Page 150 of Break The Ice

Raider is lying in the bed asleep. His face is pale, and he doesn’t look good, but he’s sleeping peacefully. That’s something.

Ryann goes to him and takes his hand, sitting on the edge of the bed.

“Raider, you idiot, you should have gone to the hospital.” She starts to sob, great, big, huge, whole body sobs. She’s been holding it in all this time. Too much has happened. I swallow hard and look away so I can get myself under control. Wren draws her into his arms and holds her while she cries. She clings to him like he’s her life raft.

I sit down and put my head in my hands while Callan leans down to whisper to Raider.

My body trembles, and it aches badly. We almost lost everything tonight. I have never been more scared in my life. I start to cry, swiping at my eyes. Callan turns and kneels before me, he grips the back of my neck and pulls me down until our foreheads are pressed together.

He repeats the same words over and over.

“It’s over. We survived.”

It doesn’t feel like it. Not yet.

Zaden places everything hefound in front of us. There are journals, videos, and external hard drives. Some of it goes back years and years.

He even had the footage of Rusty running down Danyal. There were multiple listening devices and a motion detecting camera in the woods. In the teams rooms, Zaden found he had gotten access to the medical files of Wren and Raider and was blackmailing the coach and manipulating everything.

He showed us old photos of Rusty, and as I stare down at the young guy, I wouldn’t have thought in a million years that Wesley and he were the same person.

But it was everything we would have needed to convict him. Mirakill might have their hands clean of this, but Despair MC’s hands are bloody.

His body won’t be found, but neither will Freddie’s. I don’t even feel a little bit bad over it.

Wren took everything and went with Callan and burned it all. We don’t want even the slightest bit of evidence to point in our direction. And just like that, Rusty Diernan or Wesley Carter disappeared from our planet completely, his whole existence erased but for some team photos that do not record his name.

A few days later, Ryann asked about the coach. Wren had told us all a couple of days earlier, and we’d agreed to wait until she asked.

Breaking the news to Ryann about her uncle was awful, she retreated into herself. I think she’d idolized her uncle while she was on the run. He was the last of her family, so she built him up to be a hero. Ripping that curtain open had her needing to reassess and grieve a whole different part of her life.

Auggie, Charles, Sol, and Wayne stayed in town, and they have been over almost every day getting to know us, trying to make it up to Raider. The Raines are proving that family doesn’t give up, it tries harder. They are showing Raider and Ryann they are not alone.

They are showing me they are sorry for all the years of overlooking my relationship with their son.

I can’t help but see the similarities between Auggie and Ryann. Both betas are strong and capable with huge hearts and so much love in them. Their blossoming friendship is something special to see.

When I couldn’t take anymore of the smothering of the Raines, I called my family and Wren’s, and the packs descended. My mothers embraced Ryann wholeheartedly, just like I knew they would. My dads were impressed by her and loved Wren.

She was hugged and kissed and teased until her head was spinning, and that was just from my side. Wren’s sisters adores her. When Wren’s mother had seen Ryann, she’d hugged her for a long time with silent tears running down her cheeks.

“Thank you for loving my son,” she’d said to all of us.

Louise Turner is one of the most beautiful souls I’ve ever met, and her daughters and son have that same inner fire.

Our families mingled and merged. The Raines with the Turners with the Mogels.

It was sad to see Ryann with no one, but as she pointed out, we had more than enough to share with her.

Callan’s dad made it out, too. I’d watched him warily as he’d awkwardly hummed around an apology. The desperation and misery in his eyes had me whispering to Callan to forgive him.

He’d come in, and, to my surprise, he hadn’t said one offensive thing. He’d gotten along with the families and was respectful and kind. He was trying to change, which is more than I ever dreamed for Callan.

My very unsure alpha and he had gone off and had a talk, and they’d both come back red-eyed and sniffing. Callan said later that his dad was so lost in missing his mum that he was just hurting everyone around him. It wasn’t until he left that he realised he was going to lose Callan.

He’s trying to change.

Isn’t that all we can ask?

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