Total pages in book: 254
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
And that was to do what they had done: do the best I could for a child that might not be biologically mine but was in every other sense. In every way that mattered.
That meant moving to a place with a strong wolf presence. They didn’t mind me and the way I smelled. Neither did ogres. But werewolves were as overprotective, possessive, and family oriented as books and movies made them out to be, especially around children and family members. Most screenwriters had gotten that part right.
There were worse things in the world than a group of people who all took it upon themselves to raise every child in their proximity as their own.
“You haven’t brought up the ‘but,’” I pointed out to Matti. “Tell her.”
Sienna’s face lit up. “There’s a ‘but’? What is it? Do you have to shave your head to live there? Animal sacrifice? Are they polygamous? Because I can’t see you having sister wives.”
My eyes strayed to Matti’s. He smiled, and then I smiled.
“I was getting to it.” He was being so ominous I was grateful to already be aware of what was going to come out of his mouth. He met his mate’s gaze. “She would have to join the pack. They won’t let her live there without a commitment to them. It’s how they’ve kept it a secret for so long, and part of the reason why they don’t have beings constantly trying to move there.”
She scrunched up her face again. “What kind of commitment are we talking about here? It can’t be that bad if you still see Henri every once in a while. They aren’t keeping him hostage there, are they?”
“You think someone could keep Henri hostage?” Matti scoffed.
If he was anything like how I remembered, that was going to be a negative. My memories of him had been stored in some part of my brain that I had locked up. Most of them had been neutral, some positive, some very positive, and then there were the parts that hurt. The ones I’d clung to until I had been old enough to process them and understand why Matti’s cousin had done what he’d done.
She snickered and shrugged her agreement. “So, what’s the catch?”
Matti side-eyed me again like he was testing to make sure I was prepared for his answer.
I smirked at him, because I knew. The tuna-sized catch had kept me up at night wondering if I could go through with it. Testing the boundaries of how much I loved Duncan. How much I would be willing to do for him.
And if me agreeing to do this didn’t tell the universe that I adored my boy, I wasn’t sure what else could.
Matti had a gleeful little glint in his eyes as he dropped the explanation that would’ve driven a less desperate person away from moving to a secret ranch. “Nina’s going to have to get married.”
Chapter
Two
“Do we need to go over the plan again?”
With my hands around the steering wheel, I glanced over my shoulder to find Sienna and Duncan cuddled up in the back seat of my truck. Sienna was holding a red toy I’d never seen before that he was gnawing away at. The cutest part was that they both looked like there was nowhere else they would rather be. A few hours ago, it had been Matti in the back with Duncan sprawled across his chest, both of them snoring away. Sienna had recorded a video of them, giggling under her breath while she did.
It made me so happy. Duncan loved the attention. Loved the love. And my friends loved him right back. There was that saying about how it takes a village to raise a child, and it had clicked, on a different level, how much sense that made.
Which was why I had told my friends that same night we went to them that I wanted to take him to the ranch. The fact that they didn’t argue and tell me that I should move closer and raise him with them around said everything. It wouldn’t work, and it wasn’t safe. So it hadn’t exactly been a surprise when Sienna had bumped my shoulder, and Matti had said, “I already texted Henri.”
And that was how the four of us had ended up in my truck, pulling my travel trailer across state lines two days later. We drove and drove—Matti and I swapping every couple hours—eating up mile after mile between Chicago and wherever we were going in Colorado. Matti had entered a latitude and longitude address in the navigation. If this community was as quiet and secluded as he’d made it seem, why would it have a real address?
Surprisingly, it made me feel a hell of a lot better that the people who lived there would go to these kinds of extremes.