We were not alone in the field. We had never been. But the ownership of the danger had tilted; the true cost of staying here—of sheltering someone not of our blood—stood in the rain at our feet.
Ethan folded the paper into his pocket and reached for me.
“Stay inside,” he ordered.
I wanted to nod. I wanted to obey. I wanted, more than anything, to know who had been watching us and whether the burned words were the start of a campaign or a single coward’s scare. When he turned away to meet the pack, jaw set like something unbreakable, I saw the tire tracks and the shreddedblanket and the toy with one eye missing. I saw the scrap of scorched paper and the way he cradled it.
He was ready to defend us. He would. But ready or not, the world outside the farmhouse had shifted.
A shadow moved in the trees at the edge of the cleared field, paused, then melted toward the road as if it had always belonged to dusk.
Ethan tucked the burned corner of paper into his palm and kept his hand there, as if holding it quiet. He walked back to the house, the pack fanning behind him.
I swallowed and followed, Jamie tucked under my arm, the quilt damp at our heels. The farmhouse door closed behind us like a gate. The storm had taken a lot—fence, cattle, quiet—and left a message on our land.
On the kitchen table the candle guttered. Ethan dropped the worn piece of paper where I could see the burned words.
I reached for it before I could think. The edges crumbled under my fingers and heat prickled where it had been burned; ash dusted my palm.
He caught my hand as I tucked the scrap into my palm, eyes like a trap.
“We’re being pushed,” he said, low. “Not vandalism. Pressure. And it’s getting smarter.”
Outside, the road to town lay quiet. Somewhere a car idled again.
Someone was not done with us.
6
ETHAN COLE
Heat hummed low in the council room—more than the wood stove. I felt it where the wolf kept score, a pressure behind my ribs. The pack's eyes were on me. My jaw was a stone.
"Rowan's got a point," Lena said, voice thin as the paper she always folded. "We've survived by keeping the lines clear."
A dozen pairs of feet shifted. Miguel's hand found mine under the table without a word. His grip said what his eyes had said the night the blanket was cut: caution, not war.
I cleared my throat. "This is temporary. It's a shelter, not a surrender."
Whispers rose. Scent rolled past me—metal and hay, fear and the faint molasses of Nora's soap from the farmhouse. Even now, weeks after that first storm, her scent answered mine like a bell. It made my ribs ache.
Rowan leaned back, letting his scowl do the rest. He was bulky and old-fighter lean. He'd lost kin to outsiders—the scar was in his voice as much as in his temper. "Temporary becomes precedent. Precedent becomes new law. Next thing you know the line that keeps the pack whole is worn threadbare."
"Or it's the thing that keeps a boy from the system," I said without letting my temper rise. Control was the only honestlanguage I had left. "Jamie is a human child. He needs a roof and competent care while the county untangles the mess his mother's life left. Nora is that competent care. For now."
Rowan's nostrils flared. "And if some social worker pokes, and they find a human living unbound in our territory? Do you want the sheriff on our doorstep with warrants? Do you want the county talking about 'cult activity' on the morning radio? Do you want our dens probed because an outsider thinks we harbor something illegal?"
I thought of the headlights on the lane. Of the burned notice half-buried in mud. Of the slashed blanket. I thought of what I'd lost before the pack broke and the vow I'd made: no more surprises. No more letting weakness cost us blood. My voice tightened. "I want to keep us safe, not cut our throat."
Nora stood in the doorway. She had that way-in-the-storm look—soaked hair drying into waves against the collar of a borrowed sweater, hands that smelled faintly of baby powder and wood smoke, jaw set like she'd been arguing with herself for days. She didn't come to steady me. She came to the center of the room.
"You're talking about him like he's evidence," she said. "Jamie is a child. He is not a problem to be quarantined."
She moved to the crate of supplies we'd set near the stove and pulled out a folder. She laid it on the table. Her hands were steady. Her fingertips brushed mine as she set the papers down. The electricity the wolf felt when her skin touched mine was stupid and dangerous.
"This is his school file. Nurse's notes. A record from St. Mary's—sudden custody emergency." She met Rowan's eyes without blinking. "I'm an emergency caregiver on paper until Calder finishes. I have references. I have medical consent forms. I have an evacuation plan for the school and a spreadsheet that coordinates drop-offs, medication, and therapy. I'm not askingto be claimed. I'm asking you to let me keep a kid dry, fed, and on his homework."
Silence hit harder than any bark. The pack listened to a human lay out logistics like she was mapping a wildfire, and some of them softened because competence was a language they respected. Miguel's fingers tightened on mine.
