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The air is cool and refreshing. Exactly what I needed after being cooped up inside for hours. I think that feeling of being trapped is counting down the hours, knowing Mack is in a place where it’s not safe, and that Franklin could kill him like he killed Shane if we don’t get him out soon.

So even though I’ve done a lot of pacing, I have still felt trapped. I don’t think that feeling will truly go away until Mack is with me, and I’m back in his arms again.

“I loved her.”

I turn to look at Dad, immediately knowing who he must mean. “Mom?”

He nods. “It was important that I tell you that.”

My eyes narrow. “Youaregetting mellow in your old age, aren’t you?”

I’d only been half-joking about it before, but maybe he wasn’t joking when he said, ‘perhaps.’

He looks at me, and even though there’s not a hint of a smile playing on his lips, I get the sense he’s hiding his amusement from me. “I say that so you will understand why Mack did what he did.”

I’m not sure I like the direction of this conversation.

“Mom died. I love her and I miss her, but Mack isn’t dead, and he’s not going to die. I’m getting him back.”

His eyes flick to my belly and I place a hand over it. “You’re pregnant.”

“But I’m not dead.”

“And your powers are not working, Ivy said.”

“I’m getting Mack back, Dad, no matter what. I’m not leaving him here.”

He nods then resumes peering into the distance.

It’s quiet here in Karson, Michigan. Not as quiet as Winter Lake, because there’s a faint rumbling of sound that might be from a railway.

“There are times when you have to accept that something matters more, Aerin.”

I frown. “I don’t understand. Is this is about me staying at the house while you go rescue Mack and the omegas?”

“Being Alpha means you come to a point, at least once in your life, that you accept you don’t know everything, and that you can’t do everything on your own.”

It takes me a second, but then I get it.

“You’re going in to get Mack and you want me to stay behind, aren’t you?”

“I’ve stepped down.”

I blink at him in surprise. “Stepped down from what?”

“The Boones. I’m no longer the Alpha.”

As I stare at him, I’m not sure if I fell asleep on the couch and don’t remember it because what he just admitted to doesn’t make sense.

“But you’re Douglas Boone.”

The dry half-smile he points down at me is unfamiliar. Mainly because I’m not used to my dad smiling at all. He was always serious, and he was, I thought, always going to be Alpha.

I envisioned him as an old, old man, still leading until he went to bed and didn’t wake up. Because in my life, that’s all he’s ever been. Or that’s all I’ve ever known him as.

“There also comes a point in a person’s life when they look around and realize that the people who they thought needed them don’t need them quite so much as they want them to.”

“The Boones?”

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