’s pain. And while she wasn’t a member of the clan through any other means than her signature on a marriage certificate, her panther wanted to comfort the alpha’s mate and keep her upright until she could stand on her own.
Faith reached across the table and squeezed her hand. “I’m glad you’re here, though I wish it were under better circumstances. No more needing a hot shower to warm me up after an appointment.”
“Right?” Becca chimed in, eyes brightening as she latched on to the distraction. “I straight up asked Dr. Reed if he was a vampire the other day. And still, no improvement. Until our savior with warm flesh arrived.”
Even Leah’s lips twitched. “I thought someone doused me with ice water this morning. It was just Dr. Reed waking me from a nap.”
“So everyone keeps saying,” Everly muttered. The quiet of the table returned as servers appeared with their plates.
The quiet lasted as long as it took for everyone to take their first bites. Then Becca fixed her with a mischievous look. “What’s going on with you and Sawyer?”
“Cole said someone was getting all kissy-face the other day.” Rylee refused to look at anyone, but the meaning of her singsong tease was plain.
“You know what they say. Loose lips sink ships,” Everly tried to deflect.
It must have been a signal to go for the kill. All eyes turned to her, but it was Leah that laid on the guilt. “I’m in the throes of woe. You owe me some gossip.”
“It was nothing! Just a kiss.” That shook her to her very core. That she couldn’t stop thinking about whenever she was alone or caught his scent. Which, living with the man, was far too often. “It was a reaction to a threatening situation.”
Leah spiraled her fork in the air and stabbed at the center. “I said the exact same thing, and now look where I’m at.”
“Yeah, practically begging,” Becca snorted. “Callum needs to get better soon. The lady is living vicariously through our mouths. It’s only a matter of time before she’s asking for more details.”
“Rude,” Leah answered.
Meghan grinned down at her plate. “All she’d need to do is take a walk past your cabin, Becks. I think you should have invested in some soundproofing along with the addition for the twins.”
Becca didn’t even look apologetic. She pointed at her stomach. “I have been told the best way to get these two out is the exact way they got there in the first place.”
“That was not the advice I gave,” Everly chimed in. “You need to let those two cook for a few more weeks.”
“I know what you’re saying, but I also know what I’m feeling when they’re playing hopscotch on my bladder.”
Laughs and teasing rose all around the table, and Everly found herself smiling. They made her feel comfortable and welcome. There was an honesty in inviting her to be sad with them. She got to see them raw and upset and torn down to their worries. They hid nothing from one another because they didn’t need to keep their guard up.
Everly’s experience was so utterly different. Even as she stuck her toes in the waters of true friendship, she was ready to step back. Everyone in the pride kept their thoughts and feelings to each other. There was always the fear of words and emotions being used as a weapon.
And, she was happy to see, Leah did more than pick at her food. There was power in the bonds she saw displayed between the mates.
She felt a pang of jealousy at their ease together.
“But really, fess up,” Meghan pushed. “Because Gray and I have some bets and I need the inside scoop so I win.”
“Things are weird. Kind of extremely so.” Everly shrugged. She had already given too much information. But her panther rubbed at her to reassure her. None of the women smelled like threats. They’d shown her kindness when they didn’t know her.
She toyed with her fork and continued. “What do you do when a man won’t let you say no to taking a long walk back to your pride that abandoned you on the side of the road and then claims he’s your mate? Do you immediately declare you’re getting married when your alpha shows up looking for you? Because that’s what I did and I still can’t believe it.”
That quieted the jovial nature of the table. Rylee twisted up her mouth and asked the question Everly knew was coming. “Do you want to go back?”
“No. I don’t want to go back. But I don’t know where I want to go from here, either.”
She worried about her sister and her mother and what retribution, if any, would fall on them for her disobedience. But that still wasn’t enough for her to consider taking her place back in the pride. She’d been given a gift when Sawyer brought her to his clan. She could talk freely and didn’t need to back down, even if she still struggled with actually doing so.
Then there was Sawyer. The man was hot and cold with her. One moment he was growly and protective and shoving her into his truck, the next he ignored her. Then when he was hurt and pained, he kissed her and surged a wicked desire in her that her inner animal encouraged.
Which just compounded her guilt and confusion. She felt she should miss her family and the pride. She thought she needed to question everything more. “I feel like I’m in limbo and every step I could take is tangled up in more complications than I’m ready for. That sounds selfish, doesn’t it? I don’t mean to be ungrateful or throw all the help you’ve given in your faces.”
“No, no, it sounds just right. You’re in an awkward spot, and it’s bound to be confusing.”
“But please, please, for the love of all that’s holy and every god in the sky and all the birds and the bees and the creatures of the seas, please don’t leave before we pop these suckers out. Don’t make us deal with Dead Hands Reed.”
It sounded like a safe time limit. The pride never stayed anywhere for longer than a few weeks. Becca wasn’t due for another month, perhaps a bit sooner. Faith would deliver before her twin.
Still feeling unsure about committing, Everly nodded. She was giving them more of herself than she gave her maybe-maybe not pregnant sister. But Emery might know or be involved in the explosion that hurt Sawyer and put Callum on his back.
Every which way she turned, guilt coated her actions. She had to make her choice. There would be no pleasing everyone.
Her cat purred and made her opinions known. The beast placed her loyalty firmly with the bears. Everly received image after image from her panther of her melding with the clan. Some visions had already taken place, like her centered with the other mates at the party. Then there were the surprising images of waking next to Sawyer and a mate mark on her shoulder.
Impossible. He wasn’t a cat. He couldn’t be her mate.
But there she was, agreeing to stay in the enclave. Near him.
Everly smiled and let the excited squeals of the others r
ing in her ears. When she glanced up, Leah watched her closely, and Everly knew the woman understood her conflicts.
Chapter 13
Sawyer paused to allow two men from the construction crew pass before ducking out of the engine bay. Hudson met him at the corner. He passed the man two beers, which were quickly stuffed into the pockets of his cargo pants. Tactical gear, Hudson insisted they were called.
“Ready?” Sawyer asked.
“Just need to duck into Tommy’s for the sandwiches.”
“Hurry up. Cole’s going to notice we’re gone.”
“What if this doesn’t help and she still won’t speak?”
“Then we try something else. You’ll get through to her, Hudson.”
They were on a secret mission that Sawyer still wasn’t sure how he found himself in. Too many thoughts jumbled around his head and demanded some sort of action. So when he and Hudson nearly came to blows in the weight room, he’d barely found the control to dig at what was wrong instead of letting his inner beast seek out blood.
Agitation hung heavy in the air. He felt it everywhere he went. His home, the firehouse, even out on the streets. There was no escaping the choking scent.
An attack on the clan, on enclave territory, was exactly what they didn’t need. Too many shots were taken at Bearden already. That the latest one could have come from his involvement with his mate sliced him up inside.
But still, work needed to go on. Fires and ongoing investigations that took their preliminary findings and spawned a hoard of Supernatural Enforcement Agency goons at their gates didn’t respect that one of their own was down for the count. The Strathorns showed up, dodged the construction crew, and kept protecting the enclave, no matter how their personal lives crumbled around them.
Hudson returned a moment later, and they set off toward Town Hall, adding more tension to the air as they neared the building. They ducked their heads in polite greeting to two SEA agents and pushed through the main doors without any trouble. They didn’t expect any until they were on the lower levels.