Now there is a card pressed into my palm: KANE RIVERS—K. RIVERS, CONSULTING. Under it, a rubber stamp with a symbol I don't recognize. A number scrawled. A single handwritten note: "Make it look like someone else."
Ethan's jaw tightens. He moves with a quick economy that says he has no time for theatrics. He searches the truck: a cut blanket, a red smear on a rag, tire marks pressed into the wet shoulder of the road. Miguel kneels and studies the treads like a man reading scripture. "Not local," he mutters. "Bigger rubber. Out of town."
Lena comes up with a calling card from a security firm. Different firm. Different hands.
"Phone's still on," Rowan says. "We pulled location: pinged from the east side, county line."
Ethan looks at me, the math on his face—what to do, how much to tell, how hard to push before the law knocks the door down and drags the rest of the world in. He's good at hiding struggle. Not with me. With me, his shoulders show the calculus.
"Do you want me to—" he starts and doesn't finish. The pack responds without orders. They gather the men, truss them up under Miguel's barked commands, drag the truck's plate. Someone calls the sheriff. Someone else calls an attorney. The ordinary machines of consequence start to click.
I gather Jamie's duffel, pressing my fingers into the frayed fabric of a childhood full of mismatched socks and the smell of soap. The bus empties like a broken hourglass. Parents converge, questions bristling. I answer in short sentences. "He's okay." "Police will handle it." "We need to go home."
Home. The word tastes strange when Ethan's scent seems to line the farmhouse walls.
We don't go straight to the ranch. Ethan's truck sits a short distance from the bus stop, engine ticking. He doesn't offer the passenger seat like a man on a date; he offers it like an instruction. I know better than to accept a ride without a plan that includes who will be at the house, who will document the scene, who will deal with the sheriff.
"Jamie will be safe there," he says. "We have people. You should come now, get him in, call the social worker?—"
"No." My voice is a small weapon. "No calls. Not yet. He gets nervous with strangers and the worker will turn us inside out. They can use any little thing to separate him. I want to keep this quiet until we figure the ring."
He watches me like a man deciding if a fire is friendly or a trap. "You trust me," he says—less a question than an observation.
Part of me wants to say yes and lean into him like he's the only harbor left. Another part remembers what it took to get Jamie out of that last house: the piled threats, the exhaustion, the paperwork. Trust isn't a switch. It's a ledger you balance.
"We don't have time to dance," he says, patience gone now that danger shows itself. "Come with me. We get you inside. We secure Jamie. We take evidence to the sheriff. We file. We push back."
"You want to take it public." It isn't a question.
"I want to keep you safe." He says the words like a prayer.
My hands shake when I lift the phone that had fallen from the man. Someone left it unlocked. There are recordings—voicemails. A clipped, oily voice leaving instructions: "Make them feel like risk. The county is the lever. Rivers said make it messy and they'll sell. No blood."
Then another voice—rougher, older, a shifter name that makes the air drop. "We do it quiet. We don't drag a child's name. He wants the house. He will pay."
Ethan sees it before I can speak. He reads the threads of the messages like a man who's untangled similar snares. His fingers tighten on the phone until the edges whiten.
He looks at the men he still holds—small potatoes, hired hands. "Who sent you?" he asks.
They mouth names. Rivers. A contractor. A spot east on Route 9.
"Do you know them?" I ask.
Ethan's face becomes a map of old battles and new calculations. "I know the type."
Miguel crouches beside him. "This ain't random. Kane Rivers uses a network. He hires men who weld and throw fires. The shifter names I heard are a different story. There's coordination."
Coordination. The word lands heavy. It means a hand with legal paper could be linked to boots that slash a blanket and to hands that shove a child. It means the threat isn't just money. It's muscle—and something older than paperwork.
I look at Jamie. He's staring at a scraped knee, proud of his dirt like a medal. He's too young to carry this. He smiles at me, tentative, trusting. The ache in my chest has nothing to do with mate scent and everything to do with this small human and the life I promised him.
Ethan kneels so he's level with us. "Will you come to the station?" he asks.
I almost say no. He's asking for my permission in a dozen ways. Our lives have knotted. I can pretend otherwise, but that won't make his arms or his pack any less the place Jamie and I have landed.
"I'm not ready to hand Jamie over to a stranger," I say. "I want him kept with people who know him."
"You won't hand him over," Ethan says. "Not while I'm breathing. Not while my pack stands."
