His Trouble Maker

GRAYSON

She’s here. She’s down here. And she’s shifted.

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I drop to the floor hard, clawed fingers biting the dirt, knees cracking stone, chest heaving with every inhale like the wolf’s already tearing through my sternum.

The tunnel’s too tight for two, but I crawl anyway, hunched and snarling, bent wrong around the walls, scraping bone against cement because I can’t slow down, not now, not when the air’s this thick with her- burnt fur and blood and the kind of heat that shouldn’t be this fucking strong if she wasn’t in pain.

She’s bleeding. She’s running. She’s not okay.

My elbow slams the edge of the tunnel wall, tears straight through the fabric. Doesn’t register. The wolf howls under my skin and I bite my own tongue to keep from losing form. Every inch I crawl forward feels like the wrong direction, the wrong shape. I need to run. I need to shift. I need to take the fucking tunnel apart with my teeth.

“Grayson!” Pierce shouts behind me, voice catching.

I don’t look back. Don’t answer. I growl low in my throat and keep going, faster now, faster than my body was built for, back bowed, jaw clenched so tight I feel the pressure behind my eyes.

The tunnel dips. The scent hits harder.

Her. All of her. Wild, raw, broken open.

My vision whites out. I nearly eat shit on the drop but catch myself with my knuckles. Slam the weight into my wrists and shove off the wall hard enough to bounce. The tunnel’s not real anymore. Just noise. Just heat. Just the ghost of her pawprints dragging me under.

She’s not in control. I can smell it.

She’s caught between bodies. Bones half–split. Still in heat. Still fighting it.

The shame in her scent is thick as blood, coating my tongue, choking my lungs. Every inhale slides through my ribs like knives, makes my whole body curl in on itself. The wolf wants it. Wants her. Wants the wreck of her, the humiliated twist of her limbs as she runs from herself.

And I want to find her before anyone else does.

I slam shoulder–first into the trapdoor. Wood cracks. I hit it again. It doesn’t give, so I dig my fingers under the lip and rip. Metal tears loose. I won’t stop. I drag the whole thing off the hinges, fling it behind me like I’ll skin the next obstacle alive.

I drop down into blackness and land on all fours.

Heat. Right here.

9:36 Thu, Sep 4

Chapter 144

Right fucking here.

Pierce’s boots hit the ground behind me.

“She was here,” he pants.

“She still is.”

Because her scent’s fresh.

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shaking with how close the wolf is now.

got away?” Pierce breathes,

“No.”

the smear of fur on the wall. It’s thick.

Alpha.

Male.

Twice her size.

just see red–I taste

up my spine but I lock my jaw and force it down, swallow the snarl before it rips open

I say

so…” His voice cuts, breath sharp. “Grayson… you

snap

breath short, fingers curling as my wolf drags claws through the lining of my throat. Pierce steps

And there he is.

What’s left of him.

Theo

see the inside of his throat. One arm gone. One leg barely hanging by a tendon. His jaw is broken–snapped sideways like something got tired

His eyes are wide.

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Chapter 144

Frozen.

Terrified.

Fresh.

than ten minutes

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I mean to. My claws are out. They weren’t a second ago. My teeth ache. My whole back cracks with how fast the bones want to go full shift. I shake, once, hard, like the tremor

I crouch.

fuck it, what

this,” I

“Grayson—”

she could

voice cuts through stone.

Pierce’s shaking his

“She’s not just omega.”

I bleed, until the wolf

did this,” I say again, lower. “And she’s

start forward. Step

another tunnel behind the

Narrower, Clawed wide.

fur on the

lower my head, sucking a full breath of her trail. I’m going to find her. And if anything else touches her before I do, I’ll

Pierce’s voice is behind me again, unsteady. “I think she’s with someone. I

she’s with Riot.”

brushing the cave wall, fingers trailing the rock for balance, left hand out to catch scent again. The dirt’s loose here. Packed wrong. Someone tunneled this fast–barely stable. A rat hole.

9:37 Thu, Sep 4

Chapter 144