“I only delayed to verbally castrate him like he deserved.” Sierra rounded the pool table as she stared down at her enemy’s corpse. Her nose wrinkled in disgust and her lips pursed in displeasure. “That was far too easy.”
Maverick grunted. “It always is.” He nudged Brent’s still-fresh body with his boot.
“As long as I don’t have to clean up, I’m good.” She tucked the gun into the back of her jeans again. “Next time, do you really have to come with me though? Other than to get my two cents in, you really were unnecessary.”
He let out an amused chuckle. “No,” he said, the hint of his laugh fading. “But if you choose to still be my wife, there will be a next time,” he warned.
There was little doubt in her mind.
“I’m more than prepared for it.” Turning away from the bloodshed, she headed toward the opposite exit from which Maverick had arrived, prepared to return to the ranch in her victorious state. “What I don’t understand is why he brought us off the packlands all the h—”
“Sierra!”
* * *
Maverick saw the rusty old trip wire only seconds before she opened the door. His body flew back from the force of the explosion, knocking him to the ground as the sound of the blast rang in his ears. The inside of the building pulsated with the fiery orange glow of the now-lit ceiling beams as the last shrine of the Wild Eight went up in flames. A thick layer of smoke clogged the air, choking him. The broken glass of the game-room windows was littered across the floor, and he felt a trickle of blood run down his temple from where one of the shards had cut him. But he didn’t hesitate.
“Sierra,” he ground out, calling her name as he dragged himself to his feet amid the rubble. His eyes fell to the floor on which she lay—bleeding.
No.
Maverick rushed to her side, eyes dazed, as a myriad of thoughts shot like rapid fire through his head. Rose lying in the middle of the mountainside, a trail of bloody pawprints from before she’d shifted back into human form in her wake. The filthy scent of bloodsucker in the air. The pool of crimson at her neck. The matted bits of earth clumped in her hair.
He’d lost her. Slowly. He’d been too late. Far, far too late. And it could happen again. He could be back in that dark place again.
There was no sound in his ears but the ringing of the blast. Time blurred, seeming to move in slow motion as he carried Sierra from the wreckage. Next thing he knew, they were in a strangely familiar white room, the smell of antiseptic stinging his wolf nose and the glare of fluorescent lights stinging his retinas. Someone moved to pull her from his arms.
He snarled in response, baring his teeth.
A flash of brown skin and even darker curls. Austin in front of his face. His packmate was shouting something at him, but for the life of him, he couldn’t hear it.
All he knew was he couldn’t leave her side, couldn’t allow them to take her, because if he was absent, if he wasn’t with her, death could claim her.
Minutes. Hours. Days.
He wasn’t certain how much time had passed. His vision was clouded. All he could see was her laid out in the bed, attached to machines.
“Packmaster. Packmaster.”
Someone was yelling at him again, but the sound was muffled, distant, as if the speaker had been held underwater.
He understood the feeling of drowning, of having the life sucked out of you and not being able to draw breath. He’d been drowning since the moment he’d seen that fucking trip wire. The voice drew closer. This time harsher, more guttural.
Wes.
Or was it Colt?
He’d didn’t give a fuck.
Whoever it was, they were hauling him away from her side. Using every ounce of his strength that remained, he thrashed against them. They couldn’t take her from him. He couldn’t lose her. He couldn’t. Something sharp in his throat caused him to still as he fell into darkness. The next thing he knew, the ringing in his ears turned into a steady…
Beep. Beep. Beep.
He cracked an eye open, thinking only to stop the steady beeping sound before…
“Sierra,” he growled, forcing himself up, only to be shoved back down again by the pain in his side and a large imposing hand.
“Be still.” The voice was familiar. This time, he was certain of its owner.
Colt.
“She’s fine, Mav. She was out of the hospital within less than forty-eight hours. It’s you who’s been under for well over a week.”
His head was throbbing, the vein in his temple punching him with each beat of his pulse. He grumbled. “Me?” He hadn’t even begun to think of himself until this moment. Every moment after the blast was a blur.
Save for the terror he’d felt at the idea of losing her.
“Sierra took the brunt of the initial trauma that’s for certain, but you know her, she’s a fighter. With Austin’s help, she healed quickly. You, on the other hand, refused to leave her side, and after over thirty-two hours at her bedside with a chunk of a pool table leg embedded in your abdomen, by the time we finally realized you’d been wounded, too, you had an infection. Austin had to stick you with one of the horse tranquilizers before we could get you to leave her.”
Maverick let out a long groan. “Is she here?”
Colt hesitated. “No, brother.”
“Where is she?”
“She left.”
At those words, Maverick’s eyes shot open, though the glare of the overhead lights still pained him. “What?”
“Once it became clear that you would be fine and it was just a matter of waiting for the infection to clear, she left.”
Maverick’s brow furrowed. “Where to?”
“MAC-V-Alpha.” Colt pulled up a chair beside him, the loud scrape against the tiled floor making his pulse race. “Apparently, once you made it clear you didn’t intend to defy the council for her, she said she only had one choice for her career. She reenlisted.”
Which meant he had lost her.
Just not in the way he expected.
“Did she say anything?”
He wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer, but he asked the question anyway.
Colt was quiet for a moment before he finally said, “When I asked her why she was leaving, she said you’d know. She said our father was right and that you actually didn’t want a real wife, whatever that means.”
A vise grip constricted Maverick’s chest as he fought hard to swallow the dark emotions blocking his throat, but it was no use. He knew exactly what those words meant. Everything had been wrong from the start. Not that he’d chosen to marry Rose. That was behind them now. But that in every move he’d made since then, he’d pushed Sierra away. He’d chosen the pack, himself, his duty, everything over her. It didn’t matter that he’d given her the position she wanted—at least temporarily—or even that he’d been the one to nominate her. When he refused to stand up to the council, he’d shown his true hand. He hadn’t done anything to fight for her or for what she wanted.
He’d done it for the good of the pack.
And for a woman who’d been told she was second to all—her brother, her father, the male elite warriors—for her whole life, he’d committed the worse kind of sin. It didn’t matter that he loved her.
He’d never chosen her in the first place.
Her wants, her desires, her needs.
Isn’t that what you’re doing? Using me as a means to an end?
He hadn’t realized it at the time, but he had been. He’d been so blinded by duty to the pack and his drive to protect himself that he’d become the very thing he’d been running from. And in the process, he’d lost her.
Chapter 28
Recovered and healthy again, over the coming weeks, Maverick tried to tell himself it was for the best that things had ended between them like this. That though he
’d never meant to hurt her, the pain of that hurt would keep her away, make her see that as much as he wanted to put her first in all things, when it came to his role, he couldn’t. Love would make him weaker, vulnerable, and he couldn’t risk vulnerability when he had a responsibility to the pack.
It was long past noon, the early evening sun fading over the mountains, casting shadows across the ranch. The snow had settled in to stay, a constant, packed layer coating the ground as the last of autumn had long since faded away. They still had a few months of cold to endure before the first buds of spring made their way. Maverick leaned on the paddock fence, panting and sweating. He’d been in the pen with Beast on and off the whole damn day, and still he hadn’t so much as gotten close to saddling the wild mustang.
“You can’t stand to be caged, can you?” he mumbled at the horse.
Beast let out a frustrated huff in response.
If you expect to get anywhere with that damn horse, you might start by giving him an inch of freedom instead of keeping him locked in a cage.
Sierra’s voice had come to him so many times over the past several weeks that it’d become a game. What could he do? What situation could he put himself in to evoke the sassy tone of hers so clearly in his memory? It was a poor excuse compared to having her by his side, but she’d made her choice. Any dream he’d had of them had gone out to pasture. Or so he kept telling himself…
It’s better this way. Best for the pack.
That was his mantra, but deep down, he’d never truly believed it. Not then or now.
But it was enough to hold him together most days. He couldn’t change what he’d done, the choices he’d made.
Cursing under his breath, he started to head toward the barn to finally call Dean and throw in the towel, but he only managed two steps before he paused.
What could it hurt?
Rounding to the far side of the paddock, he watched Beast, angry and feral in his pen, huffing and stomping his foot with every step he made. His dark eyes flashed. No, it couldn’t hurt. Taking her advice, Maverick threw open the gate, but to his surprise, the horse didn’t immediately shoot out it. He held it open, gesturing for the horse to go.
“Go.” The horse didn’t move. “Go on now. You’re free.”
Slowly, tentatively, the horse inched toward the gate. Then suddenly, with the last few steps, he shot forward like a live wire. Beast galloped out into the open expanse of the pasture, running at full speed. The animal truly was a sight. Fast. Wild. Free.
Maverick climbed a rung or two of the paddock gate, watching the horse as he let out a triumphant whoop in relief. It didn’t matter that the freedom wasn’t his own. It was a sight to watch. The horse ran until he was little more than a pinprick in the distance. Dean wouldn’t be pleased about having to track him down on the outskirts of the ranchland, if they even so much as bothered, but at the moment, Maverick couldn’t bring himself to care.
With a deep sigh, Maverick stared up at the wide Montana sky, inhaling the fresh air for several minutes. Once he’d had his fill, he climbed down from the gate. Pushing the thing closed, he snapped the latch, but as he did, he heard the sound of running hooves against the frozen ground. He turned to find Beast, trotting back toward the gate, any hint of the fury in the animal’s eyes long since gone.
Maverick couldn’t help himself. He laughed low and long as Beast came right up to the gate. The horse stopped several feet away. Clearly, he would no longer bite the hand that fed him, but he wasn’t ready to be friendly yet either. Still, it was impressive and unusual all the same.
Maverick let go of the gate, easing forward to try to approach the horse, but as he did, the edge of his back pocket caught on the splintered wood of the gate, and something fell from his pocket. He glanced down at the folded paper that had fluttered onto a patch of frozen grass.
Sierra’s list.
He hadn’t been able to bring himself to read it during the time they’d spent together. Too afraid he’d go wild with lust—or more specifically, love. But now, with her off retraining for MAC-V-Alpha in the foothills of North Carolina, what harm could it do?
Bending down, he picked up the list and unfolded the page. To his surprise, the folds were looser than he’d anticipated, and from the way he didn’t get even a bit of resistance from the page, he realized the list wasn’t new, it was aged, which meant she had to have written it when they’d been young, or at least years ago—and it wasn’t an homage to all her deepest sexual fantasies either.
It was far worse.
I want a man who will treat me with kindness and compassion. A man who will always put me first. I want a man who will respect my needs and desires, who asks permission, who waits, who protects me because he loves me, not because he thinks I’m weak. I want a man who will kiss me under the stars, and lend me his weapon, and champion my skill with a sword, all in the same breath. I want a man who is man enough to stand by my side.
Man enough to take my breath away.
Man enough to call me his equal.
Underneath her treatise, she’d written a short list of possibilities, but every single name had been crossed out except for one she’d underlined and circled, beneath which she’d written and dated ten years prior.
I want Maverick Grey.
Maverick clutched the list in his hands. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d shed a tear. Had he done so at Rose’s funeral? He didn’t know anymore. But with Sierra’s love cutting through him and all his grief, he couldn’t help himself.
The Grey Wolf packmaster dropped to his knees and wept.
Chapter 29
Most days, Sierra didn’t weep. Most days, she could manage to make it through the constant deluge of thoughts about him and not crumble to pieces, but today was unlike most, because today, she thought of him, and to her surprise, she smiled.
She stood on the steps of Rogue and Maeve’s North Carolina mansion, glancing out over the Blue Ridge mountains. He would’ve hated the view here, grumbling and saying it was nothing comparable to the Montana mountains she called home. That was Maverick after all, always grumpy. Had he been here, she wouldn’t have allowed him to even get started on the fact that his sister and his criminal brother-in-law had to distinguish between mansions in more than one state, when he was the most powerful packmaster in existence and only owned one home, but that was a thought for another day.
Another day when she didn’t feel the sting of his absence so keenly.
She wrapped her hands around the mug of hot chocolate Maeve had brought her, the outside of the porcelain serving to warm her hands. She needed it, considering she’d spent most of the day in wolf form tromping through the woods across the couple’s vast property. As far as she was concerned, a day well spent.
The only way it would’ve been better would’ve been if she’d spent it with him. She could almost feel the low vibration in her belly as she heard him say, “Sierra.”
She turned, expecting to find it was only her memory, but instead, he stood there, Elvis pecking at the ground behind him. She dropped the mug of cocoa, immediately spilling the warm liquid all over the wooden patio.
The scarred side of his brow furrowed. “You can wield a sword twice your size but not a mug of cocoa?” he grumbled, picking up the mug that had clattered near his feet.
“Most men would start with hello.”
“I’m not most men.” His eyes flashed to his wolf.
No. He wasn’t.
He was packmaster of the Grey Wolves, and she’d never forget that. He’d made certain.
His eyes surveyed her, not aroused—yet—but lingering. “You look different.”
She didn’t bother to respond. She crossed her arms over her chest to hold herself together. “What do you want, Packmaster?” She hurled his title at him like a weapon, and to her surprise, he flinched.
But he recove
red quickly. “I’ve come to negotiate a treaty.”
“A treaty?” Her mouth dropped open.
And to think that for a moment she’d thought…
“A treaty with you,” he amended.
“A treaty with me?”
The edge of his lips quirked into a wry, teasing grin. “Repetition, warrior.”
She didn’t have it in her to bristle against it.
“Clearly, the war between us hasn’t worked out too well,” he continued, “so I thought I’d come to make amends.”
She let out a haughty huff. “And demands, I’m certain.”
He shook his head. “No demands.”
Now, he’d truly caught her off guard.
“Only war reparations.” He eased closer, and reaching into his coat pocket, he removed a small bundle of papers. He untied the string that bound them first before reaching for her hand at her side.
She let him.
Gently, he lifted her palm and pressed the first paper into her fist. “This is the document detailing the dissolution of the Elder Council.”
Her jaw dropped. “What?”
“I’m not even close to finished with my groveling yet. I’ve only just begun. With your permission, I’d like to finish?”
Her eyes grew wide. With her permission? For a moment, she remained frozen before she finally found it in herself to nod.
Another paper pressed into her hand. “This is a pack law detailing there will be no discrimination based on gender for any position open within the pack.”
Her breath caught.
“This is the document changing the laws of primogeniture to ensure that both firstborn males and firstborn females can become packmaster.”
Sierra couldn’t bring herself to breathe, though her heart was beating a mile a minute.
“This is the document allowing for our mate separation, the first of its kind. A divorce, as it’s worded here.”
“Divorce?” Her voice was shriller than she’d anticipated. “You’re groveling with divorce papers?”
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