The Pack: Rule Number 1 - No Mates

Chapter One Hundred–Forty–Nine

DREAM SEQUENCE

I’m running through the woods, wearing nothing but an inversized button ap shirt that I’m fairly a

doesn’t belong to me. Although my (feet are bare, I somehow don’t feel the sharp rocks when I land on them or the thorny bushes as barrel through them um laughing and playing. Iraping nimbly from tree to tree as hide. Each time I hear a brunch break, or catch a whisper in the wind, I move on. Slowly but surely making my way deeper and deeper into the kingdom of Evergreens. The further in Ign, the higher the ground becomes and soon I am climbing. over boulders and shattered tree stumps. Hurding my way toward the sover hala of light that beckons beyond a tight circle of redwoods. I must there. I have to find him. He is searching for me. I know it. No matter what it takes. I have to make it to that point so that I can fully meet Him. My guardian in the woods, my wolf I havent heard him howling for me but in my heart I can feel him calling. He waits at the highest point. Minding his secrets and my own at the top of this grueling hill.

Suddenly, I catch my foot on something and look down. At first, 1

the streets of LA Except

ether you might

slivers of

In woods so brevity beced

what is staring back at me. It just appears to be a face, like any

forest, on a mountainside rodilled with spikes of green and “there is a part who uta atop this peak smoking a cheroot and dressing the

trees in curfs of smoke.

This face ducunt belong here. As I pert closer, Enota

sht about the neck that I didn t before, it appears to be torn. A long gash has (the first tattered and uneven. I pop en my eyes curch on the letters written’ulong the chin and

“are ubu mumbers circling the evelib, hed etched along

ripped the onær soft skin of the thereket over the forehead. They mean some the jawline that end just at the aman

of the

I fall to my needs a pot of the face o Tinije”

meuth any bat bytt

and the terribly dead eyes burn incu ime and follow my movement. The ground

arway from the face. A rumble bus sturted behind me. An

from

the base of

dark monsters of

of the black

poodles, his powerful body almost

in Font of me. Freach and for him, whimpering

as if he can’t understand any

and Man any bady before settling

my neck and shoulders are

I

My font une untunging is he brings me closer and shudder, marveling at the perfectly curved toge of hugs. They get drop

plunging the points

OF DREAM

panting

I

• “While the fud.” I say, dukim

meal beling

Bartlett

Chapter One Hundred–Forty–Nine

the yacht. Then a lingering scent walls up to

the events of the morning mill fogo, bet atsto where I

a whispering in my head won’t let me release my tears. Bly neck on the tight side tingles and burns for a moment and I gasp as the sensation quickly becomes soothing Chasing

windows and a tiny lamp near the front door. Looking down at my hands, I realize I’ve been clutching something to my chest. It’s a dark, navy blue shirt that smells just like Heaven and I hold it closer as I stand up. Flipping on the nearest lightswitch, the apartment is suddenly flooded with yellow light. I frown as I realize Rainier isn’t here

did he go? When did he leave?

him, the way he looked when I told him he had to let me go. The instant anguish… the panic. Then his loss of control when he snapped and latched

went home dummy. To his wife. You know the one

long to find what I’m looking for, but when I do my eyes widen like saubers and the ending of my dream resurfaces. “Oh my God! 1 hiss, shifting closer to the mirror to get a better look. My throat is covered in hickles and even

there is a mark that isn’t like any love bite that I’ve ever

He

le bit m

it, I notice the two darkest points of the bitemark. Right above where the incisors should be,

the first

my memory surfaces. I hold up the shirt and realize for the first time that it is ripped beyond repai “Did that shit really happen?” I whisper, closing my eyes as the image of Rainier hovering over me on the couch superimposes onto the image of Rainier in my dream. “No fucking way,” I say to myself, shaking my head.

afford to turn reality y into fantasy. I need to think logically.

logic. Always have, always will. Even when my dad agreed to trade me to Hector for his debt – I relied on my intuition. I was hurt, certainly. Ashamed, definitely. But there was also this little voice inside my head that said my sacrifice would not go unrewarded. That somehow one day, the sick twisted life I was forced into would eventually take me where I was meant to be.

right wasn’t I?

not right,” I scolded myself. “He’s married.”