Page 30 of Hidden Nature

“Last I checked, a storm doesn’t roll in on four wheels,” I snapped.

Maverick paused and listened, hearing the same thing I had. The color drained out of his skin as he looked up at me. “What did you do?”

I snarled at him, resenting that he was going to blame this all on me. The Senate had a person reach out to us, letting us know they would look into the situation and would handle it. Tatum promised to be back the next day, but it’s been a whole week. I figured the Senate had taken care of the problem.

“I didn’t do a damn thing. If I hadn’t gone to the Senate, Tatum would have ruined us,” I said, defending myself.

Maverick muttered as he got up, pulling on pants and a shirt. “Go wake the others. If there’s trouble, we’re going to need everyone.” He turned to his wife, Mercy, who was also getting dressed. “Babe, take the wives and kids down to hide in the cellar. We’ll deal with this.”

Mercy nodded and kissed him firmly before gathering her sleeping kids nearby. With all of us living in one house, each family had a room in the house they shared. It was cramped for those with more than two kids, but Dad always wanted us to be a unit.

We’d talked about adding more houses on the property now we had the choice to do so.

Between Maverick and me, we got everyone awake and hidden away as the sound of more cars arriving hit our ears. What were they waiting for? I knew they could hear us moving around inside the house. They knew we were aware of them.

As if they could hear me, a booming knock sounded at the door. “Open up by orders of the United Senate!”

Frowning, I looked at my ten brothers, who appeared equally confused. Moving to the front door, I opened it and was greeted with the sight of twenty muscled men dressed in military-style clothing. Their expressions told me this wasn’t going to be good news, but I stepped out anyway, not wanting to let them in the house.”

“What can we do for you?” I asked, keeping my voice calm.

“We need to speak with Elias Haltern about allegations brought up against Tatum Volenty,” the man stated.

My stomach clenched at those words. “Yes, I’m Elias, and I did make that call about Tatum,” I answered.

“You made a claim that Mr. Volenty was trying to kill your sister’s mate to take her for himself. Is that correct?”

“I never—”

“Is it also true you claimed that he threatened your family if he didn’t get your sister?” he continued, cutting off my answer.

“Sir, with all due respect, Tatum claimed that he had an agreement with my late father about the matter. My father would never have done such a thing, so I know he’s lying and using that as a way to discredit us,” I argued, my temper flaring as they tried to turn this all on me.

The man pulled out a set of papers and handed them over to me. When I folded them open, I saw that it was indeed a marriage agreement between Kathryn and Tatum to be married when she turned twenty-one. Flipping through the pages, I found the one that held the signatures, and clear as day, my father’s signature was right there. He had horrible handwriting, and his signature was nothing but a bunch of scribbles. It was incredibly hard to forge.

“Can you confirm that is your father’s signature?” the man demanded.

Looking up from the papers, I peered over my shoulder at my brothers and brother-in-laws waiting for my answer. I had two choices, lie and hope he believed me or tell the truth, and my sister would be taken from us and forced to be with Tatum.

“No, I don’t know who signed this, but it wasn’t my father,” I lied through gritted teeth. Even to my own ears, the words sounded false, devastation clear in my voice.

“I’ll give you a moment to make sure that is your final answer, but know that lying to the Senate is not a wise choice,” he warned.

Either way, this wasn’t going to end well, but if I kept up the lie, it would only be on me. I could do whatever it took to protect my sister and keep her with the man she loved. If I had to go to jail or pay a fine, I would happily do that to keep her happy.

“As I stated before, that is not my father’s signature,” I said once more, meeting the man’s hard gaze.

“You’ve got balls, kid, but that won’t help you this time. The Senate will overlook many things, but false claims and lying aren’t one of those. Know that you brought this on yourself and all you had to do was tell the truth,” the man told me before he motioned to the others.

Frozen in horror, I saw them raise guns to their shoulders and mow down my brothers, not leaving a single one standing. Once they were dead, two men tossed Molotov cocktails in through the windows of the house. Seeing as it was the house Dad built when he settled on the land, it when up in flames faster than I could take in air to scream.

Spinning on my heel, I rushed to get in the house, but I was struck by something on the head, dropping me like a rock.

The screams of my family trapped in that house were something I would never forget no matter how long I lived.

The men from the Senate then brought me to Tatum, who proceeded to torture me for days, taking out all his anger on me until I killed him and his whole pack. I hadn’t left anyone alive, including the women or the children. They had done the same thing to my family, so why should I spare theirs?

I wandered for years as a lone wolf, turning more wild and feral by the day until Lane and Colt found me. They saw past the rage to the hurting man underneath. When I had heard Colt’s story, I knew he would understand my pain and not judge me for what I’d done. With time, they became the alphas I needed in my life to keep me alive and not give in to the pain and take the easy way out. They saved me in more ways than one.