Come Out Swinging (Reach for the Moon Book 2), Sam Hall [leveled readers .TXT] 📗

of a thing is being pushed between Aidan and Selma that’s not convincing anyone. Nance is trying to push it all through though, but the town is resisting. So where the hell are you, anyway?”

“Adelaide,” I said, then listened to the resulting silence, the dull hum of the bar the only background noise.

“What’re you…?” Her voice trailed away. “Who are you with?”

“A woman called Greta. She’s talking to me about the Eine Beschutzerin.”

The sigh that came was so much deeper, perhaps because I had only one sense to perceive it.

“She’s a matriarch for one of the local wolf packs?”

“Yep,” I replied.

“Shit, I thought we had more time. Stay with her, Paige. You’ve already worked out there’s more to all this than the vagaries of the Spehr family. This has been a long time coming, and you’ll need training before the final showdown. Nance…she’s not right, not what she should be. Stay there, listen to what Greta has to say, then come home and put things to rights.” I felt the resentment in me rise. I didn’t want to, didn’t want to keep cleaning up other people’s messes. “Nothing you build will last until you do.”

Well that was fucking ominous.

“And you?”

She let out a hiss of frustration. “I’ve already stepped too far away from watching and more into manipulating as it is. I’m sorry, kid, seriously. If there was any other way…”

“So what are you? I saw a drawing of you that looked like it was created back in the Dark Ages.”

She let out a low laugh. “That must have been Petyr’s work. Lovely boy, very sweet. Let’s just say I’ve had a vested interest in your family for a long time. You and the other ulva, you’re destined for great things, if you can just get past this. You need to, Paige, it’s important. Part of your heart is here. You won’t be complete until you come and retrieve it.”

For a second, I could see Aidan’s lazy smile, his eyes fogged momentarily by the alcohol we’d drunk at her bar, before they grew sharper, hotter.

“So that’s it? That’s all you’re gonna give me?” My voice cracked on the words, and I saw Zack move forward, dropping down onto his knees before me, taking my free hand.

“Kid, I’ve given you every damn thing I could without breaking the rules, and probably a little bit more than that.” Her voice was warm and corded through by frustration and pain. “Free will—that’s what I’ve reminded myself over and over. You’ve got to have the freedom to choose, otherwise what’s the point? You stick with those ladies, you’ll learn control. You’ll be able to stay in town, build a life. That man of yours, Zack, he’s created a haven for you, hasn’t he?”

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak as my throat closed up, realising she couldn’t see that, but somehow, she seemed to know.

“I thought he might. I saw him in your future, hoped like hell you’d take him on, and you have. He’s your mate.”

Her voice contained something I didn’t realise I needed. It was all there, rich and deep, something I’d missed since I left home and didn’t get when I returned—acceptance. But not just that, it was the enduring affection of a parent for a child, one that shifted but didn’t lessen when you became an adult. I felt seen and heard in ways no one else was ever going to be able to, and that corrected something inside me I didn’t realise was still aching. My breath came hard as I looked up into Zack’s eyes.

I’d never seen my mate back down from a fight, and he wouldn’t right now. He stared back, something tremendously naked about his gaze, like every barrier was down and I could go in as far as I wanted, even down to the very core of him, and he wouldn’t stop me. He bared himself to me, hoping I’d treat that with the respect it deserved but leaving himself vulnerable nonetheless.

“Yeah, he is,” I croaked.

“Adam, he set you up well. It’s why I feel so much hope. You got a rough deal, all of you have, but he helped… He helped you be strong enough to train and better yourself, make yourself as strong as you can be. But…” She let out a sigh. “He gave you the strength to open yourself to others, to your pack. To let them into your heart. To let him in.”

Her tone hadn’t changed, it still was all hope and call to arms, but I felt a shiver, my eyes flicking around the room, Greta and Margaret’s following mine as they did. I felt it, the gloom rising, the shadows on the walls getting just that bit longer, those cast by the trees outside no longer moving with the breeze. The older woman sat ramrod straight as they formed a familiar shape on the wall, the holes in the dark shadows blinking slowly.

“To let him out, you mean,” I said, staring at the shadow.

“That’ll happen no matter what, because otherwise, it’s more of this. More of women pressed down, forced to conform, in some cases kept from their wolves, in others kept from their true mates. He is the wild masculine, her true mate, freeing her of the role of beatific mother to become what she truly is.”

A spot of sunlight grew brighter on the wall, smoothing and becoming more perfectly round, the light a cooler, less golden shade. The shadow wolf turned his head, looking up at Mother Moon.

Or did he?

Something black formed on the face of the spot of light, a long black crack it looked like initially, a hiss coming from around the room as it resolved itself into a shape. Sharp toothed, wide, I knew that smile. It matched my own when my blood was up, when I promised we’d bring my aunt, my father’s murderer, to justice. It widened and widened, until finally, it swallowed the moon whole.

“The lamb was never for us,”