Page 37 of A Beta Protects

“Because you’re a marine?” Kira asks, angling her head to face me.

“Perhaps.” I pick up my juice and take a sip so I don’t touch her like I want to. This close, her scent makes me want to do nothing else.

“And your friends?”

“We’re not afraid,” Sierra says calmly.

“And we’re feral about protecting those we care about.” Jones winks.

Everyone looks at him.

Dangerous words to say when Kira doesn’t know she’s sharing a table with shifters who have a habit of biting back, and biting back hard.

Rose mutters something under her breath about him having rabies, and Bethany smothers a laugh as I return my glass to the table.

But Kira isn’t smiling. She’s frowning, concerned.

“We will handle this, Kira.” I take her hand under the table, giving it a gentle squeeze.

A car’s engine heads this way and this time, I’m not the only one who notices Chloe perking up in her seat. Galen is watching her carefully, a line between his brow.

I see that line and I sense there’s about to be an increase in growling from a generous thirty percent to fifty. Probably an order that Chloe won’t like.

Chloe glances at Galen, as if sensing she’s being observed. One glance and she looks away, picking up her coffee.

Ah, she must know what’s coming too.

I want my packmates to be happy. As leader, Galen does too. But Chloe and Shawn…

There is no way that can end well.

Chloe’s wolf needs to go on regular runs. It wouldn’t take Shawn long before Chloe’s nighttime activities made him suspicious. Chloe would want to tell him she’s a shifter because no couple with a big secret like that lasts long.

If things don’t work out between them after she’s told him, it leaves the entire pack in the dangerous position of having someone know our secret.

Shawn is generous with his smiles as Nick lets him in.

He joins us at the dining table, taking the black coffee that Rose offers him. His expression is serious. “I heard there was some drama in town,” he starts. “Strange you didn’t mention it at Lacey’s.”

“Someone took a potshot at me,” I say before Kira can mention the bloody shirt she found in the washing machine. If Shawn sees that, he’ll want to see the wound that healed under an hour after I got it.

Shawn returns his coffee to the table without taking a sip from it, his brow furrowed. “And were they successful?”

“I’m okay.” I nod at Kira, not answering his question. “Kira was concerned about Bryce causing more problems. We wanted to talk through those concerns and figure out if there was anything we could do to prevent the situation from getting worse.”

It’s a strange thing to have a cop sitting at our dining table, talking through a problem we ordinarily would have dealt with ourselves. But Kira is human and Bryce is a sheriff. Shifters don’t marry or divorce. We mate. None of us has any idea about how divorce works.

Bryce could come at Kira through the courts, and we can’t fight that kind of battle on our own. We need a cop’s viewpoint, and we have a good one in Wylder, even if we can’t be fully honest about what we are.

“Well, the fax didn’t come with a name, just that cops from Missouri were leading the search,” Shawn says.

Kira’s hands tighten around her mug. “Bryce. He’s the sheriff there and my…” Her voice trails off, her head dips, and suddenly, I get the sense she’s not the only one looking at the band of pale skin around her ring finger.

She clears her throat, her head still bent as she speaks. “The attorney I spoke with in Chicago said he was still my husband, even if I’d signed the forms and returned my ring.”

I straighten in my seat. “What form?”

She lifts her head and looks at me. “I filed for divorce when I left Bryce. It was… expensive. More than I thought it would be.”

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