Page 26 of Wolf's Endgame

“Well, this is going to be interesting,” Royce muttered.

“Willy, Barbara,” I greeted. “How are you both?”

Barbara was as timid as I remembered, and Willy as blunt as always. “Where’s Kezia?”

“Not here,” I answered with a polite smile.

“Is she in danger?”

“Where is she?” Willy asked at the same time.

“Yes.”

Royce and I both turned to Nikan, who shrugged at our glares of warning. “What? She is.”

“From who?” Barbara asked, stepping forward. “Bale?” Her timidness was gone as she met my eyes. “Or you?”

Nikan went to speak, but Royce cut him off. “Kezia is not our immediate concern. She’s with someone who will protect her at all costs.”

Willy noticed his slight hesitation over someone but said nothing, her gaze locking on me.

Barbara was still watching me. “Aren’t you the one who should protect her at all costs?” she asked quietly. “She is your mate.”

“Landon,” Royce grunted. “She is Landon’s mate.”

Barbara looked at Royce as if he was an idiot. In fact, both women were wearing identical expressions of who do you think you’re kidding?

“I changed your diapers, boy,” Willy reminded me.

“She’s safe,” I told them, relenting under the disapproving frown of the older female. Willy was right, she was no fool, and I learned a long time ago that she saw right through all my bullshit. I also had my inner voice nagging at me, questioning whether Kezia was actually safe. “As Royce said, she’s with someone who would do anything for her.”

Even heal me. A pull in my belly caused me to look up the mountain. Where would Moonstar go? How long would it take before Kezia came back?

Would she come back? Unease sat deep within me.

“Alpha?” Royce nodded towards the house. “You ready?”

“Yes.” Looking at the two women, I said my goodbyes and headed inside the house. I wasn’t surprised to see Doc and Leo waiting for me. When the doors to the study were closed, I turned to everyone in the room. “Where is she? Who followed her when she left?”

Nikan was the first one to speak. “No one. She was gone before we knew she’d finished doing whatever it was she did to you.”

My gaze darted over the four of them. “No one? At all?” I knew my surprise showed. “You left her alone with me?”

Royce snorted. “You say it as if we were given a choice. There was none. The thing that inhabits her body acts with a primal force. She parted her hands, made a gesture that forced us apart, and then simply walked between us. In a few strides, she was at your side. By the time we were able to move again, she had already pushed us out of the room, locking the door behind us.”

“She is strong,” I conceded. Why was there no guard outside?

“Anyone we left outside, on guard, including us, couldn’t stay awake long enough.” Leo’s eyes were narrowed in remembrance. “I don’t know what the fuck she is, but I was glad she was on your side.”

My eyes met Royce’s heavy gaze, and I didn’t correct Leo. Moonstar was not on my side. I don’t think she was even on Kezia’s.

“We need to find her,” I told them as I turned to look out the window. I expected the protests, my brother being the loudest, but I waited for them to calm down, which they did when I didn’t immediately answer their questions. “Kezia has not betrayed me,” I told them when their protests had reduced to grumbles of discontent.

“Tev said?—”

“He told me what any liar would. A lie.” Turning back to them, I addressed them all. “The thing that would hurt most? Apart from the silver,” I added with a quirk of my lips, “would be to tell me that my mate had betrayed me.” I ignored Leo’s surprised look at the others when I called Kezia my mate as I carried on. “He wouldn’t have known the silver hadn’t stopped all my power. I was lucky?—”

“Lucky?” Nikan was on his feet, rage twisting his features into a mask of anger. “You have no fucking idea what we found!” He started to pace, and I let him vent his anger. I didn’t know, but I could imagine. To see their alpha brought low would have been a worrying sight.

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