“I’m serious. What happens if she does? Can I kill her, or does it have to beyou?”
“If she attacks first, then you’re allowed to retaliate.” He reached across the backseat, collected my hand, and squeezed it reassuringly. “But it won’t come tothat.”
For three entire songs, he was quiet. We were allquiet.
When the ten-foot metal fence that screened off the Pines’ former property came into view, I shivered. And then I shivered harder when Lucas slid the car through the open gate. The white stone headquarters appeared like a mirage at the end of the cedar-lined alley, its staircase darkened by bodies. It seemed like every man and boy in our pack hadcome.
My heart began to beat a rhythm more hectic than the one blaring out of the SUV’sspeakers.
Liam squeezed my hand to garner my attention. “Ness, if I fall tonight, you are not to challenge her,understood?”
I blinked as emotion rushed into my eyes. And then I squeezed his fingers back. “The day I signed up to be your Second, you said you wanted my admiration. Well, you’ll get it, but not if you don’t get backup.”
A gentle smile settled over his lips, and then he squeezed my hand one last time before letting go and exiting the car. The pack swarmed him, whispering words of encouragement. I hopped out after Liam, and Matt and Lucas came to stand at my sides like two giantbookends.
I looked for August, but Cole’s car hadn’t pulled up yet. Hadn’t they been right behind us? Had they stopped at a red light? Or missed aturn?
“You look a bit green, LittleWolf.”
I tried to feel out the distance using the tether, but my stomach was in shambles. “Can you call your brother,Matt?”
I wasn’t looking to stress him out, but my quiet plea had him craning his neck toward the longdriveway.
He all but tore the seams off his shorts pocket in search of his phone as we climbed up the stairs and entered the buffed stone atrium. “He’s notanswering.”
“I’ll try August,” Lucas said, taking out his own phone. “Matt, callGreg.”
As we descended the staircase, I watched the crowd milling beyond the French doors along the sharp hedges of the maze. The slender moon crescent cast an eerie glow over the land and the dueling ring that stretched from the maze to the stoneterrace.
“Did you reach them?” I asked, returning my gaze toMatt.
He shook hishead.
Liam had gone down the terrace steps, but one look at my pallid cheeks had him lumbering back up. “What’s goingon?”
“We can’t reach Greg, Cole,orAugust,” Lucas said quietly, darting a glance at the assembled Creeks below who were all—and I mean,all—staring atus.
“Can you sense them?” I asked Liamhopefully.
He closed his eyes. After a while, he said, “They’re a couple miles out but approachingfast.”
A breath whispered through my lips just as someone spoke my name. I turned around to findFrank.
He hugged me, cinching my rigid body. “You go on out there and show them what Boulder females are made of, okay?” He rubbed his bristly jaw against my temple, marking me with his scent in a show ofaffection.
Heels resonated in the quiet headquarters. I pulled away and peered past Frank, praying I’d see August or Sarah, but found my friend’s mother and sister-in-law instead. They strode toward the terrace, arms lockedtogether.
“We believe,” Margauxwhispered.
They believed what? In us? That we’dwin?
No other footfalls disrupted the silence; no car tires crunched the pebbleddriveway.
“Boulders, it’s mighty impolite to keep your hosts waitin’.” Cassandra’s voice bellowed from the center of the torch-litfield.
Liam lifted his gaze to mine.They’re coming,Ness.
I hoped he was saying this because he felt them approach through the blood-link and not as some inanereassurance.
