Page 131 of Home: Posy 5

Around us, the pack energy swirled and pulsed like a living thing as the king and queen waited for the signal to begin the run. Lark's mates formed a ring around her, and she looked at each of them with curiosity, wondering what they had planned.

"I got you, luna wolf."

A big hand curled under her belly and picked her up, and Lark yipped gleefully as Angelo carried her over to Thoreau's dirt bike.

As he fixed the orange goggles over her eyes and fussed with the buckles, my mind flashed back to the day I turned eighteen. I had doubted I'd make it to see another birthday, let alone gain my freedom or find my mate. Tired and broken, I had been on the verge of giving up.

But I didn't.

I got up and kept going.

And look at me now.

We did good, didn't we, wolfie?I whispered as I finally gave in and closed my eyes.

Yeah! We a badass bitch!Lark howled loud enough for Angelo to hear, and he burst into deep belly laughs.

"Damn right!" he guffawed, shaking his head at the little runt wolf strapped to a dirt bike wearing orange ski goggles. "You're the baddest bitch in the kingdom!"

Hush, Gelo, I chided. Don't encourage her. And Lark, no cursing.

Ashy say it all the time,she sassed.You never fuss at him. 'Sides, it true. Strength is what we gain from the madness we survive. And we survivea lotof madness.

That much surely is true, wolfie.

With little chuckles still bubbling out of him, Angelo hopped on the bike, kicked it to life, and revved the engine.

"Ready when you are, wolf king," he called over the noise.

With piercing howls, the king and queen surged forward and we followed. Lark barked happily, Angelo whooped and hollered, and my mates loped along in a ring around us. The betas circled the alphas, the gammas circled the betas, and then came the deltas, our family and friends, and thousands of wolves beyond them yet, circle after circle stretching into the night with the luna ever at the heart of the pack.

Which was where we belonged now and forever.

26: Stand By You Forever

~ Three months ago: June 19 ~

Mason

"Dude! I can't believe we have to go all the way down to Green River and deflate some jackass's ego!" Wyatt whined.

"I know, right?" Ash threw in his two cents. "You give some people a little power and it goes right to their head."

"Probably another instance of a big hat with no cattle." Jay, who was driving, nodded.

"Dude! That doesn't even make sense!" Ash scoffed.

"It means he thinks he's all that, but he's really nothing." In the rear-view mirror, I saw Jay roll his eyes. "I might as well be talking to your wolf."

"Sid didn't understand it, either." Ash tilted his head.

"My point exactly." Jay put on the signal and merged into the passing lane. "Neither of you understand an idiom or an analogy."

"We ain't in school anymore," Ash scowled.

"Thank the Goddess for that!" Wyatt muttered. "I don't need to be taking a literature class ever again!"

"It'slife, not literature class," Jay sneered.

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