Chapter 1

1

So close; he had been so close. Josh had hitchhiked the hundred miles to Bangor, Maine. From there, he planned take a bus to Boston or New York. He didn’t care where, as long as it was a big city. The distance might not be enough to sever the blood bond he was born into, but a life on the run was better than the pathetic life of an omega.

Welcome to Wolf Creek. Caught in the high beams, the sign’s reflective letters traced a familiar path in Josh’s brain for the third time in as many months. Wolf Creek was the last place he wanted to be and the one place he couldn’t escape.

“You can’t keep running away from your duty, from your family—Look at me when I’m speaking.”

Even though Josh was nearly twenty years old, Elaine still treated him like a child. She treated everyone in the pack like they were beneath her. And, other than Silverbane—her brother and leader of the pack—they were; no one more so than Josh, even though he was technically a part of the family.

As far as Josh was concerned, his mother was his only family, and she had died two years ago. He was more determined than ever to make his escape.

“Of all nights to pull this stunt.” Elaine kept her eyes focused on the road. “Didn’t you get Silverbane’s messages? He must have called you a dozen times. You are even more useless than Jessica.”

Josh saw disappointment in her windshield reflection, but it was no more than usual. The better part of Josh’s life had been spent in his mother’s shadow. Being the omega had secured her a place in the pack: at the very bottom. To the pack, Josh was some freak of nature to be at best ignored and at worst punished just for existing. He could almost get used to it all if he didn’t feel that wretched omega need for approval. It disgusted him to think of what that need had driven his mother to do, all in the name of keeping the peace. Josh was going to make a different fate for himself.

“Why didn’t you answer Silverbane?”

Elaine’s demand for an explanation couldn’t be ignored. The longer he waited to answer, the tighter his stomach twisted until he had to say something. The involuntary call of her authority as second in command was something no one in the pack could resist, much less Josh. It was almost as bad as when Silverbane himself gave a command.

Fortunately, Josh was an expert at only giving away as much information as was expected. He could deal with the guilt and sense of worthlessness as long as it got him far away from the pack.

“My phone was stolen.”

That was essentially true. The fact that he had left it by the sink in a truck stop restroom was a detail he wasn’t going to offer. If Silverbane knew Josh was losing his cell phone on purpose, he might command Josh to have the phone with him at all times. While Josh could evade ambiguous questions, a direct command from Silverbane was something no one in the pack, not even Elaine, could refuse or ignore. The very need to comply was in the flesh and bones of everyone who was either born into the pack or took the blood oath to serve the alpha. Fighting it was about as useful as willing yourself to stop breathing. Resistance could only last so long, and there were always consequences for it.

“That’s not the first phone you’ve lost this year,” Elaine said. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were losing them on purpose.”

It wasn’t a question, so Josh didn’t have to answer it. Instead, he stared out at the side of the road revealed by the headlights. Elaine didn’t need to confirm what she already knew. If Josh could get away from the pack, he would. That was no secret. The problem was that even though most of the pack believed him worthless, Silverbane didn’t.

“If you hadn’t been stupid enough to lose another phone, you would have known this isn’t just another patrol. A band of rogues have set up a den at the old Shaye farm.” Elaine down-shifted and swerved around a beat-up pickup that was in no hurry. “Silverbane wants you there. So you are going to be there, even if it means I get stuck playing babysitter.”

Josh wondered if he’d be lucky enough to die in a car crash. As this speed, all it would take was one miscalculation from Elaine, or maybe the old-timer driving the pick-up would veer into the other lane.

“Why Silverbane doesn’t let me take a stripe out of your hide is beyond me.” Elaine stomped on the gas pedal. The car whined as it lurched forward. Josh watched the pick-up disappear in the side mirror. “Then again, you’d probably enjoy that.”

Even though her quick temper was legendary in the pack, Elaine was more tense than usual. It was those little details that Josh couldn’t help but see and react to; another unwanted trait he’d inherited from his mother. Reading body language was so intuitive to Josh that he was dumbfounded when the rest of the pack missed what to him were glaring neon signs.