Page 30 of Ranger's Code

She’s off the bed in an instant. "Then we go."

"Mags...” I reach for her arm, not to stop her, but to steady her. Her scent has changed—no, evolved—enough that I can feel the storm beneath her skin. Her pupils are wide, jaw tight, breath coming fast. She isn’t panicking. She’s speeding up. Her system is surging with instinct, her body fighting to align what it remembers being with what it’s now becoming. I see the shimmer of pain flicker behind her eyes, just for a second. A spike in her pulse, an internal war she’s too proud to show.

"Maggie," I say more gently. "You’re still transitioning. You’re not like the rest of us—yet. Your instincts are going to override logic. Things might come faster than you expect. Too fast. You could get hurt."

She looks up at me, fierce and unflinching, but there’s a tremor in her fingers that betrays the raw edge of the transition burning under her skin. "Then I’ll fight through it," she says, her voice rough but steady. "But don’t treat me like I’m breakable just because I’m new. I’m not porcelain, Gideon. I’m fire. And you damn well know it."

The defiance in her eyes is bright, the flush on her cheeks more heat than fear. Her breath comes in shallow bursts, her body humming with a primal energy she’s only beginning to understand—but none of it dulls the truth in her tone. There’s strength there, not recklessness. She isn’t asking for permission. She’s demanding respect.

My mouth tugs into the barest grin, pride cutting through the undercurrent of concern like a blade through cloth—sharp, undeniable, and full of heat.

"No. Don’t ‘Mags’ me. I’m one of you now. You don’t get to lock me in a tower because it’s inconvenient."

"You’re not a Ranger."

She’s still for a moment, as if considering. "Kari isn’t a Ranger either. Can you honestly tell me if your sister was the baker, and I was the romance writer, you would try to exclude her?"

"Wouldn’t I?" I say, scrubbing a hand over my jaw, watching her. That doesn’t seem to appease her. "First, if Kari owned the bakery, she’d be in jail for unintentional manslaughter—she’d have killed people with food poisoning. You’ve tasted her cooking, right?"

Maggie laughs in spite of herself. “I understand your point, which is why I was so shocked at your baking skills. Kari and I agreed a long time ago—my talent was in pastry; hers was in writing.”

Her eyes are fierce, her jaw set in that familiar line of stubborn resolve. The surrounding air seems charged, not with fear, but with rising power—raw and electric. Her scent has begun to evolve—damn it, transform—deepening with the markers of change that prickle against my skin. It isn’t just adrenaline. It’s the thrum of something ancient awakening inside her, a new rhythm syncing with the pulse of the night. She doesn’t just want to help. She’s burning to step fully into this new skin, to own every inch of what she’s becoming.

"Fine," I say. "But you stay close. You let me lead. No heroics. No exceptions."

She nods. "Deal."

* * *

Shadows and silver cloak the waterfront, the moon hanging low like an omen carved from ice. The sea laps lazily at the piers, each soft crash of water echoing like a held breath across the stillness. I walk in step with Maggie, Gage, and Dalton, the four of us strung in silent formation. We look like what we are—a pack hunting not with teeth, but with readiness, every sense attuned to the tension in the air. Maggie’s arm brushes mine once, and her warmth grounds me even as the wind cuts cold through the cotton of my shirt. She doesn’t speak, but her eyes scan the horizon with sharp, new clarity. The calm around us feels deceptive—not peace, but pause. Like the city itself is crouched, waiting for violence to bloom.

Then it hits—an explosion that shatters the night. One of the food trucks at the end of the pier—a ball of fire and shattered metal.

Fire roars up from the far end of the pier, a blinding bloom of orange and red against the silver quiet of the waterfront. Heat punches the air, shoving it outward in a wave that makes windows rattle and sends flocks of startled gulls screaming skyward. The blast rolls through our bones, gut-deep and final. Smoke blooms fast, acrid and thick, already curling up into the sky like a signal.

Shadows move in the firelight. Armed. Aggressive. The food truck—what had been a familiar stop for tourists and locals alike—is now a twisted skeleton engulfed in flame. And from within the flickering chaos, the figures move. Not civilians. Not allies.

I don’t think. I roar, body already responding to the deep instinct that surges from my core. The mist rushes in, coiling around me—cool, electric, alive. It spins like fog with a mind of its own, summoned by the ancient magic of my kind. One heartbeat I’m a man. The next—I’m power incarnate. Muscle, fang, and fury unleashed into the night.

Dalton and Gage lunge into the fray a breath behind me, their forms blurring into massive wolves in a flash of fur and bone. Our howls split the night—a battle cry, a claim, a promise of violence to anyone stupid enough to test our pack. The sound echoes across the waterfront, primal and furious, harmonizing with the chaos blooming around us.

Maggie gasps, frozen for a heartbeat as three massive wolves launch into action around her—one black as midnight, one slate-gray with a jagged scar down its side, and one streaked with copper, its eyes gleaming like molten gold. Our sudden movement is a shockwave, the force of our presence hitting her like wind off a cliff. And then something in her responds—a snap of adrenaline, a burst of clarity. Not fear. Recognition. The part of her that has begun to change, to awaken, rises like a tide. And instinct takes her.

Something primal snaps loose inside her, like a tether giving way. Heat surges beneath her skin, adrenaline sharpening her senses. She doesn’t hesitate—can’t. Her legs move before the thought can catch up, boots pounding the pavement as she hurls herself forward, teeth bared in a snarl that doesn’t belong to the woman she used to be. Her vision tunnels, locked on the threat, on Dalton’s exposed flank. Maggie sees it before he does. Her fingers curl like claws, and she moves faster than she ever has—no time to think, just motion, just muscle. She slams into the attacker, knocking the blade off course.

She can’t change form—not yet—but that doesn’t matter. She’s not defenseless. Not anymore.

She slams into the thug’s arm mid-swing, throwing his balance off. The blade misses its mark by inches, and Dalton spins, jaws snapping.

I see it all—Maggie’s body moving with raw instinct; her strike saving Dalton from a blade that would’ve torn straight through him—and something fierce clenches deep in my chest. Pride, yes, but something bigger. Something harder to name. A primal surge of awe and fierce protectiveness, braided with the staggering realization that this woman—my mate—is fighting beside me, not behind. The blood arcing through the air is real, but so is the fire in her. And that fire is mine to protect, to nurture, to stand beside for as long as I have breath in my lungs.

We’re able to thwart the Grangers’ thugs. Brutal. Messy, but we win.

When it’s over, we linger in the shadows beyond the wreckage, adrenaline still buzzing through our veins. The scent of blood clings to the salt-heavy breeze. Maggie, breathless, looks to the pier—nothing. No sign of Chas. No final blow. Not yet.

I nudge her with my muzzle.

“We need to move,” she says, her voice low but urgent.

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