Because the truth was that though we’d won this battle, the real war was still to come, and I couldn’t begin to imagine the cost of such a victory, for either side.

Much less a loss.

Twenty-Nine

“People are starting to ask about you. Are you ready?” Marc asked, and I looked up to find him watching me from my doorway, just like old times. Except that the old times were gone for good, as was the golden sparkle in his eyes, at least for now. With Ethan gone and war on the horizon, things would never be the same again, and at the moment, finding happiness in my new reality looked about as likely as werewolves making a miraculous comeback from extinction in the early twenty-first century.

My only option for moving forward was to patch together my future as best I could with the scraps of my past. Which were looking rattier and less substantial with each passing day.

I smiled sadly at Marc and shook my head. I would never be ready for this.

We’d buried Ethan an hour earlier, and now we had to put on stoic faces for our guests, in the aftermath of the most devastating tragedy my Pride—as well as my family—had ever faced.

“Come on.” Marc took my good hand, pulling me gently out of the desk chair, and my pulse jumped the moment he touched me. He’d come back to the ranch with us two days earlier, after we’d spent the remaining hours of darkness cleaning up the mess at Pete Yarnell’s house. Even with Vic and Parker there to help, it was a big job, and had to be performed very carefully and quietly to avoid waking the neighbors, or being spotted carrying corpses across the suburban backyard.

Since Kevin Mitchell had acted like a criminal, we’d interred him like one. Jace and Carver had buried him in the dark, in the woods, in an unmarked hole in the ground more than a mile from where Vic and Parker buried Peter Yarnell. Which was more than a mile from where Marc and I buried Dan, so that if one of the bodies was ever discovered, its connection to the others would remain buried.

Dan Painter’s grave was the hardest one I’d ever had to dig, and filling it in was even more difficult. Yes, he’d made some really bad decisions, and yes, those decisions had nearly gotten several of us killed. But in the end, he’d saved Marc’s life, and I couldn’t help but attribute that to my certainty that he’d genuinely liked Marc and treasured their friendship, as well as my conviction that he was a fundamentally good person.

Then, of course, there was the fact that I’d made more than my own fair share of mistakes in the past, which had also cost at least one life, and nearly cost several more. Knowing that, and that Dan had died making an important stand, I couldn’t help the tears I shed as we tossed dirt in on top of him. And I could have sworn I saw Marc’s eyes glisten, too, in the mottled moonlight shining between the bare branches overhead.

At my father’s insistence, Marc had agreed to stay through Ethan’s funeral. We hadn’t bothered to clear the visit with the other Alphas, because anyone who supported my dad would approve, and anyone who didn’t would disapprove. In short, telling them would change nothing, so we’d exercised our right to remain silent.

Marc must have known how I felt. He must have seen that I was near my breaking point, because after he pulled me from my chair, he held me close. He was careful of my right arm and its cast, already covered in signatures and inappropriate jokes from every tom I knew. And from Kaci, who’d written her name in flowery letters in a pink Sharpie, in one of her latelyrare moments of levity. When I groaned over the color, she’d even smiled. For nearly five seconds.

I hugged Marc back with my good arm, and fresh tears fell on his shoulder and my black dress, in spite of my best effort to hold them back.

I’d been fine during the service. We’d buried Ethan beneath the apple tree in the east field, with an arched granite headstone. I’d held it together for the entire burial, and had even spoken at the graveside. I’d said the things everyone expected to hear from the dead tom’s sister: Ethan was loyal and funny and protective. When we were little, he was the brother most likely to make me cry—and mostly likely to wipe away my tears. He died doing what he loved to do, and we couldn’t honor him more than to remember him at his best and lift a glass in his memory.

My voice only cracked once, when I caught sight of my three remaining brothers, all lined up across the grave from me. Michael stood with Holly on his right—a rare appearance at the ranch, and one we’d all been briefed on—and Owen on his left, his formal black cowboy hat held over his chest, his eyes rimmed in red and magnified by tears. Ryan flanked Owen’s other side, after a surprise appearance that morning.

Only my mother had looked more relieved than truly surprised.

My father was just as upset as the rest of us, but not too upset to notice that his prodigal son had returned. Again. I had no doubt he would soon find out exactly how Ryan had gotten out of the cage—and how he’d known about Ethan. After the funeral.

“Let’s get it over with.” Marc kissed my forehead, then guided me gently but firmly toward the hallway. We passed my mirror on the way out of my room, and I noticed that the blue bruise-bloom on my cheek was finally fading, and with it, the memory of my fight for my life. And for Marc’s, and Jace’s, and Dr. Carver’s.

Marc looked pretty good, considering how long he’d spent outside in below-freezing temperatures, with no food or water. And that his skull had turned out to be fractured. He’d been Shifting at least once a day to accelerate the healing of his head and too many bruises to count.