Remy’s POV **
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“I’ve just found Jaxon running towards the town. Someone get back to the house now!”
Parker roars in the mind–link.
Dread hits me harder than I expect. My mate is in danger. Thoughts of hunters dragging her off, torturing her for days on end for information sh through my mind.
My wolf lets out a furious roar and turns away from the hunt, doubling back towards the house.
“On my way!”
Despite hearing Ryder and Callen’s frantic response, I block it. I need to focus. I have to find her.
I don’t run for long before I hear Paige’s desperate calls for Jaxon. Good, if she’s shouting, she’s okay. Now I just have to get to her before the hunters do.
The scent of her hits me before I see her, the usual sweetness now tainted with the sharp tang of fear, and tinged with salt from her tears.
She’s crashing through the trees like prey that doesn’t know it’s being hunted from two directions. The hunter’s boots pound somewhere off her right nk. Too close. Far too close.
I move without thinking, eating up the ground between us, silent in the way only a wolf can be. I shift seconds before she bursts past the tree I’m crouched behind, and I wrap my arms around her, covering her mouth before she can scream. She thrashes like hell, small but furious. Her nails scratch my forearm, and her bare feet kick at my shins.
I hold tighter. My palm covers her mouth, my other arm bands across her ribs, pinning her to me. She’s warm, trembling, her heartbeat hammering into my chest. I can feel every terrified breath she tries to drag in.
Above us, the hunter’s voices slice through the night. Too close. Too many for me to fight whilst keeping her safe.
I sink with her into the ditch, keeping my body between her and them, forcing myself to breathe slowly so she’ll match me
She doesn’t. She’s all panic and fight. I wish I could. mind–link with her, to tell her it’s me, that I’ve got her and Jax is safe.
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I should’ve been here sooner. I shouldn’t have let her be alone tonight. But I’ve been keeping
my distance for a reason… the bond.
I’ve spent days trying not to want it, not to want her. She’s human. She’s chaos. She’s the one thing I didn’t ask for, and the one thing I’ve wanted, anyway. I’ve told myself over and over that I’m not ready. That she’s not <b>ready</b>. That we’d be better off if I stayed <b>away</b>. If she rejected me. And yet here I am, heart pounding, every instinct screaming to keep her alive, even if it means giving her the one thing I swore I’d never give in to.
The hunters pause overhead. One flicks the safety off a rifle. That’s it. Decision made. Her safety outweighs everything else.
As soon as the hunters move out of earshot, I turn her slightly, enough to see the confusion in her eyes when the moonlight catches my face. I press a finger to my lips, making sure she nods before I remove my hand. I poke my head up to check there is no one with their sights
set on us from a distance.
“I’ve got Paige. She’s okay,” I say to Parker, Rye and Callen before shutting the mind–link down
again. I can’t handle their distractions right now.
No one blew my head off with a sniper, so I don’t think we’ve been spotted. I look back down
at Paige. Her eyes are wide and so full of fear. I wish I could tell her she is safe, but she isn’t, not yet.
I hope she forgives me for what I’m about to do. I cover her mouth again, trying to give her a
silent apology with my eyes. The shirt she’s wearing <b>tears </b>easily under my grip. Her eyes widen impossibly more, a muffled protest catching in my palm. I lower my head to her neck and let my wolf rise.
The bite is fast, deep enough to anchor the bond but controlled so I don’t damage her
delicate human neck too much. Her muffled cry hits me like a de.
The first rush of her blood floods my senses, but it’s the bond’s surge that nearly knocks me t. It’s heat, light, and the electric snap of two halves locking together. Her essence floods
into me, and mine into her. She’s not just Paige anymore. She’s mine.
Her scent sharpens. Her fear shifts, tangled with something hotter. I feel her nails dig into my
arm, not to push me away anymore, but to hold on as she rides the wave of pleasure the bite brings with it. I never nned to see her orgasm, but if I had, this would not be how I’d have done it. My body reacts to her release without permission. My instinct to connect with her body as well as her mind and soul rides me hard, but this is not the time.
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The bond settles like a second heartbeat, and I know, with brutal certainty, that I’ll kill
anything that tries to take her from me.
I pull back, running my lips along her jaw. Not a kiss, but close. Then I open the mind–link with her, praying this works.
“Paige, listen to me. If you can hear me, just nod.”
She nods. Good. We don’t have time for more.
“Parker has Jaxon. He’s safe.”
I feel her relief m into me.
“I’m going to draw the hunters away. You’re faster now. Run to the house and don’t stop.”
Her nod is shaky, but it’s enough.
I poke my head above the ditch again and catch movement to the west. Perfect. The trail back towards the house is silent. A clear run for Paige. I release her and move silently and fast, barely a shadow between the trees.
Once I’m far enough, I shift mid–stride. My paws hit the earth, and the bond’s new thread to her hums, alive with her shock at what she can feel from me.
“Paige is on her way back to the house. I’m going to lead the hunters to the enforcers in the west,” I say into the mind–link.
“Be careful, Rem. I’m headed back to the house with Jax,” Parker responds quickly.
“East is secure, Rye and I areing back,” Callen says.
Perfect. When I get home, they’ll all have seen what I’ve done to their mate. That’s a problem forter. Right now, I just have to stay alive and lead these assh*les to their death.
I push harder, going wide to get ahead of the hunters, then letting them catch glimpses of me through the trees so they’ll follow. They do. They’re so predictable.
Gunfire cracks the air, too close. I bank a hard left, leading them away from the heart of our territory and towards where I know a group of enforcers wait. My lungs pull in cool night air, my muscles <b>burning </b>with speed.
One of them tries to cut me off. I lunge, hitting him in the chest, and feel bone give under my jaws as I mp down on his shoulder. His scream breaks the others‘ focus. Making them hesitate. Mistake.
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I vanish into the dark again, circling wide, making sure none double back toward Paige. Every few strides, I check the bond. She’s moving fast, her pulse a quick flutter in my head. Good girl.
We keep this dance up for miles until their scent fades. Only then do I slow, paws silent in the undergrowth, my sides heaving.
“Move in,” I give the order to the enforcers.
Secondster, I hear the distant screams <b>and </b>desperate gunfire. Usually I’d be there, in the thick of the fight, but I’m mated now; getting hurt or killed will hurt Paige. That’s not a risk I’ll take if I don’t need to. Our men are more than capable of handling <b>this</b>.
The bond hums faintly in my chest, her warmth, her fear, and something else I don’t want to name yet.
I shake out my fur and turn back toward home. There’s still a long night ahead.
The forest is quiet again, but the quiet after a fight is never peace; it’s a strange stillness. The kind where everything listens, waits, ready to break into chaos again at any moment.
I cut back toward the house, taking a wide route in case any stragglers are still out here. My mind keeps skimming the bond, checking her over without even meaning to. She’s not moving now, breathing hard, but she’s inside. Safe.
Relief hits me in a way I’m not prepared for. I believed that letting the bond form would be a mistake. That she couldn’t handle it and that it would make me weaker. But the only thing I feel right now is strength, the kind thates from knowing I’ve tethered her to me and nothing will break that without going through me first.
I shift back when I hit the edge of the yard, skin prickling in the cool night air. My feet are silent on the damp grass.
Through the window I see movement. Paige and Jaxon huddled together in a nket. Parker at her back, his arms around them both.
It stops me cold. That’s my future. My family.
I should go inside. Let them know I’m here. But I just sta
Parker at her back, his arms around them both.
It stops me cold. That’s my future. My family.
I should go inside. Let them know I’m here. But I just stand there a second longer, letting the sight burn itself into my mind. The three of them are safe. Breathing. Because I got to her <b>in </b>time and gave her my bite.
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