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I have my spine flush to the wall as I struggle to comprehend that look of longing in his eyes. It doesn’t make sense that he would feel this way, and it doesn’t even matter what he wants. I no longer want him. I only want Mack.

And I scrub the back of my hand over my mouth, removing the memory of his kiss from my lips. “Why did you kiss me?”

“You wanted me to.”

“I was dreaming,” I burst out. “Of Mack. Not you. Never you.”

He doesn’t speak for a beat, then he clears his throat. “We’re getting back on the road now. If you need the bathroom, use it now. I’ll wait here.”

My eyes scan an unfamiliar room that I have no memory of entering.

Wewerein Winter Lake. I was rushing out of the den because a woman was screaming and the scent of blood was so overpowering. And I saw…

“You killed Chris,” I whisper.

I remember the blood soaking the grass in the backyard. He hadn’t been moving. Zoe had been on her side, also unconscious. I don’t know how badly she was hurt, but I know Chris had lost a dangerous amount of blood from what I had scented in the air.

But that isn’t all I remember.

“And the house…” I breathe. There was another man. I look around, but we’re the only people in this unfamiliar cabin. But therehadbeen someone else. A dark-haired man who had a cloth that he’d set on fire with a lighter he’d pulled from his pocket. As Shane had dragged me away from the house, the man had punched the den window and thrown the lit cloth into the house.

Chris could be dead and the house burned down with my packmates inside.

My eyes flick to the closed door. It’s on the other side of the room and I would have to get past Shane to do it. I don’t think I could move that fast. Not while six months pregnant.

Shane sits on the edge of the bed, staring straight ahead. “I did what needed to be done. The bathroom, Aerin. We have some place we need to be today.”

I plant my back to the wall. “I’m not going anywhere.”

He laces his fingers together, muscles straining his forearms.

The Shane from before was always well dressed and well-groomed. This Shane is rougher around the edges, with stubble on his usually clean-shaven jaw, a couple of rips in his blue jeans, and a stain I can’t identify on his long-sleeve white T-shirt.

He doesn’t look at me as he speaks. “Then I will pick you up and put you in the car myself. One way or another, you’re coming with me.”

He doesn’t say it like a threat. But like a promise, and when he flicks a look my way, there’s a heat in his gaze that reminds me of his kiss.

I think he wants an excuse to touch me.

Panicked, I reach for a power that I once used to fling him to the ground. I have enough anger and pain inside me to fling him into next week, but I can’t do that incredible thing because my powers are not there.

Mack thinks it’s because I’m pregnant. That I can create life or wield an incredible power. Not both. I’m starting to think he’s right, because I’m still struggling to embrace a reality where my omega powers have gone forever.

“I’m not going anywhere.” I lift my chin.

He looks at me. “Yours isn’t the only head that will roll if you don’t fall into line, Aerin. Use the bathroom or don’t. We leave in five minutes.”

Every muscle in my body is tense as he pushes himself to his feet and walks over to the closed door I was eyeing up moments ago.

Before he kidnapped me from Winter Lake, we’d discovered that omegas were being hunted. Across the country, omegas were going missing, and no one knew who was behind it.

I’m an omega, a broken one, but still an omega.

And Shane just kidnapped me.

“What did you get yourself messed up in?” I call after Shane.

He halts at the door, one hand around the handle, his back to me. “There are no windows in the bathroom and only one way out of this cabin. I’ve parked right outside. Five minutes to get in the passenger seat or you're going in the trunk.”

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