Page 36 of Black Moon

“Colt Doherty,” I whispered back, though logic said that wouldn’t mean a damn thing to him.

The alpha narrowed his eyes, put off that the omega clearly didn’t know me. Surely, the last thing he wanted to do was hand Brook into an even worse situation than the one he’d been in.

I took a shaky breath, forced a smile, and tried again to put them both at ease. “I’m staying with the Groves. I saw your sister Shiloh at The Cider House tonight.”

At the sound of his sister’s name, Brook’s breath hitched. Tears filled his eyes, and he took a second to breathe in deep.

With one uneasy step, he moved toward me. He seemed weak on his feet, but his eyes were fixed on me, his pupils wide as he focused on the closest tie he had to the Groves at hand.

“You smell like...home.”

Brook sounded absolutely shattered, his voice a rough, desperate squeak.

Unsure what to do, I held out my arms. He stumbled into them with a pained whimper. When he was close, I wrapped him in a tight hug and let him bury his nose against my neck, clinging to the small of my back with fists in my sweater, slipped under my jacket to try and get that much closer.

I rubbed his back, lamenting he didn’t have the right kind of omega there to hold him up—somebody like my mom, or Claudia, who could be the emotional support he needed. But if all he had was me, I was going to do my best to see him home safe, to give him a place to fall apart.

Thankfully, Brook was a little shorter than me, so his head fit just right against my shoulder.

He was stockier too—had the arms of a guy who did hard work. I thought I remembered someone saying he worked at the mechanic’s. Whatever the cause, it made me feel better that he was there, that he was solid.

I’d seen omegas waste away before, from the Condition, mostly. But whatever the Reids had put Brook through, he felt substantial. I had to believe that meant he was going to be okay, if not now, then eventually.

I met the alpha’s eyes over Brook’s messy hair. He frowned at us—two strangers to each other, tangled up and unwilling to let go.

“You have to get out of here,” the alpha whispered after a second. “I’ll try and turn the pack the other way, give you a chance to escape, but you need to go now.”

I nodded. I figured I’d have to bump Brook off my shoulder and drag him along, but when he heard the alpha’s voice, he lifted his head. “Dante?”

The alpha paused in moving away. He didn’t quite look back at us, shame dropping his eyes to the forest floor.

“Thank you,” Brook whispered.

Dante just shook his head, and he loped off into the shadows back toward his pack—the one who’d kidnapped and hurt Brook, who were responsible for the bruise on his face and his split lip and the bite on his neck, and who knew what else.

“Let’s get you home,” I whispered, slipping my hand into Brook’s, even as he stared after the disappearing alpha.

After a second, he nodded. When it came right down to it, I didn’t have to drag Brook away at all. He rushed through the trees, eager to escape.

And there was no doubt in my mind that right then, we were running from nightmares that were going to dog his steps for a long time coming.

19

Linden

Sure enough, Colt’s little silver Prius was parked just a few dozen yards away from the vans of the pack members who were out looking for Brook. Had he met up with them and insisted on going along? No, they wouldn’t have agreed to that.

I lifted my face, trying to catch a scent on the air. It was one of the few benefits of being an alpha—heightened senses.

The scent of Colt was newer than the pack scents, and even more, they’d gone in a slightly different direction.

I couldn’t decide if that was a good thing or a bad one, but either way, the pack enforcers had each other to watch their backs. Colt had gone off alone. He needed me more than they did.

My decision had absolutely nothing to do with his enormous blue eyes and delicious scent. Okay, fine, not much.

Even if Colt was behind the pack, all of them were way ahead of me, so I made a snap decision and stripped my clothes off, leaving them folded on the driver’s seat in my car. Then I tucked the keys behind the front left tire, and shifted.

Like every Grove alpha for generations, I was a big gray wolf. I didn’t stand out in a crowd of wolves too much, except that I was a head taller than most of them. As such, my legs were also longer, and as soon as I’d finished shifting, I was off like a shot, racing through the woods, following the spicy scent of Colt Doherty. Leaping over roots and around tree trunks, going almost as fast as I could see ahead of myself, I ran the danger of rushing straight into something, but I didn’t have time to waste. I had to find Colt before he got hurt, or worse, captured, by the Reids.

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