Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 61280 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 306(@200wpm)___ 245(@250wpm)___ 204(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 61280 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 306(@200wpm)___ 245(@250wpm)___ 204(@300wpm)
“Natalie,” she blurted. “He spoke to Natalie.”
“You.”
Her fiery curls swayed as she shook her head. “The real Natalie.”
I took a step back as I stared at my mate before me. A tear slipped down her cheek, but she remained silent.
“Who the fuck are you, and what have you done with Natalie Shefield?”
She inhaled and let out a long breath. “Natalie is in LA. She’s fine. I didn’t kill her and stuff her body in a freezer.” She looked at Boyd, then at me. “My name is Willow Johnson. I’m a DEA agent, and I’m here undercover.”
My eyes flared wide, and my wolf wasn’t sure if it should howl in misery or snap at her at her deceit.
“We don’t have drugs here. You’ve done a thorough check of my bed. Search the rest of the property, then get the fuck out.” I pointed at the closed door.
The tears came faster now. “You’re not who I’m investigating.”
“Oh no?” I asked. I’d never hit a female before, and I wasn’t going to start now, but this woman… this imposter… was trying my abilities to hold back. She’d tricked me and my wolf. She wasn’t Natalie Shefield. All this time, I’d had no idea. What a pathetic alpha I was.
“It was all a lie, wasn’t it?” My brows went down low. “Were you using me to get information? Was any of it real?”
“Rob, no—”
“Fuck, I opened up to you.” I took a step toward her when I realized something. “Holy fuck. You know the truth about the pack.”
It was my job to protect the shifters who looked to me to lead, and I’d broken the biggest secret of all. No one could know we were shifters. I didn’t just tell the hot neighbor. I told a fucking DEA agent. Not only did I have moon madness and my wolf had chosen a human… a lying human, but I’d blabbed pack details like a middle school girl.
“I won’t tell your secrets, Rob,” she whispered.
“Says the liar,” I snapped.
She flinched at the words.
I took a step closer and pointed at her. “You mess with my brothers, my pack… any shifter, I’ll know. As alpha, I have the responsibility to protect everyone and that includes eliminating all threats.”
“Rob…”
I didn’t give her the chance to talk. She’d had days. Days to tell me the truth.
“Get the fuck off my property before anyone else finds out you’re a fake. They won’t be so kind. Trust me.”
I didn’t say anything else, only turned my back on her, just as she had me. My wolf may have thought Natalie was my mate, but he was wrong. The woman who was walking through the house to the front door wasn’t even Natalie Shefield.
“Rob,” Boyd said, but I held up a hand to keep him silent.
I listened for her car to pull away, but before it did, I heard another arrive. We followed Natalie’s—no, Willow’s—path to the front porch. Three men and a beautiful young woman piled out of a big truck with Canadian plates.
“Alpha Wolf?” the man rumbled.
I couldn’t focus on him because Natalie—fuck!—Willow was standing with her car door open, leaving. I stared at her, my chest ripped open and bleeding onto the ground.
“Yes?”
“I’m Alpha Jackson, from Manitoba. This is my daughter Kara.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
This night couldn’t get any worse.
23
WILLOW
I stood rooted to the ground, staring at the beautiful alpha wolf meant for Rob. The one Marina had told me about.
Oh God.
This was the train wreck I saw coming.
Rob wasn’t looking at her, though. He was looking at me—the pain of betrayal burning in his gaze. I’d made him look at me that way. It was my own doing.
I scrambled into the car and rushed to start it. I had to get away. Leave him to get on with his life. I backed up fast, tires skidding the dirt, then took off for home.
Home. Ha. What a joke.
I tried to stay strong, but halfway back to the house, I broke down and cried the whole rest of the short drive. It was any wonder I didn’t end up in a ditch. Everything I’d thought would happen, had. Rob learned the truth and felt slighted. No, that wasn’t the right word. Betrayed.
He’d bared his soul, and that of his community, to me, and I’d given him nothing in return. Only lies.
Not everything had been fake though. How I felt about him and how I showed it hadn’t been pretend. I felt for Rob. Deeply. For once in my life, I cared for someone else. I cared that I’d hurt him, that my real life had ruined the only good thing that had ever happened to me.
I’d been on my own for so long, I didn’t even know I was able to fall for a man. I’d thought I was unlovable. Unwanted. I’d never been adopted, only coasted through my entire childhood in the system, at the whims of selfish adults who only wanted me for the money I could bring them from the state.