Either that or trouble.

Clearing his throat, Ethan muttered, “What do we do with her?”

“We’ll take her to the house. I’ll say I found her. The council would prefer to think you were involved.” That he believed us was something I didn’t question. He trusted us as much as we trusted him. It had always been the way of it. When he beckoned with his hands for her, dread filled me. It deepened when he stated, “I’ll take her.”

Everything inside me clamored to refuse, but I couldn’t disobey him. It hurt me, physically pained me to let the she-wolf go, to shift her in my hold, and when I did, I felt the loss of the omega more keenly than when she had passed over earlier that evening. How had she died? Though we were important to Eli, we weren’t council, so we weren’t privy to any information until it was pack knowledge, but the grief inside me was like a brewing storm. When the she-wolf was in my arms, it had been kept at bay.

Now? I felt faintly adrift. A little lost.

Maybe Eli saw that, or maybe he sensed it, because he gave us a purpose.

As he so often did.

“Return to the carnival,” he ordered, his gaze on the she-wolf. “Find the scent of her attacker. When you find them, don’t kill them. Leave that to me.”

Eli

The bundle of femininity in my arms was something I’d never anticipated dropping into my lap tonight.

After losing my mother, even with her promises of finding my mate ringing in my ears, I’d never thought…

Did the Mother always heed a sacrifice this quickly?

I didn’t even need to blood her to know she was mine. I felt it deep in my being.

My mate.

My omega.

But how?

She’d been transformed against pack protocol, had endured the horror of that metamorphosis without any guidance, without any warning, and yet, here she was.

And because of the bastard who’d put her through that terror, who’d put her through something that no one should endure without aid, I had my mate.

It was difficult to be happy when I knew what she’d gone through. I’d transformed relatively few people in my term as alpha, over seventy percent of them women, and I knew how painful it was. I’d been there to witness the first shift, had helped them through the first hunger and the first hunt.

I’d never, not in all those times, seen a she-wolf as beautiful as this one. Our purebloods were the brightest colors, had gold and silver tints to their fur. The mixed bloods were less shiny. Like natural selection had weeded out the beauty in their animal half. This one, however, was breathtaking.

I’d scented her from the bottom of the drive, aware the twins had been up to their usual mischief, but when I’d seen her, well, the old phrase was true—seeing was believing.

It had been easier to trust my eyes than my nose, and now, with her in my arms, it was even more difficult to believe.

Though I was concerned for her, concerned that she hadn’t eaten yet so soon after the initial shift, I was unsure what I could do for her.

Was it wiser to take her to the house? To settle her in a room and make her comfortable? I could prepare the pack then for her ‘arrival,’ get things ready so that when she awoke, everything was in place.

Or I could take her to the woods, bring her food, help her…

Though the former option made more sense, instinct clamored at me. She didn’t need a soft den, didn’t need the warmth of a centrally heated bedroom with a bathroom nearby.

She needed the woods.

She needed nature.

At times like these, I would have asked my last living parent for advice, would have sought her guidance, but this was all on me now.

Until this female awakened and ascended to the place that was shaped like my mother.

My throat tightened at the thought.

Mother had said within a few days I’d have my omega, but… So uncanny, so surreal, because here was my mate. In my arms. Like a miracle. Except, miracles didn’t come with a blood price.

Releasing a shaky breath—because I was shaken to my core—I made the decision to follow my gut. I usually never questioned my instincts, because what was an alpha who doubted himself? But in this, I was treading on new territory in a world without the one constant I’d had since childhood.

So, instead of plowing ahead to my home, I ignored the warmth, the scent of wine that the council was drinking down as they discussed the evening’s events, trying, without success, to plug the chasm my mother’s passing had created, and totally bypassed any and all of my responsibilities to them this night.

I was alpha to be sure, and my presence was required at the party they were holding, but I figured there’d never been more reason than now to evade my duty.

Not only had I just lost a parent, I’d gained a mate, and the pack had just lost and gained an omega—in the most unusual ways imaginable.

The desire to see her in her human skin ate at me as I trudged around to the back of the house, where there was a thick gathering of trees. Fall had shed a canopy of leaves, and that would be perfect for her when I settled her down and went hunting to feed her.

I could feel her weakness, and my wolf was both repulsed by it and enticed. Our baser natures preferred strength over vulnerability, yet my beast wasn’t sure what to make of this. Didn’t know what to do with a creature who was somehow both. Somehow alien. Yet somehow ours.

The farther away from the house I moved, away from the chatter of the council who was dealing with their own grief, away from the pollution in the air with each step I took, I could breathe her in better, could scent her true essence more easily, and what shook me even more was that her scent wasn’t just her own, but it was tangled with the twins.

My father had never understood my appreciation for the boys. Well, I called them that, but they were only six years my junior. I’d forever been protecting them, shielding them from his awareness, because I knew he didn’t like their father, but since when was that a child’s fault?

It had become second nature to watch over them, to put them in a position that was untouchable, where only I had a say in what they did.

Yet, though I trusted them, though I knew they weren’t lying about their involvement with the attack on the she-wolf, that their scent was embroiled in hers set me on edge.

It wasn’t uncommon, exactly, for an omega to have more than one mate. The more powerful she was, the more grounding she needed, but powerful omegas were few and far between. Where better to ground a strong omega, however, than in several powerful males who could not only protect her physically, but could shield her emotionally?

I’d just never imagined that I’d be like that.

That my omega would need several mates, that I wouldn’t be good enough to be everything she needed.

Was that why I’d sent the twins away?

Was that why I was taking her to the woods and keeping her to myself?

Because my wolf already knew what I wasn’t willing to accept?

It was a night for feeling like I was walking on broken glass. My blood was pouring from several wounds on my feet, every part of me torn to emotional shreds from what had happened, and this wasn’t helping.

Overhead, the moon called to me, demanding I shift, and I knew why.

The Mother was guiding me.

Showing me the way.