Claimed by the Pack

thankfully unguarded. Either the rest of the pack had been too lazy to find it or they just hadn’t looked.

Or maybe they were still licking their wounds from what happened in the courtyard.

It didn’t surprise me to learn about Serena’s powers, but I was impressed as hell. I’d only half-seen her do her thing back in the alleyway, and now I was glad Broderick had witnessed it too.

“Maybe we shouldn’t go home tonight,” I said, as we bumped along.

Broderick looked lost in thought, staring out over the steering wheel into the star-streaked sky.

“I mean they know where we—”

“Maybe you’re right.”

He turned onto the main road, and a half hour later we were back in Paris. Rather than steer toward our apartments, Broderick kept driving, deeper into the heart of the city.

“Can I ask you both something?” Serena asked from the back seat. Our silence gave her license to continue. “What made you leave the pack?”

Broderick was stoic and expressionless. It’s not that he didn’t want to answer, I just knew he was lost in thought. Thinking hard, trying to figure out our next move.

“Our pack was dwindling,” I said over my shoulder. “In order to boost our numbers, Karessa started taking matters into her own hands.”

Serena said nothing for a few seconds, but eventually she caught on. “So she was making more of you?”

“Yes. Creating new brood, against their will.”

“So… going out and biting people?”

I laughed, and it came out too a little too harsh. Broderick’s lips went tight.

“Something like that.”

In truth it was exactly like that. Karessa had been taking what she wanted, without regard for human life. Much the same way I’d been made — totally against my will.

And whether he liked to admit it or not, Broderick had had no choice at all.

“If given a choice, most people don’t choose this life,” I said. “Take me for example. I was bitten while sleeping on the beach. Left for dead, in a puddle of my own blood. Never saw the guy again.”

“Holy shit,” swore Serena.

“Yeah, totally. The first time I shifted, I had no idea what had happened to me. It took me a while to figure it out, and even when I did I had no idea how to handle it.”

I looked up and noticed the city lights were especially beautiful this night. The weather was clear.

“Someone eventually helped me,” I said. “They found me somehow. Took me aside and showed me who I was.”

“Xiomara,” Serena said matter-of-factly.

“Yes,” I said, with admiration. “That’s exactly who it was.”

She shifted forward from the back seat, leaning in between us. When she rolled her head in Broderick’s direction, I closed my eyes.

Shit…

“And what about you?”

The miles spun out and the truck rolled on in silence. Up on the steering wheel, Broderick’s knuckles had gone stark white.

“She made you, didn’t she? Karessa?”