"He's still building the case. Nest destruction, heat abandonment, failure to provide adequate care. Jasper's proof has gone a long way. He thinks it's solid but the registry can be unpredictable."
"What happens if they don't rule in our favor?"
Malcolm's mouth tightens. "Then we figure something else out."
"Like what?"
"I don't know, Finn. But she's not going back there."
I reach for the bottle and take another sip. The whiskey is cheaper than what we usually buy but it does the job.
"Do you think she wants out?" The question comes out quieter than I mean it to.
Malcolm looks at me like I've grown a second head. "Of course she does."
"We don't know that."
"What are you talking about?"
I stare at the dark shapes of the tomato plants Vee put out. Alex picked them up from a local nursery. Her face lit up when he gave them to her and I had the sudden urge to kiss her. Which I had to squash quickly, of course. She's not ours. She can't be. "She loved that pack for years, Malcolm. Five years. That's not nothing."
"Fuck that." Malcolm sits forward, his voice sharp. "She's never going back. They'll destroy her. They don't deserve her."
"Maybe we don't either."
The words hang in the air between us.
Malcolm glares at me. "How can you say that?"
"Because we're a joke, Malcolm." I take another drink. The burn feels appropriate. "We aren't much better than them. We lied to her and manipulated her for months. We lived next door and watched her get smaller and sadder and we didn't do anything."
"We were waiting for—"
"We left her in that house with that alpha for months before we took her. We should have taken her before it got that bad."
Malcolm's expression darkens. "Chase hadn't given us the go-ahead. We had nowhere to hide her before Chase got us here. We couldn't just kidnap her, Finn."
"We should have done something."
"Like what? Storm the house? Get arrested? Get Alex sent back to prison? Get her sent back to the registry immediately?" Malcolm shakes his head. "No one thought it would get as bad as it did. We thought we had more time."
"We should have known." I lean forward, elbows on my knees. "After Ragon destroyed her nest like that, we should have known."
Silence.
Malcolm takes a long pull from the bottle. When he finally speaks, his voice sounds rough. "You're right about that."
I look at him.
"We fucked up too," he says. "We saw the signs and we didn't act fast enough. We should have pushed harder, found another way." He sets the bottle down harder than necessary. "But now we're going to make it right. She never has to go back to that."
"We can't have her either, Malcolm." The words taste bitter. "Or did you forget that?"
"Chase might get the flag lifted. It's not impossible." Malcolm's voice carries something desperate. "Alex has done so well. There's been zero history since that night at the bar. He's done everything they wanted him to do. He's more in control than either of us now."
"But that doesn't change howfuckedthe system is," I reply. "We may have to accept that Vee ends up somewhere else. Maybe even in Chase's pack. Or some other pack the registry chooses. But anything has to be better than Ragon's."
Malcolm's eyes flash in the dim light. "It will be a cold day in hell before I let that place give our scent match to another shitty pack. She's already been through two. And if they try to force her back to Ragon’s, I’ll obliterate hell itself. You know I will, Finn."
