9. Mai

Chapter nine

Mai

R yan’s jaw was clenched tight. I knew he was considering Maxwell’s request for help, but he was pissed off about it. He wasn’t wrong to be angry. We were already juggling enough with integrating the rogue wolves left over from Korrin’s attacks into our Pack, the ripple crisis, and trying to find the witches involved in it. And now, we had a werewolf child in our house whose very presence could bring a shitstorm down on us.

I had questions—so many questions—and not enough answers. I wasn’t sure that Maxwell knew anything else though.

I stood and walked to the door. I cracked the door open and called out for Sylvie. She arrived smelling of cocoa powder and cinnamon. Her eyes darted around the room, hesitating a moment too long on Maxwell.

“Sylvie,” I said. “Could you take Maxwell to the kitchen and get him something to eat, please?”

Her scent turned wary. Was this her usual reluctance to be with others or something else?

“Sylvie? I can ask someone else?” I kept my tone gentle, giving her a way out if she wanted one.

Her face turned determined. “It’s no bother. Maxwell, is it?”

He stared at her for a moment longer before answering. “Yes. Maxwell.”

Sylvie nodded. “Okay, then. Follow me.”

Maxwell hesitated for just a second, tossed a glance back at Ryan and me, then followed Sylvie out of the room.

I watched the study door close behind them. Ryan rubbed a hand slowly down his face and exhaled; the weariness and frustration in that sound sharpened my awareness of how annoyed he was that Ronnie had put us in this position.

Maxwell Bishop and a frightened werewolf girl on the run from an unknown Pack that wanted her back. There were many issues with this, but the main problem was we still didn’t know if we were on the right side of it.

“Thoughts?” I asked.

“It’s one thing to help a stray werewolf pup,” Ryan replied. “It’s another to take on the very real possibility of her Pack coming after her. Coming after us. And I gotta say, if it was one of our pups, I’d burn the fucking world down getting them back. We don’t know why Lark left or what happened with her Pack. We can’t even be sure Maxwell’s story is right. Even if he is telling the truth, he heard it from Ronnie’s prospects. Who knows what the situation actually is.”

“Ronnie Bishop has some fucking nerve,” Derek muttered from his spot by the door. “Dumping a kid at our doorstep like this. What the hell is that guy thinking?”

Sam ran a hand through his hair. “I’m betting he’s thinking he has few options left.”

“Yeah?” Mason snorted. “He knew he screwed up, so he goes and tosses the bomb in our lap, hoping we can clean up his mess.”

Derek shook his head slowly. “She’s just a kid. A scared kid. But taking her in—it puts everyone in the Three Rivers at risk. The whole Pack. We don’t know what we’re facing. We don’t have a clue who this other Pack is and what their resources are. Would it be worth it?”

I could feel everyone in the room shifting on the edge of that line. Were we prepared to handle more enemies right now? Could we risk the fragile peace we were trying to build?

I let my eyes flick toward the window, watching the hints of snowflakes gently swirling in through the light of the house before landing on a patch of untouched white outside. In the distance, Lark stood, hesitating at the edge of where Ben and Tucker were throwing snowballs, trying to convince her to join in.

She looked so small compared to the two boys. Fragile but sharp. She was on alert. Not relaxed the way kids should be—hell, the way most of our Pack pups were when they felt safe. She wasn’t safe yet. Even here, she knew she was in danger.

“I didn’t know Ronnie had a brother,” I glanced at Ryan. “Did you?’

“You wouldn’t,” Derek cut in before Ryan could reply. Derek was our Beta, but he’d worked in the military as an intelligence officer, and when he came out, he’d wanted to use his skills to make the Three Rivers Pack secure. Recently, he’d found out that there were people from his past who were targeting Sofia because of her connection to him. He was on edge all the time. He wasn’t going to let anyone harm Sofia, but with her still wanting nothing to do with him, she wasn’t making protecting her easy. So, it didn’t surprise me that Derek had thoroughly investigated anyone connected to us, and that meant the Bishops.

“Maxwell isn’t easy to find. Not many people outside the gang know about him … well, most wouldn’t even peg him as Ronnie’s brother. He split from their gang a while back, went legit, and now works down south, according to my sources. But before that, he was right in the middle of all of it. Ronnie and Maxwell were groomed to run the Bishop gang together. If things hadn’t changed? He’d probably still be out there, right beside Ronnie.”

“So, what happened?”

“We don’t know. Something big enough to make Maxwell give everything up, move across the country, and become a lawyer. He walked away from everything their family stood for.”

Frustration flickered across Ryan’s face, his hand kneading the back of his neck as if trying to get all those warring instincts to quiet. “Look, we don’t owe Ronnie anything. We aren’t exactly on good terms. So, if we’re going to take a stand defending this girl, we’d better be ready for whatever crosses our doorstep. And that means understanding if Ronnie’s really protecting her or if she’s somehow an asset for him to leverage, and he’s actually keeping a pup from her Pack.”

The silence that followed was broken by the muffled laughter coming from outside the window—the soft sounds of Ben and Tucker playing their game of snowballs. Lark still stood on the edge, watching them with a look of yearning on her face. In that moment, I knew she desperately wanted to join in but didn’t know how. What the hell kind of Pack had she come from? My chest tightened. Hell, she was a kid—just a kid who had been through more than she should have.

Mason leaned against the desk, considering Ryan’s words carefully. “You think we should give her back?” His words didn’t carry judgment, but they shook something loose inside me.

Give her back?

Outside, Lark finally moved from her spot on the sidelines, inching closer to the boys. Her small hands were clenched, her whole body tense. But then something shifted. She moved fast, picking up a handful of snow and flinging it with surprising accuracy at Tucker, hitting him square in the face. He toppled over, flat on his back in the snow. For a second, Lark froze, a look of horror on her face. Then Tucker burst out laughing, and she relaxed, a small smile appearing on her lips.

That’s when I saw Gremlin plow through the snow toward Lark. The ball of fluff kept falling in the deep patches of snow. Her tiny white paws sank straight through the thick, powdery blanket, and I watched as Gremlin disappeared completely into the holes of the kids’ bootprints. All I could see was the tip of her tiny tail, flitting like a flag lost in a snowdrift. Then Gremlin leaped—well, tried to—and promptly fell face-first into another patch of snow. She was making progress, albeit slow progress, toward Lark. Gremlin finally made it past the last deep footprint and tumbled into a much shallower bit of snow, resulting in a puffball of kitten fur and powder. She shook herself off, made a beeline for Lark, weaving between her boots and brushing up against her shins.

Lark blinked as Gremlin climbed up Lark’s jeans, her claws finding purchase on Lark’s clothes, though they must have tickled because the girl started giggling—an actual, honest-to-Goddess giggle. The sound was so genuine, so raw, it floated on the cold air around her, ringing out like a bell that we could hear even in the study.

Gremlin had given her approval of the girl. I turned back to the room.

“We’re not giving the girl back,” I said. All eyes turned toward me. “At least not until we find out what is going on with her Pack. She’s here. We’ll protect her until we see a reason not to.”

“Mai—“ Ryan started, but I knew he was going to say that I was acting rashly and jumping into decisions again.

“I know how dangerous this could be. But we can’t turn her away.”

I expected resistance from his brothers, but Sam, Derek, and Mason remained quiet.

Ryan exhaled slowly, then nodded once, finally letting out a low sigh. “Alright,” he said. “We’ll do it your way. We’ll protect her.”