by J. L. Wilder
But Marco followed behind him. “Where do you think you’re going?” he asked.
“I’m going to track them,” Ryker said. “I’m going to find her.”
“Not alone, you’re not. Are you kidding?”
“Go back to the cave, Marco.”
“No,” Marco said. “She’s my omega too. And you’re not in charge. Besides, what do you think you’re going to do if you find a pack of bears? You won’t stand a chance against them.”
“Then I’ll go down fighting,” Ryker growled. The words tasted like acid in his mouth.
“Great, Ryker,” Marco said. “That’s really great. Run off and be a martyr. And how is that going to help Sophie? You’ll get yourself killed, and she’ll have one less person on her side. One less person to fight for her. Do you really think that’s a good idea?”
“All I can do is fight,” Ryker said. It felt like the truth. Even now, his chest was heaving, his muscles aching for his wolf form. Even looking at Marco, one of his closest friends and allies, he felt wracked with violence. “Until I get her back, that’s all I’m good for. Maybe I’ll take some of them out, and then you and Burton can stage a rescue—”
Marco grabbed Ryker by the shoulder and slammed him up against the trunk of the tree so hard that it knocked the wind out of him.
“Don’t be a goddamn idiot,” Marco said. “I know you’re smarter than this. We can go in with a plan. We can figure out something that’s actually going to work.”
“I can’t—”
“Damn it! You’re not the only one hurting, Ryker. You’re not the only one who’s lost your omega. The three of us are in this thing together. Don’t you bail out on us. Not now. Not when we need you.”
“Whoa.” Burton came jogging up behind Marco. “What the hell is going on?”
“Get him off me,” Ryker growled.
“He thinks he’s going to run off and take on the bears all by himself,” Marco said. “He’s lost his mind.”
“Let me go.”
“Marco’s right,” Burton said. “We have to make a plan.”
“You’re saying that?” Ryker demanded. “You’ve never made a plan in your fucking life. If anyone was going to charge in halfcocked—”
“It would be me,” Burton said. “But I’m not. And if I can keep my shit together until I know what we’re doing, you can do the same.”
Ryker snarled. He felt as wild as he ever had, and he was sure he looked it, too. But Marco didn’t back down.
“Come back into the cave,” Burton said. “The sooner we talk about how we’re going to handle this, the sooner we can get moving.”
“I’m not abandoning her to them,” Ryker said. “No matter what gets decided in there.”
“Of course you’re not,” Marco said. “Nobody is.”
“Fine.” Ryker shoved Marco off him and strode back into the cave, vaguely aware that the other two were following behind him.
Back inside, Robby was stoking the fire. Chrissy and Cam were talking to one another quietly. Petra sat at the very back of the cave, a bowl of berries cradled her hand, staring off into the distance.
Chrissy looked up when they came in. “What’s the plan?” she asked.
“We’re going to confront them,” Marco said. “We just need to put a strategy together.”
“Good,” Chrissy said. She got to her feet and dusted off her pants. “I’m coming with you.”
“No,” Marco said. “Absolutely not.”
Chrissy looked outraged. “You don’t think I can fight?”
“We think you can,” Burton said. “That’s why we need you here. Petra and Cam aren’t fighters. If anything happens while we’re away, you and Robby will have to protect them.”
“Cam can come with us as well,” Chrissy argued. “He’ll just stay back, away from the action.”
“And you think he’d do that if something happened to you?” Ryker asked. It felt good—powerful—to find that he was on the same page as his co-alphas. “You don’t think that if you were hurt or killed, he might forget himself and come rushing into the action?”
“He wouldn’t do that,” Chrissy said, but she sounded unsure.
“If he did, we would have to protect him,” Burton said. “And that could lead to more people getting hurt. That could cause us to lose our chance to save Sophie. You’re not coming.”
“You can’t tell me what to do,” Chrissy said.
“If you’re a member of this pack, we can,” Ryker said. “If you’re one of us, you’ll do as we say. And if you’re not, you’re free to go—but you’re not free to follow us into this battle.”
“It’s time to decide,” Marco said quietly. He looked from Chrissy to Cam, and then to Petra and Robby. “We need to know now. Are you with us? Or are you going your own way?”
“I’m staying,” Petra said quietly. “If you’ll still have me after what happened to Sophie, I mean.”
“Of course,” Burton said. “Nobody thinks that was your fault, Petra. Right, Ryker?”
“Right,” Ryker said, only slightly reluctantly. “There wasn’t anything you could have done about it.”
“I’m with you too,” Robby said. “You’re going to need a strong beta guy around here.”
Cam nodded. “We have to stay,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to come across those bears alone. There’s strength in the pack structure. It’s better for all of us.”
“Chrissy?” Marco asked.
She sighed. “I don’t like it,” she said. “But you know I’ll do what Cam wants.”
“Then you’ll stay behind? You’ll help guard the cave while we go looking for Sophie?”
“I will,” she said.
“We have to make it an order,” Marco said. “We can’t afford to be worrying that you’ll change your mind. This is too important.”
“Do it, then,” Chrissy said.
The three alphas exchanged glances.
“All right,” Ryker spoke first. “I order the four of you to remain behind, here at the cave, while we go in search of Sophie.” He put as much weight and power behind his words as he could.
The four betas nodded.
Marco spoke next. “You’re free to leave the cave to find food or to go to the river,” he said. “But you should always be in groups of two or more. No one should ever be left alone. Watch each other’s backs. Take care of each other. Don’t ever turn your backs on each other.”
They nodded again.
“And if the bears do come back to this place,” Burton added, “then you should leave. You should flee and find a place of safety. The most important thing isn’t the cave itself; it’s that you all stick together as a pack. If you’re forced to leave, try to keep to this area—this is where we’ll come looking for you first. But if you have to go farther away, we’ll track you. Just make sure the four of you stick together.”
The betas nodded one final time. The way their heads moved in unison gave Ryker confidence that the orders had been received, and that they would be followed.
We’re a pack now. For better or worse, all of these people are my packmates.
Now he just had to go and rescue his missing omega, and then they would be complete once more.
But it was hard to feel hopeful, knowing that she was so far away. He didn’t even know where they had taken her. He didn’t know where to begin to search.
And wherever she was, she was surrounded by treacherous bears.
There was only one piece of news that felt slightly encouraging. She was probably alive. If the bears had wanted to kill her, they could have done so in the cave. There would have been no reason to carry her away with them. The fact that they’d chosen to kidnap her instead of killing her meant that she was probably still alive.
Probably.
God, he hoped she was still alive.
He looked at Burton and Marco. “What do we do now?” he asked. “You’re the ones who wanted to make a plan. What’s the plan?”
> “We need to get out after them before the trail goes cold,” Burton said. “We need to start tracking them while we still have the opportunity to catch up.”
“And when we find them?” Marco asked. “What are we going to do then?”
“We’ll figure that out along the way,” Burton said. “Ryker’s right about that much. We need to get moving. The longer we sit here waiting, the farther out of our reach she’s going to be.”
Ryker nodded firmly. “We have to go,” he agreed. He couldn’t stand to think about what those bears might be doing to her even now, about how scared she must be. We’re coming to get you, Sophie, he thought. Just hang on. We’ll be there as soon as we can.
“Okay,” Marco said. “You’re right. Let’s get moving. We can’t let the trail die.”
Ryker grabbed the backpack that Sophie had had when she’d arrived at the cave. A wave of nostalgia threatened to wash over him, but he couldn’t allow himself to be carried away by his feelings. He pushed them aside, gathered up some food and clothes, and put them in the backpack.
It would have to be enough.
“All right,” he told the betas. “Be safe while we’re gone. Take care of each other.”
“Good luck,” Chrissy said quietly. “Come back safely, okay?”
Ryker nodded, not trusting himself to speak. He turned and led the way out of the cave, with Burton and Marco following close behind him.
Chapter Seventeen
SOPHIE
“Let me go,” Sophie begged, tears streaming down her face. “Please, just let me go.”
Dina and Harv had deposited her among a group of five other bears. They had obviously been some kind of scouting party sent out to look for her and her pack. Now the bears were celebrating their success in capturing an omega with rabbit meat off the bone.
Dina glanced over at Sophie, then tossed a leg of rabbit in her direction. It landed in the dirt. “Might as well eat,” she said, laughing.
Sophie shuddered. “Untie my hands.”
“No,” Dina said.
“How am I supposed to eat?”
“Figure it out. You wolves are smart, right? I’m sure you can crack it.”
Feeling sick and ashamed, Sophie leaned over and took the meat between her teeth. It tasted like dirt and the sweat of other people’s hands, but it was still food. She forced herself to chew and swallow.
“Can I have something to drink?” she asked.
“In a bit.” Dina was sucking down pieces of meat off of her own rabbit leg. “Relax. We’re in no hurry here. You don’t have anywhere to be.”
“Please,” Sophie begged. “Please let me go back to my pack. I just want to be with them. I’ll tell them we have to go south. We’ll go all the way down to the United States if that’s what it takes. I don’t care. I just want to be with my family.”
“You should have left when I told you to leave,” Dina said. “I warned you once.”
“You’re right,” Sophie said. She felt wild, desperate. She would have said anything to win Dina’s approval. “You told me. You gave me fair warning, and I didn’t do what you asked. I fucked up. I’m sorry.”
“There’s no reason for me to trust that this time would be any different.” Dina sucked on a bone as if it was a lollipop, then threw it to Sophie. “There’s probably some marrow in that, if you want to bite it open.”
“They’re going to be wondering where I am,” Sophie said.
“Who is?”
“My alphas. My mates.”
“Alphas, plural?” Dina laughed. “God, you’re really making up some fairy tales, girl.”
“It’s true,” Sophie said desperately. “I have three alphas.”
“Three alphas can’t live together. They’d kill each other,” Dina said. “Maybe I was wrong about wolves. Maybe you are stupid creatures. I get why you’d lie about an alpha coming to rescue you, but to tell me it’s going to be three of them—I mean, do you also have the RCMP on call? Are they going to ride in and save you?”
Sophie felt nauseous. The truth was, she had no idea whether her alphas were coming. She couldn’t imagine that they would just leave her to this fate. But would they have any idea of where to find her?
She certainly didn’t know where she was relative to the cave. Harv had carried her over his shoulder for hours. She had blacked out for a while, the blood having rushed to her head, the adrenaline that had flooded her body during her kidnap fading out and leaving her to crash.
She had come to with her hands bound behind her back and one ankle tethered to the trunk of a tree. Trying to escape would be hopeless, she knew, and yet she had done her best to work herself free of her bindings. Now, hours later, she had given that up and had resorted to begging for her freedom.
There was one more card left to play.
It wasn’t something she had wanted to tell the bears, partly because they might find a way to use it against her, but also because the idea of sharing her deepest happiness with her captors made her feel ill. She hadn’t even told her alphas yet. How could she be considering telling the bears?
But if there was a chance it would compel them to show her mercy, she had to try.
“You have to let me go,” she said. “You have to let me go back to my family. I’m—I’m pregnant.”
She watched Dina’s face, desperately hoping to see some sign of compassion. Dina might be a bear, but she was a woman. Surely she would feel something about this.
But Dina’s expression darkened.
“Are you telling the truth?” she asked.
Sophie felt strangely terrified. “Yes,” she whispered, suddenly wishing that she hadn’t said anything at all.
Dina got to her feet and walked away without a word.
Oh, God. I shouldn’t have told her.
Sophie had discovered the truth of her condition only that very morning. It felt like a scene from someone else’s life now, and yet she could still remember how it had felt to sit under the rays of the rising sun, her eyes closed, relishing in the knowledge that her body was being put to use in this new and miraculous way.
She had kissed each of her alphas goodbye that morning, putting a little more into the kisses than she might have ordinarily, wondering what they would say when she told them they were going to be fathers. How they would react.
Marco would be quietly pleased. He would want to have a conversation about it. A hundred conversations, probably, between now and the time their litter was born.
Burton would be excited. He would grin from ear to ear, and he would come up with baby names that would make the rest of them groan.
And Ryker—Sophie thought that becoming a father would change him, more than it would change either of the others. Ryker had always been the wildest, the most feral, of her beloved alphas. Imprinting on her had mellowed and tamed him. But having children would tame him even further. It would be fascinating to see him live the life of a family man.
Now, though, Sophie wondered whether she would ever have a chance to see that.
She had planned to tell them together when they had returned from the hunt. She had planned to sit them all down and share her news so she could enjoy all of their reactions at once.
What if she had told them the truth in the morning? What if she’d told them as soon as she knew? Would it have changed anything?
Would she be at home with them right now?
God. It hurt to think about it.
And what was Dina going to do with the knowledge Sophie had given her? Where had she gone? Was she telling the rest of the bears that Sophie was pregnant?
If so...what would their response be?
The answer was a long time in coming. The bears gathered in a cluster far away from where Sophie was tied. Sophie felt sure they were all talking about her—what else could they possibly be talking about, gathered together like that?—but they were too far away for her to pick up what was being said.
Her stomach ached with hunger. She fe
lt dizzy with thirst. And for the first time, it occurred to her that the deprivation she was suffering now might harm her unborn children.
For that matter, being carried over Harv’s shoulder for hours, as she had been, might have harmed them.
The panic that shot through her felt as real and visceral as if she had been stabbed. If something had happened to her babies...
What? What will you do about it?
She knew the answer. She wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. There was nothing she could do to get revenge if her children had been harmed. She was completely at the mercy of the bears.
And bears had no mercy. That was becoming abundantly clear to her.
If only she could have hoped to be found by her alphas! But she had been carried so far. How could they possibly track her? They were good at following scents, she knew, and they would be attuned to hers. But she was sure the bears would have taken steps to obscure their smell, to make sure they wouldn’t be followed.
The terrible thing was that Sophie knew she hadn’t been lying to Dina. She absolutely would agree to take her pack and go south. And she knew that she had the power to convince her alphas that that was what needed to be done. If they would only agree to let her leave and go home, everyone could be happy.
It would be so easy.
But they weren’t going to agree to it.
She heard footsteps and looked up. One of the bears—one she hadn’t been introduced to—was walking over.
He was bigger and more muscular than any of her alphas. He was bigger and more muscular than any man she had ever seen. And there was something graceless and inelegant about him. He moved like a boulder that had been pushed downhill and swung his arms like clubs as he walked.
She was afraid of him. He wouldn’t think twice before hurting her, and he could kill her without trying.
“Wolf girl,” he said, looking down at her.
She forced herself to meet his gaze.
Dina was at his shoulder, her beady eyes narrowed. “She’s pregnant,” she repeated. “Means she’s telling the truth about having an alpha, doesn’t it?”
“No,” the man said, scoffing. “She’s an omega. An omega could get pregnant just thinking about sex. All they do is get themselves knocked up. That’s all they’re good for. Any beta could have done it to her.” He leered. “Honestly, I’d be more surprised if she’d said she wasn’t pregnant.”