Ravensong (Green Creek 2)

Kelly glared at me as Robbie stood at his side, looking confused. Carter paced behind them, the timber wolf acting as his shadow. Pappas was sitting in a corner, mewling loudly. Ox and Joe stood side by side. Rico yelped as Jessie did something to the wound on his leg.

And Mark.

Mark stood in the center of his cage. He was caught in his shift, though he was still more man than wolf. His bottom lip was bleeding from where a fang had pierced it. And his eyes were violet. So violet.

“Do you see the mark on his neck?” I asked her.

She nodded tightly. “The raven.”

“Do you know what that means?”

“Yes.”

“Then you know I would do anything for him.”

“Would you?” she asked. “Why now? Why after all this time?”

“Because if this is the end,” I said as honestly as I could, “he needed to know that I never stopped loving him.”

My heartbeat, though accelerated, remained steady.

And she knew it.

Kelly scoffed. “You forced him to turn Omega. You told him to let go. How the hell can you say that you—”

Elizabeth said, “Kelly,” and he subsided, though he still looked murderous. I hoped he would forgive me for what I was about to do. “Why?”

I swallowed thickly. “You know why.”

“Not good enough,” she said, and oh, she was angry. “After everything we’ve been through, that’s not good enough, Gordo Livingstone. You will say it. Now.”

I knew what she was asking for, and it was the least I could give. “Because he’s my mate.”

She wiped her eyes. “You were his choice. You always were. Even when—even when he thought you would never choose him back. Even when you thought otherwise, he always chose you.”

“I know.”

“Did you choose him back? Or was this all part of a plan? Are you using him?”

You can’t trust a wolf.

They don’t love you.

They need you.

They use you.

The magic in you is a lie.

Except it wasn’t. My mother hadn’t understood. But that hadn’t been her fault. She had been fooled by my father, just as the rest of us had. And in the end, she did the only thing she could.

“I chose him,” I told her. “And I would do it again. And if this works, if this will do what I think it will, then we may still have a chance. They may have a chance. The hunters, they—they gave us until the full moon. And they have our friends. Our pack.” Those crazy, brilliant men. “We’re outnumbered. Maybe we could take them head-on. Maybe we could win. But the weapons they have can put down a wolf in seconds. We need to even the odds.” It was now or never. “We need to open the door.”

They were confused. I expected that. They weren’t thinking like I was. They didn’t know what I did. And the idea was so abstract that it was a struggle to even understand it to begin with.

Ox understood first. He knew what it would mean. “The door,” he repeated. “Are you sure?”

I nodded.