Chapter One
Silas
The scent hits me before the main gate of the Hunter compound even comes into view.
Not the scent of home—pine, storm-soaked earth, and pack musk—but something sharp and sweet swirling under it.New.Unexpected.Impossible.
My dire wolf slams against my ribs hard enough that my vision blurs.Mate.The instinct roars through me like a blade to the gut.I stagger, planting a hand on the rough bark of a tree.The world tilts.I’m a seasoned Alpha-born warrior who’s survived war, loss, betrayal, and more.I don’t stagger and I never lose control.
But the bond doesn’t settle into certainty, it flickers.Just a spark and a flash of heat.Then nothing but the echo of it.
My dire wolf howls in frustration, pacing and frantic, unable to lock onto the scent fully.Something,someone, is interfering.Drugs, fear, pain ...trauma.It muddies the air until I can’t tell what’s real.
She’s close,my dire wolf insists.She’s hurt.
My chest tightens.
I push off the tree, breathing unsteadily.“Not now,” I mutter to myself.I have a mission to lead and a rescue to execute.Emmaleigh’s intel said a Hunter convoy was moving captives tonight, and we finally caught a trace of their trail.
But the scent...Goddess, it coils around my spine and drags.
Marc appears beside me, nostrils flaring.“Are you okay?”
No.Not even close.But I force my shoulders back.“Focus.We move in thirty.”
He nods and jogs toward the trucks.I stand alone in the trees, fists clenched, trying to breathe past the bond’s broken pulse.It shouldn’t react like that.Mate scents don’tglitch.Unless...
Unless she’s so traumatized her animal can’t rise to meet mine.A low growl tears out of me.Whoever she is, she’s already suffering and she’s close.Too close to be a coincidence.
I shove down the panic.One mission at a time.Save the captives.Identify the scent later.
Except fate doesn’t give a damn about my plans.
****
We reach the coordinatesThomas retrieved from the Hunter tech they captured last week, a supposed abandoned warehouse near the river.But the moment our boots hit the ground, my neck prickles.
It’s too quiet.Too open.Too fresh.
Godrick snarls under his breath.“They knew we were coming.”
Raleigh is already scanning the tree line.“We were fed bullshit intel.”
A shadow shifts near the warehouse windows.I inhale and that scent hits me again, harder this time.Closer and panicked.It feels drug-heavy and smothered in fear.
My entire body locks up.
Marc notices first.“Silas...?”
I don’t respond because I’m already moving.
The Hunters burst from the building in tactical formation wearing uniforms, and carrying shock sticks glowing blue.Not the chaotic, scattered Hunters we’ve dealt with before.This cell is organized.Prepared.
Iris’s intel warned us that some Hunter groups have started regrouping, but this ...this is worse.Gunfire explodes shattering the silence of the night.The pack spreads, shifting, snarling, and meeting the Hunter force with brutal precision.
But I only hear one thing.A thin, broken whimper.
Mate.
