Page 27 of Traded to the Alpha Wolf

I’m sitting at a window table in the Bluebird Café, pressed as far into the corner as possible as I try to blend into the background completely. Outside, Main Street is a picture-perfect example of spring; every business has impossibly bright flower baskets strung under the eaves, kids on bikes race through the square, and the air here is so clear it feels artificial. I can see the general store, the bakery, even the stone face of the library that’s somehow both imposing and inviting. If I turn my head, I catch the copper flash of the pack’s Town Hall sign glinting in the sunlight. It’s almost pretty enough to make me forget that I don’t belong here.

I try to look casual, but my hands betray me because I’m fidgeting, so I put them under the table. Sara is at the counter, chatting with the barista in a way that suggests she’s been doing it for years. No one pays me much attention, but I feel the low-level undercurrent of being observed anyway; it’s like when a stranger would walk into the bar and shift the air in the room just enough to make the locals aware that something’s off. It’s not hostility here, at least; if anything, the energy is curious and gently nosy. But I’m still an outsider, and in a town like this, that’s all it takes.

Sara glances over and gives me a thumbs up. I force myself to smile, and she beams back. I try to return the smile, but I can’t compete with her natural soft edges and easy warmth. She seems to have made it her mission to guide me through the gauntlet of local gossip, saying things like “Don’t worry, everyone’s just glad Cade is seeing someone” and “everyone’sjust fascinated, you know; you’re the alpha’s mysterious city girl.”

She means well, and I want to like her—I do, actually—but I can’t stop thinking about what else she said. About how everyone expects Cade to find a luna, how it’s the only thing their pack is really missing.

I can’t be Luna. I’m not a shifter; I don’t have a wolf.

I’m a human.

Albeit a human with some random bloodwork abnormalities, I still don’t think that changes who I am. And I’m not a shifter.

I shake my head. Why do I even care? Cade brought me here, kept me captive, and, admittedly, gave me the most pleasure I’ve ever felt in my entire life. But he’s not promising forever; we’re not even in a relationship…more like a situationship. Besides, he’s so much older than me; he’d want a woman like him to be Luna. Not someone like me who’s bounced around bar jobs trying to take out the hunters for revenge.

I doubt he thinks I’m Luna material anyway.

I’m not Luna material.

Sara returns, balancing two cappuccinos and a plate with two slices of cake; one looks like lemon and the other dark chocolate, so full of frosting it should be illegal. She sets the tray down and slides into the seat across from me; her presence is so immediately comfortable it’s hard not to relax, though I keep my spine straight, as if good posture will spare me from whatever this conversation is going to be.

“Sorry,” she says, breathless, “everyone is out, and about today, the line was crazy; it’s not normally like this, but it’s getting busier on weekends now.” She grins, then pushes acappuccino toward me. “I hope you like foam. I told them to go easy on the cinnamon, but you never know with Betsy. She’s got a heavy hand.”

“I’ll live,” I say, and take a sip. The cinnamon is aggressive, but the coffee is good. I can feel Sara watching me, not in an uncomfortable way, just like someone who’s genuinely invested in the outcome of my first sip.

She nudges the cake plate toward me. “I couldn’t choose, to be honest, so I thought we could share. The chocolate one is the new ‘house specialty.’ Betsy was saying people have been getting territorial about it, so I wouldn’t eat it too close to the window if I were you.” She says it with a completely straight face, and I almost choke on my coffee.

There’s a lull as she stirs sugar into her coffee, and I do my best to look like a person who has never once in her life plotted against a paramilitary organization. For a moment, it almost works. Then, because I’m a glutton for self-sabotage, I glance at my phone on the table, checking for texts from Cade. There’s nothing, just the blank home screen and my own reflection in the black glass.

Sara catches it and gives me a look, so knowing that my face heats up immediately. “You can text him, you know,” she says, “He’s probably pacing a hole in the training yard pretending not to worry about you being out and about.” When I don’t respond, she leans in, lowering her voice. “Is everything…okay? Between you guys?”

I don’t answer right away. I want to say yes, but the word tastes like a lie. I toy with my fork, using it to make neat furrows in the cake icing. “I don’t really know what we are,” I say, finally. “Things aren’t exactly normal. Not bad, but not normal.”

Sara laughs, but it’s gentle. “Oh, honey. Nothing about our world is normal. And for what it’s worth, I think you’re good for him.” She sits back, studying me. “I mean that. I’ve known Cade since we were kids, and I’ve never seen him like this.”

I want to ask what she means, but I’m afraid of the answer. Instead, I pick at the cake, letting the chocolate and sugar give my brain something else to focus on.

Sara says, “You know, when I met Grey properly, I just knew. One date, and that was it,” she smiles wistfully. “You may not have a wolf, but I think we all know when we find our mate.”

I want to laugh at her, at the crazy implication that I would ever feel that kind of certainty. But when Sara says it, she’s looking at me like she knows exactly what I’m afraid to admit, and suddenly I’m not hungry for cake or coffee or even the curious comfort of this table. I’m hungry for the feeling I get when Cade’s eyes are on me, when he’s got me pinned to the wall, or the floor, or the edge of his kitchen counter, and I know, beyond reason, that I’m not going anywhere. Maybe ever.

But can I really stay?

I push the plate away and look out the window, trying to hide my face behind the rim of the cup. The town is so aggressively wholesome I want to scream, but I also want to hold on to it, just for a minute. I want to imagine what it would be like to stay. To stop running. Maybe that’s what’s been building within me since the first time I let Cade touch me: the fear that if I stop running, I won’t get my revenge, but also the secret hope that he’ll be the one to make me stop. I want him to tell me not to go. I want him to want me.

I’m about to say something to Sara, something that might, for once, be really honest, when a sound outside splits the air. It’s not the usual laughter or the shriek of a kid fallingoff a bike. It’s a scream, raw and high and so full of panic that everyone in the café goes silent at once.

I turn in my seat and see pure chaos unfolding. Four giant trucks, matte black and dust-streaked, are barreling down Main and skidding to a stop in the square. For a second, nobody moves. The engines idle, exhaust clouding the air, and then the doors fly open. Men in black tactical gear spill out, moving in formation, faces obscured by riot helmets and body armor.

Hunters.

I suddenly can’t breathe. The cup slips out of my hand and crashes to the floor, shattering and splattering foam across my boots. Sara grabs my wrist across the table, her nails biting into my skin. The barista ducks behind the counter, and half the café is already on their feet, but none of it feels real until the first shot cracks the window. Glass explodes, raining down in sparkling sheets. Someone screams, a much louder scream this time, and people start scrambling backward, knocking chairs and tables to the floor.

Sara is up, dragging me toward the back, but I’m rooted to the spot. Through the jagged hole in the window, I see townspeople running for cover, ducking into alleys and doorways. A man I recognize from the bakery is lying face down on the sidewalk, and I’m not sure if he’s alive or not. He’s a shifter, but it depends on what kind of bullets they’re using.

Sara drags me behind the counter, and we watch out the window as a group of shifters attack the hunters, their wolves massive in comparison, and push them back behind their vehicles, but the hunters aren’t giving up.

I watch, numb, as the hunters fan out, and I spot two of them carrying a large weapon that looks like it could take down a tank, let alone a shifter. The wolves that had been holding themat bay are suddenly pinned behind a planter and a row of parked cars, forced to ground by a hail of silver-tipped bullets. At first, I think they’re tranquilizers, but then I see one of the shifters go down, blood pouring from a wound in his flank, and I know it’s worse. These hunters clearly don’t do warning shots.