Hey everyone! If you find me a typo, you can have a cookie!! I had to rush the editing on this chapter so there's probably a lot of them :)

"We're okay," I told Nia through the link. It was the first thing I'd done after getting out of the prison. Above ground, it was laughably easy to reach her. And the speed at which she answered me was impressive.

"Well, that's a bloody relief," Nia said. The tension in her voice was obvious ... and so unlike her. "We thought you were dead - or worse. Your mother is on her way with a small army. Give me a second and I'll call them off."

"No," I blurted. "Don't call them off. The entire pack is in turmoil right now. It's a good time to raid them, and we're in a position to help you."

I could feel her hesitate. I knew I wasn't exactly qualified to order raids, but it was too good a chance to miss. As it turned out, that wasn't what had given her pause. "Why's the pack in turmoil?"

I couldn't help smiling then. "There's a new Alpha."

"Oh, well done, Eva," Nia breathed. I could feel her thoughts racing across the link, and they were little more than a blur. The amazement shone through, above all else, because she had not been expecting this news today.

"Yeah," I said. "I have to go, but ... talk to Mam. See if she'll let them stay."

Without waiting for an answer, I emerged from the linking trance, blinking and disorientated, to find Liam waiting for me. I gave him a thumbs up. Another few hours, and it might have been a different story, but no one would be dying for us today.

He jerked his head down the corridor, and that was all the warning I got before he set off at breakneck speed. He led me across the pack house before he turned into a stairwell and began heading upwards instead.

"Where are we going?" I asked, as I tripped over my own feet. Flockies made stairs look easy, but I was still struggling with them, weeks later. They were just rubbish, overcomplicated hills.

Liam didn't even glance back. "To get Lilah."

I didn't understand at first. Lilah would be distraught and grieving, and the last thing she needed was an outing. It was the tension in Liam's body that gave me the biggest clue. "You think ... you think Micah would hurt her?"

"I think he'll kill her," he said. "Micah's lived through three successions, same as me. He knows how it works. You clean house or you live to regret it."

I made an effort to catch up with him, and then I nudged his shoulder. "But ... it's not like she's a threat ... and her daughter is only two."

Liam gave me a wary look. "I thought you knew."

"Knew what?"

"Lilah's pregnant. And if it's a boy..." He swore softly, shaking his head. "Let's just say I don't fancy their chances."

Oh, Goddess. I'd killed her mate while she was pregnant. And even if she didn't miscarry from the stress of it, she would have to raise both children on her own. In a pack with an Alpha who wanted them all dead.

It was weird to see the flat again. The door was ajar, and no one was answering our knocks, so I crept inside. Liam baulked at the threshold. He had to force himself to cross it, and I could hear his heart thumping in his chest as we went deeper inside. It couldn't have been easy for him - seeing his home again after so long.

The place was a tip. Felix's room had been ransacked in the search for 'evidence,' and half of his clothes were strewn through the corridor. The smell of smoke had lingered.

"Lilah?" I called. "Are you in here?"

No reply.

I went further in. The living room was in a similar state, but it was there that I found Lilah. She was red-eyed and sniffling, the toddler in her arms. When she saw us, she took a step back, her entire body tensing. Her gaze was fixed firmly on Liam. She knew he'd been arrested, and she was not happy.

"That's close enough," she said.

I stopped where I was, making a show of keeping my hands where she could see them. Beside me, Liam was having trouble standing still. He kept glancing over his shoulder, like he was expecting to be attacked at any moment.

"Lilah..." he said. "It's okay. We're just checking on you."

She didn't relax. If anything, his words had the opposite effect. She drew herself up and held his stare, even as her voice was breaking. "Look me in the eye and tell me it wasn't you."

Liam blinked at her. Hurt, if not very surprised. "They've arrested Felix now. It's looking like he did it."

"I know," Lilah said. "I heard the shouting. I still want you to say it. I didn't tell them who you are - and I think maybe I should have."

It wasn't hard for him, because he wasn't telling a lie. But I didn't think the look of complete misery on his face was feigned when he took a slow breath and met her eyes. "I didn't kill him, Lilah."

He was still upset about Mason. That much was obvious. I'd done the right thing - I was sure of that every time I looked at him and the half-healed tooth marks on his throat - but it didn't help with the guilt.

Lilah certainly bought it. Those big dark eyes were so disgustingly sincere that I think anyone would have bought it. She choked on a sob, all the tension draining from her body in the space of a breath. She didn't ask me if I'd done it, and I was very grateful for that. I was having a hard time looking her in the eye as it was.

The toddler was wriggling in Lilah's arms. There were fresh tears in the little girl's eyes, and I recognised the smell coming off her well enough. Her mother hardly even seemed to notice it until my eyes darted towards the kid one time too many.

"She needs changing," Lilah admitted. "But all the nappies are in there, and I can't. I just can't."

By 'there,' I knew she meant her bedroom. And it wasn't hard to understand why she couldn't bring herself to go back inside.

"I'll get them," I told her quickly. "Sit down, yeah? You look exhausted."

I left without waiting for her to obey. The door to the bedroom was shut tight. I opened it with one hand and crept inside, swallowing down my reluctance. I didn't want to go in there either.

The bed had been stripped, but the blood had soaked through the sheets and left an unmistakable brown stain on the mattress beneath. There was no disguising it. I'd been half-expecting to see Mason's body still lying there, for some reason. The room still smelt like him.

I found the nappies in about ten seconds flat and took a handful to the living room. Despite Lilah's half-hearted protests, I changed the toddler myself, setting her on the coffee table and then holding my breath for a minute straight. Flockies used disposable nappies, but they weren't too much different to ours.

When I'd finished, I handed her back to her mother. Lilah took her with no small amount of relief. She hugged the girl close, eyes shut and cheek pressed against the top of her daughter's head.

"Lilah," Liam said, in that soft, gentle way of his. "Did you and Mase ever talk about what you should do if something happened to him?"

She chewed on her lip. "Sort of."

The way her eyes darted to him, only to drop back to the floor, made me think there was something she wasn't saying. Liam saw it, too.

"And part of that talk was that you shouldn't trust me or Felix or Micah," he said. It wasn't a question.

Lilah was quiet for a long time. Her forehead creased as she tried to find the right words. "I... I don't think he meant you, Liam. He didn't even know you were alive at the time."

"No, it's okay," Liam told her. "He was right to say that. It's safest if you don't trust anyone right now. Once we're done talking, I'll leave if you want me to."

"What did you want to talk about?" she asked hesitantly, the beginnings of a frown on her lips.

Liam glanced at me. Glanced over his shoulder again. There was an awful lot of tension in his body. He was not comfortable in these rooms, and that was very understandable.

"Lilah..." he began. "I don't want to scare you ... but you're not safe here anymore. Micah is declaring himself Alpha as we speak. I'd like to move you out of the pack house, at least until things calm down."

I'd been expecting denials, excuses and disbelief. But Lilah just ran a hand through her hair and nodded absent mindedly. "I was thinking of going to my parents' house - at least for a few weeks."

"That's the first place he'll look," Liam said, rubbing the back of his neck. "For now, let's throw some things in a bag, and then I'll call around. I don't want you here when Micah gets back."

Lilah nodded, but she didn't move, only looking helplessly towards the bedroom. "All my stuff is in there. I'm really sorry, but do you mind-"

Once again, I was moving before she could finish her sentence. Liam stayed with her. We had no idea when Micah was going to be back, and somehow I didn't think he'd react well if he saw us making off with the Luna only five minutes after being released from prison.

I found a duffel bag and stuffed it with clothing. Anything that looked comfortable and anything that looked like it might pertain to the toddler. It was a rushed, motley assortment, but I reckoned she'd manage fine. Right now she was wandering around in leggings and one of her mate's t-shirts, bare-faced and hair loose around her shoulders. I didn't think she was too fussed about her appearance.

By the time I exited the room, they'd moved into the corridor. Liam was leaning against the doorway of his old room. He was staring inside with a worryingly distant expression. The first thing I did was brush against his arm, ever-so-gently.

"Alright?" I asked.

He jolted, like I'd caught him by surprise, but he didn't look at me. He couldn't seem to tear his eyes away from that room. "Yeah. I'm ... yeah. Let's go."

I slipped the duffel bag over my shoulder. "Where to?"

"Charlie's mother has offered to take her - for a few days, anyway."

I still didn't like Charlie, much less trust him, but I knew that Liam did. And that was good enough for me. I nodded my head, because he was still looking at me, like he wanted my approval. We were back to making decisions together, apparently. And honestly, I didn't care where we went. I just wanted to get him out of here sooner rather than later.

***

My paws beat an erratic tempo against the earth. The undergrowth was a green blur on both sides, and the long grass whipped against my belly. The trees were sparse enough here that I didn't have to worry about crashing, but the brambles still snatched at my legs and left bloody furrows.

I'd needed the run desperately - and so had Liam. There was no quicker way to relieve stress and pent-up energy. Already, I felt better. Ten minutes in the fresh air had that effect.

Glancing backwards, I slowed my pace. The silvery-grey pelt of my pursuer was still nowhere to be seen. He couldn't match me at full speed, and that was exactly the way I liked it. If I spent long enough running, his wolf got all riled and hot under the collar. And when he finally caught me, I could be sure I'd get a proper wrestling match.

I put my nose to the ground as I ran, sniffing the warm summer air. Rabbits had been on this trail in the last hour, and if I'd had an hour to spare, I could have tracked them down and enjoyed an early lunch.

My tail swished back and forth as I loped along. I could hear footfalls on my flank now, but I didn't turn my head to look. That would only ruin the fun.

Already, he was gaining on me. The footfalls were getting louder and louder, and some primal part of me began to panic. Without warning, I lurched left, leaving the trail entirely. The ferns came up to my shoulders and hid all kinds of obstacles. I was forced to weave in and out of the trees, and that slowed me more than I'd like to admit.

It might have worked on a flockie, because they were stocky, lumbering oafs who could only run in a straight line. But Liam was as light-footed as I was, despite his size. Those longer legs worked in his favour in the undergrowth, and it wasn't long before he had drawn level with me.

Paws across my shoulders. Weight on my back. Teeth tugging at my scruff. With my paws so tangled, it didn't take much to send me tumbling into the ferns. He fell with me, and our momentum kept us rolling all the way into a boggy ditch.

Liam ended up on the bottom. He was heavier, and that made gravity my ally. I lunged for his throat, delighted at the chance to win for once. My teeth had barely scraped his pelt when he got his mouth around my muzzle and growled at me. We were at something of a stalemate, and our hind legs scrambled at each other, hopelessly tangled together, as we thrashed in the mud.

I felt myself slipping. And panic, more than anything, made me release him before I fell face-first into the puddle. Liam moved his teeth from my muzzle to the scruff of my neck the second he found his feet. He pulled me over and lay on top of me, ignoring every pathetic little yip.

I was helpless under his weight. It his turn to nip at my exposed throat, his tail wagging back and forth in slow, lazy sweeps. I wriggled beneath him - more out of excitement than anything else. I knew I was caught. And so did he. The nips soon turned to licks, and then he rolled off me.

Quick as a flash, we were up again. Only now it was my turn to do the chasing. I nipped at his legs and hindquarters all the way back to the path. We raced each other with reckless abandon for another mile at least.

When the leaf litter turned to sand beneath our paws, Liam finally slowed to a trot and turned to greet me. This was not a path well-trodden. We were hemmed in by scrub on all sides, and there were willow saplings underfoot.

Nose to tail, we said hello. When I was done, I rubbed up against his side, licking the soft fur under his chin. His flanks were heaving. It was hard to get breathless in wolf-form - not when every lope brought fresh air into our lungs. But the day was hot, and both of us were panting heavily.

The lake was barely a metre away. I could see our reflections flickering in the grey water. Liam shook himself off. He was a lot muddier than I was, and the sun was drying it at an impressive speed, dulling that silver-grey pelt. We could both have used a swim, but there wasn't time.

We both turned to look down the shore. There was an old, decrepit building tucked into the forest. A half-rotten pier stretched out into the lake. A single rowing boat was tied up there, and its skin of algae told me that it hadn't been used in many years. Because the boathouse was no longer a boathouse.

It had been our destination from the beginning. And all the games, all the goofing around ... it ended now. It had been a welcome diversion, but that was all. There was nothing playful about our visit here today.

The flockies hid boxes of clothes all over the territory, just in case they wanted to shift back. There was one hidden beside the boathouse, and we made use of it that morning.

"Isn't this going to piss Micah off?" I murmured as we approached the front door.

"Yeah," Liam said. "But that's the idea, right? They're safe, he's angry, and we're in the crossfire."

I threw him a wary, sidelong glance because I was far from convinced. "I guess."

There was a padlock on the boathouse door. It was the same kind that you would use to lock a shed or a storage container. The Vaughans didn't care about keeping their prisoners inside. One solid kick would have taken the whole door down. No, that padlock was purely possessive. It was telling us that they owned the contents of that building and there would be consequences if we interfered.

The stench of urine on the porch only added to that. There was a deep, primal part of me that didn't want to go any further. That smell told me that it wasn't my territory. Luckily, there was a much bigger part of me - the rogue part - that loved to cross boundary lines.

And in all honesty, I was anxious to get this over and done with. We'd left Lilah with Charlie's mother. She had a lovely little cottage with ivy growing up the walls and an impressive vegetable garden out the back. Lilah had been welcomed with a hug and a cup of tea from the tall, motherly woman. They would be okay for an hour or two, but any longer than that and we'd be pushing our luck.

The padlock was going to be a problem. We didn't have lockpicks, and we didn't have our knives. But there was a length of wood near my foot. It looked like the end of an oar - sturdy enough to contend with the rotting wood. I picked it up and passed it to Liam, casting surreptitious glances over my shoulder as I did. We weren't all that far away from the pack house.

Liam wedged the wood into the gap between the latch and the door. He turned his head to watch for onlookers, too, and then he brought the oar handle down sharply. The latch came free of the door with a horrible cracking sound, leaving a few rusty nails behind.

He pulled the door open. The interior was gloomy, and it took my eyes a moment to adjust. There was a girl waiting there. I doubted she was a day over seventeen, looking at her, but her eyes were so much older than the rest of her. Cold, hopeless and haunted.

She risked a glance at us and then fixed her eyes firmly on the floor. And then she just stood there. Waiting. Expectant. Her entire body was tense, almost like she was expecting to be hit ... or worse. And looking at the blotchy bruise under one of her beautiful brown eyes, it was easy to guess why.

She smelt like Micah - like, overwhelmingly of Micah. His mark was high on her neck and messy. It told a damning story. She'd fought him. And of course she'd fought him. He wasn't her mate, but with that single bite, he'd taken away any chance she had of finding her real mate one day. It was an evil thing to do.

"You're Andrea, right?" Liam asked. "Do you remember me? I was here the other day."

"Lots of guys come here," she said indifferently. Something seemed to occur to her then, and she risked a glance upwards. She was looking at me, perhaps asking herself why a man would bring his mate here. I imagined they didn't get female visitors very often. If ever.

"We talked," Liam told her, undeterred by the cold front. "Just talked."

Her eyes darted up sharply, and then she nibbled on her lip for a moment. "Yes. I remember you."

"Good," Liam said. "Get your things. You're all coming with us."

I could see a handful of other girls emerging from the gloom. They must have heard the talking and got curious enough to investigate. This was clearly the main room - with old sofas scattered around and the floorboards littered with rubbish and empty paper cups. But at the far end, a corridor stretched into the darkness. They must have converted the boat racks into 'bedrooms.'

Andrea glanced over her shoulder, giving them a look that was clearly meant to be a warning. And then she shook her head vehemently. "No. We can't. We'll get in trouble."

"Look where behaving has got you," Liam said, not ungently.

"It's kept me alive," she snapped, crossing her arms. "We don't need you here, stirring up problems for us. Get out before I link someone."

I understood. Goddess, how I understood. We were coming in here and asking them to trust us with their lives, and it was way out of line. But I didn't think we had much choice. We couldn't just leave them here, suffering through day after day of abuse.

Liam wasn't giving up either. And those big eyes of his were hard to refuse. "Andrea ... Mase is dead. And things are about to get a whole lot worse for you."

They hadn't known about Mason. I saw the news break over them, leaving tight jaws and wide, worried eyes in its wake. Two pressed closer together to whisper. They were so isolated out here, so cut off from the rest of the pack, that they had gone two days without knowing their Alpha was dead. Andrea was the first to recover.

"So? If we leave, Micah will kill us," she said matter-of-factly.

Liam met her stare. "I'm not going to let him."

There were benefits to having a strong wolf, and this was one of them. He was convincing. There was force behind the words - and plenty of fierceness, too. I would have believed him. And despite her misgiving, I could see that Andrea was beginning to believe him, too.

She was still sneaking glances at me, but they were becoming fewer and fewer by the minute, as her wariness overcame the curiosity.

I went further into the room, leaving Liam in the doorway. I had to pick my way through the litter - an excruciatingly slow process because I was barefoot. I stopped close to her and held her gaze. She was more likely to trust me than him, if only because we were both girls. I know I'd have felt the same in her shoes.

"They're not going to touch you again," I told her, "and that is a promise."

The girl swallowed. Said nothing.

And I decided to push my luck. "Get your things. Please. We'll protect you here if we have to, but the place we're going has beds and hot showers, and it's a lot safer."

Because it was close to the border. Two hundred metres from the bone fence, to be exact. If Micah decided to come and take them back by force, I could have a few dozen rogues there in five minutes flat. I was almost hoping he would come, in all honesty, because it would be a very easy way to kill him.

Flockies were obedient, if nothing else. One of the girls slipped into the back room, coming out a moment later with a pair of shoes in her hand. Even as I watched, she tugged them onto her feet without bothering to undo the laces.

"I don't have any things," she said. "But I'll come with you."

There was a little tremble in her voice. But her chin was held high, her eyes determined, and the other girls didn't fail to notice. She was the trickle that open the floodgates. Another darted into the back rooms to grab a jacket, and a third picked her way towards the door. Andrea swore to herself, but she came, too.

Sometimes, that was all it took. One person being brave and everyone else following their example. Because as much as they feared leaving this place, they feared staying more. None of them wanted to be left here alone to face Micah's fury when he realised the rest were gone.

***

If Charlie's mother was annoyed that we'd brought five more guests into her home without consulting her, then she did a very good job of hiding it. She made up beds for them, let them use all of her hot water, and spent most of the afternoon making enough lasagne to feed a small army, let alone the eight of us.

I quickly found out that flockies didn't like going to bed when the sun set. Instead, they turned on their overhead lights and spent a few hours defying the natural order of things to watch TV. By the time they'd all disappeared off upstairs, I was both exhausted and wide awake, because their dumb artificial light was messing with my body clock.

"Go to sleep, Eva," Liam told me, and I wondered if my eyes were as bloodshot as they felt. "I'll take the first turn."

I shook my head firmly, even as I fought off the latest in a long series of yawns. I knew that if I went to sleep, I would wake up to the morning sun and a very tired Liam. He wasn't good at sharing when it came to chores.

"I'll sleep when you do," I said matter-of-factly. It might have sounded a little more convincing if the sentence hadn't been interrupted by another yawn. But the truth was ... we were safe here.

We had a pair of kitchen knives lying within easy reach. The curtains were drawn. The doors were locked. A rogue could have broken into this house in two minutes flat without making a sound, but a flockie? Ha. They were like bulls in a china shop. We'd hear the window smash if they did turn up tonight, and I doubted they would. Micah didn't have much in the way of work ethic.

Liam knew all that, too. He looked around, wrestled with it for a moment, and then he gave me a grudging nod. I wheeled around, stretching my legs along the sofa. Liam draped a blanket over me before he joined me.

He lay on his back, and I curled up next to him, my arm across his chest and my leg resting on top of his. It was the only way we could fit. But ... we were sharing a pillow, and our faces were dangerously close. I could count his freckles and make out every groove on his lips. I swallowed hard, but it didn't seem to help. The thoughts running through my head were suddenly about anything but sleep.

Liam's hand brushed over my knee, coming to rest on the bare skin just above it. I knew he wouldn't push it. Knew he wouldn't take it any further than that. He wouldn't escalate unless I did, but my self-control was in tatters. All that playing in wolf form had riled up my wolf, and she hadn't shut up since.

I needed a distraction. And fast.

"There are three raiding teams at the border now," I told him. "And Mam says they can stay as long as we want them to. I thought we could send them to raid the pack house ... maybe even kill Micah while they're at it. Unless you have any better ideas?"

I saw a frown creep across his lips and wariness tighten the skin around his eyes. "I'm the one who's got to kill Micah. It's the quickest way to make the pack fall into line."

My stomach became a cold, bottomless pit. I lay there, my eyes fixed on him, trying to hide how badly those few words affected me. "I know you can probably do it, Liam, but he's a lot bigger than you are. We can get some help ... to make sure you win."

"I'd rather fight him fair," he said quietly.

"I know you would," I said. "I'd rather you didn't fight him at all, so we'll call this a compromise."

Liam chewed on it for a moment, eyeing me, and then he gave me a reluctant nod. I smiled to myself as I nestled my head into his shoulder. One of my fingers was wandering across his arm, tracing the ridges of scar tissue. The tooth marks were little white bumps, and every now and then, I found a longer line where he'd been caught by a knife tip.

"We'll have to think of another job for the army," I said sleepily. A raid was a good idea, but it would be even better saved until we had control of the pack. "You got any ideas?"

He didn't even have to think about it because his mind worked a lot quicker than mine did. "This place is full of dickheads. Maybe we can kill some of them off. The ones who are abusing their mates, the ones who have killed pups, the rapists... There isn't enough evidence to put them on trial, but I know who most of them are."

Oh, I liked this plan. "You want to have them ambushed?"

"Ambushed and killed."

"We could do that when we're in charge," I reasoned. "It'd be easier."

He grinned at me then. "Or we could let Micah take the blame for it, and then swoop in to fix everything."

By then, I was having to bite my lip to keep a smile at bay. "Be good, and if you can't be good, blame it on a flockie. It's a solid plan. For an Alpha's son, you make a pretty good rogue..."

In answer, Liam dug his fingers into my side, and I squealed. In the blink of an eye, we were scrapping with each other like children. It was all I could do not to giggle and wake up the people upstairs.

He ended up on top of me. We were too close. His hand was brushing against my mark, which would have been enough to take my breath away even if he hadn't been staring at me with so much intensity. Neither of us was at good at being platonic as we liked to think. One tilt of my head, and our lips would touch.

Just as I was about to do something really stupid, I heard the crunch of footsteps on gravel. My eyes were drawn to the front door, where the sound had come from, and I saw the handle turn. Once. A little pause. And then once more.

Liam had frozen along with me. Without taking his eyes off the door, he eased off me, finding his feet without even a whisper of sound. One hand reached for the knives on the table.

"Wait here," he told me.

With the knife in one hand, he padded towards the door. I rolled onto my stomach so I could see better. There was a shadow blotting out the panes of glass, so we could see the intruder, but he couldn't see us. The hallway was dark, while the porch was lit by the moonlight.

Liam watched for a moment. The figure tried the handle one last time, just to be sure, and then it turned and stalked back towards the woods. As he was going, Liam leaned over to flick a switch. The porch was suddenly flooded with light.

I saw the figure hesitate. Look back over his shoulder. And then make a run for the shelter of the trees. Liam hadn't been trying to spook him, I didn't think. He'd been checking whether the guy had any friends lurking on the driveway. And sure enough, he turned towards me just long enough to hold up three fingers.

Just three of them. Fine. They had tracked us back here. We had known it was only a matter of time before they visited the boathouse and realised that the girls were missing. There was a clear scent trail through the woods, leading back to this cottage, so Micah knew now. He knew where his prisoners were hiding out, and he knew who'd taken them. Add Lilah into the equation and we might as well have declared war.

Liam came back towards me, satisfied that they were gone. For now, at least. He cast a lingering glance at the staircase as he passed it. "Lilah's light is still on."

"That's weird," I said. It had been nearly an hour since she'd gone up to bed, pleading exhaustion, and there had been dark circles under her eyes to prove it. Despite my body's loud complaints, I dragged myself off the sofa and trudged up the stairs to check on her.

I knocked on the door, softly so as not to wake the others, and then I nudged it open. The brightness made me blink. The toddler was asleep on the bed, mouth open and drooling. But Lilah was not in bed ... or even anywhere near it. She had sat herself in the corner, and she was playing on her phone, even though her eyes were rimmed with red and she looked ready to drop.

"We've got a long day tomorrow," I told her. "You should try and get some sleep."

She didn't even look up from her phone, but I could see her blinking back tears. "I don't think I can. The last time I went to sleep, I woke up and Mase was..."

Guilt welled up inside me. Relentless, overpowering and hard to ignore. I wondered if she could see it written all over my face. If she could smell the self-hatred on my breath. Or if she thought it was just pity that had me so torn.

I swallowed hard. "I'm sorry, Lilah."

"I keep thinking - what if they come back to finish the job?"

"Whoever it was, they didn't kill you then," I told her. "There's no reason they'd come back and do it now. And Micah ... he's not the type for sneaking around in the dark. You don't have anything to be afraid of. Liam and I are just downstairs."

She was chewing on her lip with enough force to make it bleed. "I know all that, Eva. But it's not rational. It's not something I can will away with logic. Every time I lie down, I can feel his blood on my skin. And every time I close my eyes, I see him."

I believed her. I could smell the fear on her breath - sickly and sharp and noxious enough to make my own heart beat faster. It was abhorrent that I was the one comforting her. That I could sit here and look her in the eye when I was the person who had done this to her. I dug my fingernails into my palms, letting the pain wash over me, because it was the very least that I deserved.

"You'll have to sleep sooner or later, Lilah," I said, trying to be gentle. "The first time will be the hardest. I'll stay with you, if you want. I can help you drift off."

She eyed the bed. She let out a long breath. And then she nodded her head.

Footsteps behind me. It was a light sound - barely more than a whisper of skin against the carpet. Lilah flinched, her eyes wide as she watched the doorway. I didn't even turn. A flockie wouldn't have been so quiet.

Liam stopped behind me. I leant back against his chest, the corners of my lips twitching as his arms curled around my waist, pulling me even closer.

"Is everything okay?" he asked.

When they were in the same room, it was hard for me. Their grief became a massive, tangible thing. The way they looked at each other ... with so much sadness in their eyes ... it sent daggers into my chest. Lilah especially. Liam looked a lot like her mate, and she was probably reminded of what she'd lost every time she saw him.

Two people I had never meant to hurt. Mason's suffering had been over very quickly. Theirs would last for months. Maybe even years.

"Yes," I said, answering so Lilah didn't have to. "Everything's okay. But I'm going to sleep in here."

Mostly to help her. And maybe a tiny bit because I was worried I'd do something I would regret if I shared that sofa with Liam tonight. I'd told him that we needed to wait. And that hadn't changed.

Liam didn't seem surprised. "I'll be downstairs if you need me. Sleep tight - both of you."

He squeezed my waist, and then he was gone, just as quietly as he'd arrived. I was quick to shift into my wolf and sprawl on the bed with Lilah. She put a hand on my scruff, and that contact helped me to keep a link open with her. I used it to feed a steady stream of distractions into her mind to keep all the fear away.

It was like streaming a movie directly into her brain. I showed her woods and streams and valleys and mountains, being careful to keep all traces of rogues from my memories, and being careful not to let her see the guilt that was still wreaking havoc in my mind.

I'd done it for Liam before. There were nights when he really struggled to sleep. It wasn't often that he let me help him, but I took the chances that I could get. It was no surprise that it worked on Lilah, too. Before long, I could feel her sleepiness across the link - a heavy, oppressive feeling that infected me, too.

When she finally drifted off, after almost an hour, I nudged her hand beneath the blankets and jumped off the bed. A glance around the room told me that all was well. The toddler was asleep. Lilah's breathing was slow and steady.

Satisfied, I padded over to the doorway. I turned a tight circle on the spot before dropping onto my belly. The carpet was soft beneath my pelt as I rolled onto my side. My back was pressed firmly against the door. If someone wanted to come in here, they would have to go through me.