Enough, dammit!
Whatever Merric’s built in his personal life is his business.
That doesn’t stop me from turning the binoculars away.
The work. Focus on the work.
Two years ago, I walked into a fire and didn’t come out. Let the flames erase the evidence, let the pack believe what they needed to believe. Brenna Corvus, dead in the defense of her people. Mourned. Memorialized. Gone.
The decision nearly destroyed me. But it was the right call, and I’d make it again.
Alive, I was the biggest target in the southern wolf territories. The most powerful Ravenclaw magic-user, the matriarch of a pack the purists wanted eradicated and the Syndicate wanted harvested. Every enemy we had oriented toward me. As long as I was breathing and visible, the ranch would never be safe. They’d keep coming. Keep hitting us. Keep picking off our scattered families to draw me out.
Dead, I became invisible. And invisible, I could hunt.
So I slid into field work. Tracking the intelligence leaks that fed our enemies locations of isolated Ravenclaw families. Burning Syndicate supply caches that serviced their wolf-territory operations. Relocating three families before the purist packs could reach them. Mapping a network of surveillance positions across the Ozarks that told me someone—someone with resources, patience, and access to pack intelligence channels—was systematically monitoring every magic-blooded wolf in the south.
I haven’t cracked who’s running that network. Not yet. I’m close. But close isn’t proof, and without proof, I’m just a dead woman making accusations.
Everything I’ve built depends on staying dead. Every contact, every safe house, every line of intelligence. The moment someone sees my face, the network unravels. My contacts scatter. The surveillance positions I’ve logged become useless because whoever’s running them will relocate. All that work, gone.
That’s why I can’t go down there.
Not because of Merric. Not because of the auburn-haired woman who fits so neatly into the space I left. Because the wolves on that ranch are safer with me dead and working than alive and exposed.
Except…
I found the other watchers yesterday.
Southeast ridge, opposite side of the valley from my position. Boot prints in a deliberate pattern, same approach three times over the past two weeks. Professional concealment. Whoever set up that position knows the ranch’s blind spots, which means they’ve been studying the property.
I’ve seen this pattern before. It matches the surveillance methodology I’ve been tracking across the region, the same spacing, the same approach discipline, the same careful avoidance of direct observation. This isn’t freelance. This is part of the network.
And it’s active. The most recent prints are less than forty-eight hours old. Someone was on that ridge watching the ranch while Merric’s trucks were rolling in.
The Frostbourne wolves have drawn attention. Four trained fighters, an alpha with political enemies, and a teenager who radiates magical energy that anyone with the right equipment can detect from miles away. That’s not a low-key arrival. That’s a signal flare.
If the watchers report back to whoever’s running the network, the ranch could be hit within days. Willow doesn’t have the fighters to repel a serious assault. Merric’s wolves improve the odds, but not enough. Not if the attackers come prepared for magic-blooded resistance.
I lower the binoculars. Below me, the ranch is settling into evening. Greta’s organizing dinner at the outdoor table. Willow is checking the generator fuel levels, moving between tasks like a woman who hasn’t stopped working for too long. Cameron is sitting on the porch with a book, and from the way he keeps looking up from the pages, he’s not reading; he’s watching the treeline.
He used to do that as a child. Sit on the porch and watch the forest, looking for something he couldn’t name. I always told him it was just his wolf, wanting to run. But I wonderedsometimes if it was something else. If he was looking for the shape of a missing person he’d never met.
My throat closes. I put the binoculars down and press my palms against the stone until the feeling passes.
One more day. I’ll hold position, gather more data on the southeast ridge surveillance, confirm the pattern. Then I’ll make a decision based on the real picture, not on the knot in my chest.
That’s what I tell myself.
Below me, my son turns a page he hasn’t read. The ranch lights come on one by one. And I settle in for another night of watching the life I gave up keep going without me.
Chapter 5
Merric
It’s our fourth morning at the ranch, and it’s the first one that almost feels normal.
Almost. Willow still watches my pack like she’s counting silverware after dinner. The Ravenclaw wolves still go quiet when I walk past. And Briar keeps disappearing into the hills for hours and coming back with that tight look that means she’s not happy with what she’s finding.
