Page 1 of Ethan
Chapter 1
Dean
“You’re goingto have to be on your best behavior, you hear?”
Carter’s voice cut through the silence like a blade against leather. Firm, authoritative. Alpha.
I didn’t respond. Not because I didn’t hear him, but because I was tired of being spoken at instead of to.
My elbow rested against the truck’s passenger-side door, my cheek pressed to the cool glass as I stared out at the road.
Miles of dry cornfields blurred past, gold turned gray by the overcast sky.
Our family had called these fields home for generations, but to me, they were nothing but dead space. A gilded cage with stalks for bars.
And now, finally, we were driving away from it. Leaving Thornebane territory behind. My lungs expanded easier than they had in weeks. Maybe months.
Even my wolf stirred from where he lay listless in the back of my mind, tail twitching once, slow and uncertain. Neither of us said it aloud, but we felt the same: relief.
It wasn’t about Carter being a bad alpha. Hell, he was probably the best Thornebane had seen in decades. My brother was calm, collected, strategic and fair.
He was everything the crazy bastard who’d ruled before him hadn’t been. Carter saved the pack. But he didn’t save me.
He didn’t see that every time he looked at me, all I felt was scrutiny. That no matter how good his intentions, my wolf couldn’t submit to him. My older brother.
The one who used to shove me into snowbanks and steal my fries and now sat in the alpha’s chair, giving me orders like I was some mouthy cub who needed taming.
In some ways, I guessed that’s exactly what he still thought I was. The truck curved, and in what felt like the blink of an eye, the scenery changed.
The cornfields dropped away, replaced by thick, towering pines that loomed on either side of the road. There was a scent in the air here. Wet earth and cedar, sharper, wilder and older.
We were in Pecan Pines now.
I straightened a little and rubbed the back of my neck, voice dry as I spoke for the first time during the two-hour drive. “You know, you didn’t have to come.”
Carter glanced over, one eyebrow raised.
“I’m not a kid you need to babysit. I could’ve come here and introduced myself to Cooper on my own,” I pointed out.
Cooper.Even thinking his name made my stomach tighten. My new lead alpha. My future alpha. The word didn’t sit right in my mouth, like a tooth that hadn’t healed straight after being broken.
I’d met Cooper at the pack summit a few months back. Watched him speak. Watched how the wolves of Pecan Pines responded to him. They responded with loyalty, not fear.
He wasn’t loud, but he was dangerous. The kind of alpha who didn’t need to raise his voice to be obeyed.
A part of me, some raw, aching piece buried deep, wondered if I could belong here. If I’d finally feel like I fit in with this pack. Or if I was just as broken here as I’d been back home.
“I have some matters to discuss with Cooper,” Carter said flatly, eyes back on the road. “Besides, your track record doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.”
I scoffed, rolled my eyes, didn’t answer. The truth was, I’d made that reputation myself.
I shoved the other enforcers too hard in training, talking back at the wrong moments, blowing up when I felt cornered.
What Carter didn’t see, what nobody did, was that I acted out because it was easier than feeling like I wasn’t enough.
I’d learned a long time ago that people didn’t ask questions if you gave them a reason to back off.
We pulled into the Pecan Pines pack compound just as the sky started to spit rain.
