Page 22 of Rogue Games

Will Maya be furious? She seems amused more than anything and I decide I like her.

“Dean will hate that. Things have obviously gone to hell around here since I left.” Maya laughs, relishing the opportunity to tease her brother. It’s hard to imagine him taking it well. I can picture Dean throwing her in a jail cell easier than I can see him laughing about someone sneaking across his borders.

“How are you feeling about all these people being here?” I ask, watching her reaction closely.

Her brother doesn’t seem too thrilled about it, but she gives off a completely different vibe. Maya’s less intense, and frankly, happier. But she’s a mated woman with a pup on the way, and she doesn’t have to live with Dean Reynolds anymore. Maybe that explains it.

Maya shrugs and lets her gaze drift over the boisterous crowd.

“I moved to another pack, so I’m used to being around strangers, and this madness, more than the others are, but for the most part, everyone is excited.” She looks me square in the eye. “Dad deprived this pack for decades, now Dean is giving everyone the opportunity to live bigger lives, if they want. Or stay here and never set foot off pack land, if that’s what they want. It’s all about having choice after living most of our lives with none.” After a thoughtful pause, she adds, “Most people here are focused on the positives. Dean wouldn’t do anything that wasn’t in the pack’s best interests. They know that. They trust him.”

Staring at where he disappeared in a cloud of anger, I find it hard to believe everyone is on board with Dean’s plans. Especially when he doesn’t exactly seem enthusiastic himself.

“He’s an introvert. These kinds of big events are… challenging for him,” Maya explains. “Go easy on him.”

Go easy on him? Because he’s such a helpless little pup, I scoff internally.

I’m about to ask what she means, when Wyatt cuts me off.

“What pack did you move to?” Wyatt asks, even though he already knows the answer. I’d point that out, except I want to hear Maya tell us what happened, too. We were stunned to hear the famously overprotective Dean Reynolds let his little sister go to live in Grey Ridge, a pack with whom they share a tumultuous past.

That’s putting it politely, they hate each other. Or they used to, at least.

We were even more shocked to hear it was the luna there, a human no less, who encouraged him to open the borders back up. And that he agreed. It gave us hope that maybe, just maybe, our mother got out of here alive.

“Grey Ridge. My mate, Nathan, is the alpha’s brother. We met when I went there to work for the luna.” Maya has the same dreamy look on her face when she speaks about Nathan Jones as I’ve seen on every other mated couple.

“Oh yes, I heard about that. Were you really the first person to leave the territory? Or was this just the first time it was official?”

Wyatt pinches my leg under the table, but I keep an open expression on my face as I bend his finger back hard. He yanks his hand away and shakes it out, while giving me some serious daggers. He thinks I’m being too pushy, but we’re not going to learn anything if we don’t start asking questions.

That’s the real reason we’re here, after all.

“Yes, I was the first to leave. We’ve had a couple of unofficial visitors onto the land…” Maya winks. “But never off.”

Open-mouthed, I stare at her. Someone got inside Reynold’s territory. But how? Numerous times, I’ve come to the border, scouting for our mum’s scent or any clues that she’s still here, but I’ve immediately known someone was watching me and left. I can’t comprehend how someone could have snuck in.

“They didn’t sneak in. Dean let them stay here as a favour.” Maya laughs at my stunned expression. “See, he’s not that bad. He’s even stopped threatening Nathan, which is progress.”

Wyatt and Maya both chuckle, and I’m irrationally annoyed by my brother’s easy acceptance that Dean is a good person. We don’t know that for certain, and his behaviour so far doesn’t scream, easy-going approachable alpha.

“Is Nathan going to enter the competition?” Wyatt continues the small talk, and I zone out, my attention switching to the happy crowd.

“No. I think he has enough on his hands. Or at least, he will very soon.”

The shifters filling every table are all so relaxed, making jokes and having fun with wolves they haven’t even met before. It’s all so easy for them. They’ve clearly never walked into a room and known in the core of their being that everyone already hates them. It has a way of denting your confidence.

Scanning the room, I see lots of flirty glances and heated stares. I smile at the thought of wolves here finding their mates over the coming days, trying to ignore the pang of envy. As spectators start to arrive, and more high-ranking wolves join in, it’s bound to happen.

Not for me, though. I can already picture how that meeting would end. Painfully.

It’s better we don’t meet at all. I’m here for business and not pleasure, anyway. No distractions needed.

“I’ve heard good things about the Grey Ridge pack,” I comment, keen to move the topic away from fated mates and pups. This is my chance to get to know more about Maya. We are stepsisters after all. We’re family. She just doesn’t know it yet.

“As opposed to the horror stories you’ve heard about this pack?” Maya asks, one eyebrow raised, but with no heat in her words. “I’m joking,” she assures me, reaching out to touch my arm when I flush, embarrassed at my faux pas.

I didn’t mean it like that, but she’s not stupid. She lived through it. Barely survived, if the stories are true. She knows her pack’s reputation.

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