Chapter 2

Cole

The triumph of victory after taking down Thomas floods my veins. I’ve wanted to kill the bastard for far too long, but it’s taken me years to get the number of warriors to ensure we could overtake him. I wasn’t walking away from this with just Thomas’ lifeless body as reward. No, I was taking over his entire pack, going to make them kneel to me, obey me, and that meant taking out every single member that was a threat.

A woman screams as Thomas drops to the ground and I turn, letting the delight of this kill show in my eyes. She runs at me with a knife in hand, and I snap into her arm before she knows what’s happening, severing the limb as she drops. Her blood tastes like Thomas’ did, his daughter most likely. I’m about to snap through her neck to end her, rather than let her bleed out, when my wolf pulls me back, turning us away from the main fight at the packhouse.

I try to urge him back towards it but he’s adamant, racing across the grounds faster than ever. It’s not until I can see the group in the distance that I begin to understand his drastic flight. It’s not the fight that’s drawing us there, it’s the scent of blood.

Not just any blood though. It’s our mate’s blood that’s driving us.

Someone put their hands on my mate, harmed her, and they’re going to pay.

No.They’re going to die.

I don’t care if they’re part of my pack. They’re going to die.

The closer we get, the more her blood calls out to me, shows me that she’s not what we anticipated finding all these years. She’s not a shifter that can match my strength. Oh no. She’s human, which makes her a target. Why she’s here I don’t know, but no one is taking what belongs to me. The Mother gives us one true mate—one. Only in rare circumstances is a shifter ever given a second true mate, a second chance to have that eternal happiness, or have it again, and I will not be like Thomas and reject mine simply because she’s not what I expected, originally desired.

The need to protect her floods me, sending my wolf across the distance faster. As I near the yard, a wolf moves to attack her, and it makes my blood boil. Not because it’s one of mine attacking my mate, but because it’s one of that pissant alpha’s sons doing it. His stench is unmistakable, and I won’t allow anyone to touch what’s mine, especially not to harm her further.

A snarl leaves my mouth as I jump, knocking him aside. He tries to lunge for her again, and my teeth snap through his neck, making him fall. I toss my head, sending the scum’s body into his brother, knocking him over as well. I’ll deal with him in a moment. First, I want my mate.

My first real sight of her knocks me for a loop. She’s gorgeous. More stunning than any woman I’ve met in my entire life. She’s short, tiny compared to my wolf, which means she’ll be even smaller compared to me, but that means I can protect her more easily. I can wrap around her, hold her close and keep everything from touching her.

The scent of her blood calls to me even more and I spot the large bite on her leg, a leg that appears to have already been injured, with the remaining piece of brace wrapped around the lower part of it. It pains me to know something’s harmed her, hurt her.

I have to make it better. Make it up to her for not finding her sooner. Soon enough to keep her safe—unharmed.

I begin to move when something slams into my side, making me stumble, pushing me away from her. Another attack puts more space between us, and I flip around, growling at the wolf that moves between me and my mate.

The forward movement of my pack, their stances ready to attack makes me see red and I flip around, growling out the warning to them. If they attack, they could harm my mate and I won’t allow that to happen. No one is getting close enough to hurt her further.

My gamma moves forward more, and I let out a new snarl. No one moves! Mine! Mate!

We understand Alpha,Rennick returns, as my mate’s scent changes, alerting me to someone else near her.

I turn back to get her, snarling when I see another’s arms around her, holding her. He’s near her age, far more than I likely am, and it makes me see red entirely. No one is taking my mate from me. No one!

I move to get her when something knocks into me once more. I flip around, taking note of the pack’s beta. The scent of the man holding my mate far too similar to not be his son, and no way in hell are they keeping her from me.

I attack before he has the chance to move, sending him across the yard. Following it instantly with another, and while the man is quick, he’s not quick enough to escape me entirely. I throw him onto the ground, prepared to end him, then his sons, not solely for being part of Thomas’ pack but for daring to touch my mate.

My teeth are poised just centimeters from his neck when sobbing, heartbroken cries flood me with pain. A single word stop me cold, and I move off the man, shaking off the conflicting urges.

My mate’s terrified, pain-filled cries win out. That desperate, inconsolable shout of Daddy haunting me already.

I snarl when he steps in between us, wanting my mate and nothing more. Needing her in my arms, not in another’s. Rennick’s attempt to negotiate a truce only makes more anger flood me when the boy holding my mate notes her injury came from someone in my pack. That and the fact that he’s dead and I can’t kill him for touching not only a human—an unmated human at that, but also my mate makes me snarl further. It’s only calmed by the fact that the kid calls her his sister. Not his girlfriend or fiancée—mate-to-be as I’d been expecting, but his sister.

Rennick’s warning to me to calm down as the kid’s twin moves between us as well does nothing for me. The need to have my mate in my arms, to make her better, take away the pain my pack caused her erases all common sense until I’m on top of them, pulling the two away from her.

I stop when she’s before me all alone, just staring at her beauty. This near and it’s overwhelming. But the scent of her blood draws me out of her beautiful eyes that are a dark amber honey, and my tongue swipes over the bite, erasing the worst of it. I’m about to do it again when something slams into me from both sides, knocking me away from her.

I snarl as she gasps, the sound frightened and worried, as the kid lifts her up to stand. Another of the boys gets in my way and I push him aside to get back to my mate as the beta tells his son to let her go.

He finally releases her, and I slide up to my mate, able to see just how tiny she really is as my wolf stands with her exact height. The scent of her neck draws me closer, and I can’t stop from getting a taste of it as she shakes. It sends electric shocks straight through my body and I move back to her leg, needing her healed so I can make her mine, claim her entirely.

I lick the wound there away, hoping it will also heal whatever other injury she had forcing her to wear that heavy brace. As my bones reform, returning my hands to me, I undo it, so it’s not dragging on the ground any longer, possibly tripping her. Then stand, needing to feel her tiny body against mine.

“Mine,” I growl, caging her up against the door, my hands lifting to her face. Panic floods her eyes as my lips come down towards her.

“No…no,” she cries softly, pushing at my chest. “No, not again…”

Anger and pain flowed through me as I caught sight of her eyes, the terror in them something I’ve never seen. Not once have I seen anything that could compare to that look, not even when I’ve been looking my enemy in the eye as I’ve killed him.

“Shh, you’re safe with me, my mate,” I whisper to her, brushing a kiss to her lips, but it simply made that look deepen, flooding me even deeper with pain.

“Don’t touch me,” she cries pushing at my chest again. Her hands pulled back quickly when they came into contact with my bare skin, and my wolf howled inside me, furious that our mate would dare reject us. A human dare reject an alpha like us.

“You are my mate. Do you not understand what that means?” I demand, my tone darkening as her scent makes my body wake entirely. My hardness presses into her belly and she jerks back, shaking further, that look in her eyes deeper still.

It’s the way she’s not focusing on me, her eyes glazed, dazed, like she’s not here, that makes me stop, holding back my anger.

Fury slips through my body at whatever’s causing her pain, being unable to solve it simply with the mating pull. I don’t want to, but I take a step away from her, accepting the clothes from Rennick, glad that no one will see my mate naked as my beast snarls at having him so near her. Never before did I worry about it, but now…feeling the depth of this pull towards her, I will kill anyone that gets near her, tries to touch her.

Snaps and snarls from behind me pulls my attention away from her, turning to spot the alpha’s last son racing our way. My mate stumbles, her face paling seeing him, the terror in her gaze deepening, and my beast takes over after I keep her upright. The shift happens mid-jump, and I slam the bastard into the ground, tearing at his throat, until someone pulls me off his lifeless body.

The red haze falls, and I shift back once more, turning to find my mate. Her eyes are on the trash on the ground, but they lift to mine, fear still filling them as her brother stands next to her, half dressed. She shudders and my jaw tightens as I stalk towards them, grabbing up the clothes I dropped in order to talk to my mate, calm her.

“Cole, take it easy,” Rennick says, stopping me from storming up the steps to reach her. “Figure out the situation first, then devise a plan, rather than simply reacting. That’s what you tell us to do, isn’t it? You have to give her time to come to terms with what’s happening. She looks like she’s barely of age, and she’s human somehow. That will make it vastly different than if she were a wolf or other shifter.”

His words make logical sense but telling my wolf he can’t have his mate in his arms isn’t something he understands. He’s waited thirty-five years for this moment. To have our mate beside us, able to be claimed by us. From the moment I turned eighteen, he’s been waiting to find her, and now that we have, I don’t want to waste any time.

I take a breath before pulling on my clothes, looking to my mate, then onto her mother and father. The knowledge of what she is to me is in their eyes, and at least that is one less thing to deal with at the moment. I look directly at her mother before speaking, “Take her inside and calm her. I will come for her before we leave.”

“Cole,” Rennick warns, and I turn to face him, not wanting any lectures.

“Go to the packhouse, see that things are finished there. I will be up shortly to ensure everyone that remains knows they answer to our pack now,” I state, waiting for him to leave with the others before looking to the pack’s old beta. “We need to speak. Alone.”

“Take your sister inside,” Bryant says, shaking his head at the twins when they look as though they want to argue. “Now.”

His mate kisses him, before hurrying to my beauty, making me realize I don’t know her name. That will need to be remedied quickly. My eyes stay on her until she’s out of sight, making my wolf huff, wanting her back.

Once we’re alone, I turn to the man, shorter than me by at least a foot. I’ve yet to meet another wolf that matches me in height, a carryover from my father—a bear shifter. He was itan, or alpha, of his clan, but when I shifted into a wolf as my mother was, instead of a bear, the clan turned against me. Turned me out when I was seventeen rather than allow me to take over as itan when my father died.

They weren’t true mates. My father’s true mate died before she had a child, whereas my mother’s true mate I gladly killed today. It’s because of him that I lost her when I was four. His rejection weakened her, allowing her to succumb to an illness most shifters would easily survive. Losing a second mate weakened my father, and my rejection by the clan made him vulnerable.

I could have fought for my rightful spot when he died, but I felt the need to avenge my mother more, leading me here today, to my mate.

“Your sons are shiften, yet your daughter is human, how?” I demand to know, to ensure my mate is safe.

“Mora is my mate’s daughter, born a year before I found her, claimed her as mine—claimed them both as mine. She is as much my child as my sons are,” Bryant replies calming the wild questions flowing through my mind.

“She was hurt, before today.” It’s a statement, not a question, and anger begins to rebuild as the man’s face darkens.

“Yes, she was attacked three and a half months ago at her graduation. She nearly died but no one took responsibility for it.”

“But you now suspect the alpha’s sons?” I guess as his gaze slips back to them for a moment. “Mora did not tell you who it was?”

“She didn’t see them. They tied a bag over her head, shattered her leg, tore her shoulder from its socket, and broke every rib in her body, leaving her to suffocate. We only stayed to allow her to recover. The healers nearly lost her far too many times before we were able to bring her home to finish her recovery,” he says and the rage I felt earlier is magnified by ten million.

“You are only alive now because she cares for you. I was not going to leave anyone of rank or opposition here alive, so she’s saved you twice now. If I learn that you are in any way responsible…”

“How dare you!” he shouts, his wolf pressing forward, his eyes flashing dangerously at me. “I have loved Mora from the moment I met her, claimed her as my daughter just as I claimed her mother. I would not allow anyone to hurt her, then or now! Mate or not!”

“Then you and your sons may live, but know it is only because of her,” I warn. “I will be taking her with me when I return from the packhouse. If you remain here, you will be under my pack’s rules, unless you’d like to challenge me that is.”

His eyes glitter but he doesn’t say a word, letting me move across the grounds hoping to get my fury under control before I reach the packhouse. They are likely to increase it more and that is wildly dangerous in my current state of mind. Someone here attacked my mate, tried to kill her. If anyone in that house even looks guilty, I’m liable to kill them.

Tear them to pieces and spit on their remains.