silent inside her, watchful, worried, growing a bone-deep devotion that Summer couldn’t stop even if she tried.
She didn’t have Hunter’s number, but Wes needed help.
Wes would be angry if she reached out to his pack for help, but Wolf didn’t care about moral compasses. She cared about keeping her mate safe, end of discussion. And she would do treacherous deeds to make it so, even at the cost of Wes’s trust. As long as he existed, she could keep improving, keep seeing the world differently, keep trying for happy. As long as he existed, she was going to be okay. Selfish of her? Perhaps, but that didn’t mean a hill of beans to a creature who was aimed at survival.
Wes was survival, but not only that. The man who had destroyed her turned out to be her only shot at steady. Was that love? To a damaged werewolf like her, it sure felt like it. Maybe it wasn’t roses and love letters. But maybe bone-deep ride-or-die loyalty was the only type of love she understood now.
Wes. Felt. Important.
She traced his chiseled jaw line, fingertip light over his stubble. His dark lashes brushed his cheek, and a beautiful vision nudged her mind. She had a vision of a little boy in her arms, hair long like Wes’s with those eyelashes. Chills rippled up her arm, and she flinched back. And just like that, the vision was gone.
But it had been there, for just a second, and it offered her something she hadn’t dared to dream of for years.
Hope existed now. Hope for the life she’d wanted in “the before.”
His eyes shifted back and forth rapidly under his closed eyelids and then settled. When he sighed a long breath, the tension in her chest eased.
He’ll be okay, Wolf promised her. Just needs rest. And meat. Feed him meat when he wakes.
That she could do. Summer stood and grabbed the truck keys off the end table. Beside them sat his cell phone, but it was locked. The picture on the lock screen was a shot of some land with cows in the distance. The Kaid Brother’s Ranch. She wanted him to go back there. To be safe again. To stop hunting. She’d made a mistake stirring him up like this.
She knew him, though. He would never stop hunting until he’d found resolution with Sam. With Leif.
She pushed his thumb against the secure measures of the phone and unlocked it, walked out of the hotel, and searched his contacts for Hunter. It took her a minute while she sat in his truck because Hunter’s name was Asswaffle Bro in Wes’s phone. She laughed a little. Of course, it was.
He picked up on the first ring. “Wes! Wes! Where are you? Are you okay?”
“It’s not Wes.” Summer swallowed a growl. “I mean, I’m not Wes. But he’s okay!”
“Who is this?” Hunter asked in a careful tone. God it was good to hear his voice. It had been so long.
“It’s Summer.”
“Oh, shit,” Hunter whispered. “Did you kill him?”
“Ha.” She shook her head and stared out the front window, splattering with raindrops as a cloud opened up on her. “No, I didn’t kill him. The thought crossed my mind, though.” How did she tell him? How did she tell him Sam was still alive like this? Over the phone? “Wes needs you.”
“He’s been in my head. What does it mean that he’s in my head? I can hear him. Sometimes he says ‘help her.’ Help who? Help you?”
Summer frowned. “I’m okay. He’s hurt, though. Maybe his subconscious is pushing that into the bond with you?”
“It feels big now, Summer. I can feel him. Feel a link. It’s wide open, and I don’t think I should close it, so I haven’t. But it hurts a little and it’s chaotic. What’s happening? I feel a lot that I don’t understand, and it’s not just me. Sadey feels it, too. Bryson and Maris, too. We’ve been calling everyone we know, trying to track him down. Something bad is happening, isn’t it? Summer? Just tell me fast.”
“Okay. First, Wes was hurt in a fight. He’s healing quickly, probably because you are leaving that bond wide open. Don’t shut it, okay? Don’t make it smaller. A pack can heal an alpha faster if they stay connected. He’s sleeping in a hotel outside of Albuquerque. I’m here with him, and he’s okay.”
Hunter huffed a long sigh and murmured to someone, “He’s alive. He’s hurt but alive.” Static blasted across the speaker before he