Page 102 of The Weakest Wolf

I turn to start looking for something highly flammable. “Okay,” I say, “I don’t think I’ll ever get used to that.”

A hard tug and he brings me right back to him. “Get used to what?”

“Someone asking how I am.” I shake my head. “No, someone caring enough to ask.”

“Get used to it. If you grab some empty bottles and rags, I’ll siphon some gas from the truck for Molotov cocktails.”

I stare at him. “Molotov cocktails?”

“You didn’t think I was joking about burning this place to the ground, did you?”

A sound emerges from my throat. I’m not sure it’s a laugh or something else, but I’ve never made it before. “I like you.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Like?”

“You heard me.”

“Well, I like you too.”

He can’t mean…?

“You do?” I search his face, but I can’t tell if he means like, or like-like.

His eyes soften. “Yes. I do.”

Uh, why are you so impossible to read?

“That’s all you have to say?”

Nodding, he releases my hand. “For now, yes.”

“And later?”

He backs out of the kitchen, his eyes warmer than I’ve ever seen them before. “That comes later. I’ll be back as fast as I can. Stay inside, just in case.”

Five minutes later, Galen is back with a plastic jug of gas. We spend the next twenty minutes making Molotov cocktails, which we light before tossing into each of the cabins.

If any of the pack survived, as Galen seems to think they did, we don’t encounter even one of them. We just find empty and mostly filthy cabins.

In the dreams I’d have of this moment, I’d inhale the acrid smoke hovering around me and know it meant the Stone pack was dead. That I’d finally gotten justice for Mom and Dad.

I never imagined I’d be doing it with someone by my side.

When all the buildings are engulfed in flames—including the cabin where Bowen tortured me—we climb into Galen’s truck.

As he drives away, I keep my eyes on the smoke spiraling up into the sky until I can’t see it anymore. Only then, do I turn away, and face the front.

To the future.

26

GALEN

Irun my hand down Sierra’s smooth warm back. By the time I’ve skimmed my fingers up again, her eyes are open and she’s studying me with bemusement.

“Where are we?”

After grabbing the sheet from her waist, I cover her. That much bare skin is a distraction, and now is not the time to be distracted. “Highway motel. You fell asleep.”

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