Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 108368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 542(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 542(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
“Ally, don’t move. Don’t go after them alone.”
She wouldn’t, because that would give the cougars what they wanted. But she wasn’t going to hole up at her lodge either.
“I mean it, Ally. I need you to stay there. We’re bringing Shaya and Willow to you.”
“What? Why?” But he’d already hung up. By the time she’d quickly washed and replaced her long shirt with a white, long-sleeved T-shirt and her faded blue jeans, the pack arrived at the lodge. Only Derren, Bracken, Kathy, and Shaya with Willow in her arms filed inside.
“What’s happening?” Ally asked them.
“We weren’t prepared to leave anyone at the main lodge, considering what’s parked outside the border,” replied Derren.
That didn’t make a lick of sense to Ally.
Derren pinned her with a determined look. “Lock the doors and stay inside. Don’t split up—not for anything.” His wolf didn’t want to leave her, but even the animal understood that the need to protect the pack was vital. Wanting his head firmly on the threat on their territory, Derren ignored the urge to kiss her and forced his mind to the current issue.
Ally watched as Derren joined the rest of the pack outside. As one, they all shifted into their wolf forms and charged into the forest. Confused, she turned to Shaya. “What was he talking about?” As Derren requested, Ally secured the locks.
“Someone parked a car outside the road leading to the main lodge.” The Alpha female was slowly pacing, her daughter balanced on her hip. “There was an injured, unconscious guy in the passenger seat.”
“Decoy,” Ally guessed.
“I called an ambulance,” interjected Kathy from the sofa. “EMTs were taking him away when we left the lodge.”
“My guess is the cougars were using the vehicle as a distraction.” Bracken’s gaze was scanning his surroundings through the windows. “They had to know that Nick would summon his Beta and enforcers to the main lodge to tell them what’s going on.”
Shaya nodded. “The cougars were able to cross the border without being noticed, and it left the other members of our pack who were scattered around our territory vulnerable to them.”
“They were mimicking Willow’s cry,” Ally told them. “In the vision, I mean.”
Bracken briefly glanced at her. “Smart. It’s a trick cougar shifters sometimes use. No shifter—submissive or dominant—would ignore the cry of an infant. They’d rush right in to help.”
That was exactly what Ally had done. “In my vision, I didn’t even think to call for help. All I could think about was getting to Willow.”
Bracken didn’t appear surprised. “When they use this particular lure, that’s what they count on. If their intention was to mimic Willow’s cries, they were probably hoping to draw any of the pack members that weren’t in the main lodge to them.”
“Getting rid of the pack, little by little.” Cougar shifters really were tricky fuckers. “Kent and Caleb were dying in my vision. I would have been next.”
A muscle in Bracken’s jaw ticked. “When you have a small pack, the loss of three members makes a big difference in a battle.”
“And it’s an emotional blow that can make you act out in rage,” Shaya pointed out.
“How many cougars are out there?” Bracken asked Ally as she came to stand next to him, watching for any threats.
Ally shrugged. “I only saw one in my vision.” But she highly doubted one cougar was working alone, given that Caleb and Kent had been so brutally attacked. They could have held their own against one cougar.
Bracken shot her an odd look before asking quietly, “So, want to tell me why this place smells of you, Derren, and sex?” At her scowl, his expression turned innocent. “It was just a question.”
When his Alpha male halted a safe distance away from the clearing, the black wolf did the same. It had been easy for the pack to track the cougars. They had simply followed the fake cries. His Alpha looked at the black wolf and jerked his head to the left before then going in the opposite direction. The black wolf understood the order. He led half of the wolves one way, while his Alpha led the others another. Stealthily and silently, the pack moved to loosely circle the clearing. Surrounding and trapping their prey was a tactic they had used before.
The black wolf sensed the presence of five cougar shifters. The felines were not on the ground. Each one was positioned on a tree branch.
As his Alpha shifted before him, and the gray-white wolf—Eli—flanked him, the black wolf sensed that Derren wanted dominance. He drew back and gave his human half control.
“One of us needs to lure them out of the trees,” Nick whispered to Derren and Eli when they shifted. “If we don’t, they’ll just climb as high as they can and hop from tree to fucking tree.”
Derren agreed. Keeping his voice low, he said, “Me and Eli will drop back and then noisily bolt into the clearing, as if in a panic.”