Chapter 12 AURORA

I slapped at his gnarled, clawed hands, and he looked down at me with hatred. I tried to call for Trajan, but I couldn’t breathe.

Remi leaned close. In his lycan form, he was half-man, half-wolf, nearly seven feet tall and corded with muscle. His face was wolf-like and monstrous.

“Did you think you could walk away from us?” His sour breath washed over my face, and I gagged. He was squeezing so tight, I couldn’t breathe. I pulled at his hands, but they were like steel.

All the memories of him torturing me when we were both children came flooding back. My vision darkened around the edges. Would he kill me? Would I ever see my children again?

Then a massive wall of muscle thudded into Remi. He went flying, and I was in the arms of my rescuer. Bigger than Remi. Stronger. With power rolling off of him like I’d only experienced with one man.

My throat was bruised and swollen from Remi’s grip. “Dane?” I whispered in a broken voice.

Because I knew him. By his scent. By the feel of his thick, soft fur that was so dark gray it was nearly black. By the way my instincts screamed at me to curl into him and let him keep me safe.

But Dane had never been safe. Not for me.

He held me against him, his arm an iron band around my waist, and he snarled a challenge at Remi.

Hatred ran deep between my brother and Dane. Remi pushed himself to his feet. In a voice like gravel, he growled, “She was disloyal to you. She made you look like a fool. What the hell are you doing here, protecting her?”

That was what I was wondering, but I was too terrified to ask, or think about it. I was too terrified to do anything but hold onto Dane and be grateful he was here.

“She’s ours,” Remi continued, gesturing for Dane to hand me over. “You never wanted her in the first place. Give her here and let us have her back. You know what the Council will do if we spill each other’s blood.”

My terror grew as Dane paused, then loosened his grip.

He was going to hand me over!

DANE

I would never give her to them. Maybe she’d betrayed me. That just made her mine to hold accountable for it. Not theirs.

But I wasn’t going to fight him one-handed.

I loosened my grip to set her aside. Then another wolf, massive and steel gray, came hurtling out of the night and slammed into Remington Reed’s side. They went down hard, snarling and clawing at each other.

“Trajan!” Ann screamed.

Then Remi was up and yelping. I caught a glimpse of blood streaming from his neck and chest as he ran into the thick forest. Then he was gone.

I hadn’t had to shed his blood, thank the goddess. If I had, it might have meant the end of both of us.

The steel gray wolf turned into Ann’s silent bodyguard and strode over to us. I was still holding her against me. She was so small in my arms, so delicate.

My mind flashed back to five years ago. The one time I had claimed her.

The beast in me wanted to claim her again.

To his credit, the man didn’t flinch, even though I still wore my lycan form. Over seven feet tall, my body bulging with muscle, my claws long and sharp.

It took a powerful werewolf to be able to shift into this between form. Of all the shapes a wolf could take, it was the deadliest.

“Alpha Montague,” her bodyguard said. “Put the Luna-heir down.”

His voice was respectful, but it was still a command.

That wasn’t why I listened.

I set her down because I couldn’t trust myself for as long as my hands were on her, no matter what form I was in.

As I set Ann down and she brushed herself off–she was still in the silver dress that made me want to bite every luxurious curve on her body–I started to believe that maybe the representative from High Alpine had been there, after all.

That Ann wasn’t lying when she said she found a new family. That the woman in my arms wasn’t my ex-wife at all. At least, not anymore.

This woman was someone different.

“What happened to you, Ann?” I asked. For the first time since she’d walked into the gala earlier tonight, I wasn’t enraged. I wanted to know.

She raised that one cool eyebrow again. She’d never made that face as my wife, but it was already starting to become familiar.

“It’s Aurora,” she said. The moon was mostly full, and beneath its silver light, she was so beautiful she only looked half real. Like I might have dreamed her coming back to me. The way I’d dreamed too many times before. Dreams I despised. Dreams I couldn’t get rid of, no matter what I did.

“If you’re ready to listen,” she said, “I’ll tell you…almost…anything you want to know.”

The night was cool, and she shivered and hugged herself. In that motion–self-comfort–I finally saw a flash of the woman I used to know.

“All right,” I said. “I’m ready.”

“Good, then let’s–ah!” She took a step forward and fell.

Her bodyguard moved, but I was faster. I caught her and lifted her in my arms. “Damn it. Why didn’t you say you were hurt?”