Declan - Heart of a Tiger (Royal Taiga Streak #1) - J.R. Loveless Page 0,3

you. You won't need me anymore."

"We'll always need you," Tara sniffled. "You're family."

Fredrick and Tomas agreed. Vicky nodded fiercely to which Sean smiled, humbled and heart hurting. "What matters is getting you all out of here, back to your real families. I have no family to go home to. Carl... I have nothing outside of these walls."

"You can stay with us," Tara growled. "Besides, who knows what any of us have to go home to. After all, we have no idea how our families have changed or if they'll even want us anymore."

"They'll want you," Sean said quietly, reaching up to stroke her dirty cheek. "They've missed you. I'm sure of it."

Sean knew his father would be beyond furious the moment he discovered Ronnie's disappearance, but he remained hopeful it wouldn't be until Ronnie had gotten far enough way to not be recaptured. The gods must have been listening because it wasn't for at least another two hours before Carl dragged Sam back downstairs and shoved her, almost unconscious back into her cage. Sean winced at the sight of the blood on her face and inner thighs, wondering what they'd done to deserve the hell they'd all been living through for so long.

"Where's the runt?" Carl barked, dragging his gaze around the room, eyes narrowing as he realized the newest shifter was gone.

Steeling his nerves, Sean raised his head and calmly replied, "I let him go."

Carl swung around. "You did what?" he snarled, stomping toward Sean and backhanding him.

Sean's head hit the wall, hard, and his ears started to ring, covering whatever else his father began spewing as the fists began flying. The sound of his own bones breaking were loud in his head, but the most painful part wasn't his wrist snapping or his clavicle fracturing, it was the jagged edge of a rib bone, caused by another brutal kick from his father's boot, piercing his heart. Sean screamed in agony, blackness, blessed darkness, loomed before him as he fell swiftly toward unconsciousness. The last thing he heard before it swallowed him whole was a roar thunderous enough to rock the foundation of the place he'd called home his entire life.

2

Declan

Alpha Declan Page paced his living room floor, running a hand through his dark blond hair. "We need to find him," he growled.

"We are looking everywhere, Alpha," Victor, his beta, soothed from the doorway, knowing better than to get in his alpha's way.

Declan looked at his sister Rose. She stood near the window, face wet with tears, eyes haunted. They and other surrounding packs had suffered through similar disappearances over the years. None of the children had ever been recovered. He prayed they would find Ronnie. His sister wouldn't survive losing her child, not after having lost her mate only a year ago in a car accident. He crossed to the window and dragged her into his arms, holding her tightly. A sob broke free and she shuddered. "I can't lose him, too, Dec."

"I know, Rose. We'll find him. I know we will. Is there anything else you can remember?"

"No. One minute he was there and the next gone. I turned my back for two seconds, Dec. Two seconds! I'm a horrible mother."

"Stop it, Rose. You are not." Declan stroked her hair and pressed a kiss to her forehead. "Did you notice anyone watching you? Following you?"

"No. I stopped to talk to Brigette from the flower shop for a second. He'd been playing a game on his handheld computer thingy."

Declan couldn't help but smile. She'd never been very good with technology. Declan remembered buying Ronnie the Nintendo DS as a gift a couple of Christmases ago. "Okay. What else?"

"When I looked back, the game was on the ground and he was gone!" she wailed, crying even harder into his broad chest.

He rubbed his hands in circles on her back, teeth clenched so hard they could have shattered. He would gut whoever had taken his nephew. "Shh, shh. It's going to be okay, honey. Michael is asking the businesses in the area for security video footage to see if we can find anything that way. I'm sure they must have picked up something."

Rose sniffled and nodded, but her shoulders still shook. Ronnie had been missing for eight hours, seemingly a life time to a distraught mother, Declan knew. One of the streak enforcers, Michael, had tried to locate a scent, but the trail went cold in an alley, meaning the son of a bitch had taken Ronnie to some form