The Lost Pack (Paige) novel Chapter 207

** Ryder’s POV **

I never thought I’d see these roads again. Not in this lifetime. Not in any life.

The tyres hum steadily beneath us, carrying us straight into the past I thought I’d buried. Old scars itch under my skin. Wolves don’t get phantom pain, not really, but l swear | feel it now. Memories I boxed up years ago rattle loose with every passing mile.

Paige must feel the shift in me, because her fingers slip into mine the moment we turn off the motorway.*

– I don’t look at her at first. I can’t. If I do, I’m going to fall apart in ways I don’t have time for.

“Talk to me,” she whispers, squeezing gently.

I exhale long and slow, letting some of the tension bleed out. “I didn’t think I’d ever come back here.”

She tilts her head slightly with a sad smile. “I prayed every day that you would.”

I nod. “The last time I was on these roads, I had just turned eighteen and my wolf was out of control. I ran, and I didn’t look back.”

Her thumb strokes the back of my hand, grounding me.” Everything is different this time. You have us now.”I risk a glance at her. She’s watching the passing landscape, but her focus is split, half on the road, half on me. She’s glowing faintly again, an unconscious shimmer under her skin that has become as natural as breathing.

But today… there’s something else beneath it. Something I can’t name. Something warm and small and quiet that makes me want to pull her into my chest and never let go.

Remy glances at us through the rearview mirror. “So… this is the legendary hometown that traumatised you both?”

Paige huffs a laugh. “It’s not that bad.”

l arch a brow. “I heard the mayor got arrested for stealing garden gnomes.”

She winces, playing along. “Okay, well, that was one time.”

“Twice,” I correct her with a wink.

Remy whistles, catching on to our joke. “And people said you were the feral one?”

From the seat beside him, Hayden speaks for the first time in a soft rasp. “This place smells strange.”

Paige leans forward in her seat. “Strange how?”

He frowns, like he’s listening to something none of us can hear. “Like memory and… fear.”

Paige’s eyes soften. “Hayden… are you okay?”He nods once, but there’s a delay. A hesitation. Since his resurrection, something in him is quieter. More watchful.

Atmost painfully gentle. Ronnie said the Twiceborn wolves are not the same wolves they once were. They carry their death like a shadow.

He looks out the window again, and Paige reaches forward to squeeze his arm. Blaine, who is travelling in the other car, is the same. They’re different from the enforcers they were, changed in a way that’s too big for words. Their devotion to Paige is absolute, but it doesn’t erase what happened to them.

Parker’s voice pushes through the mind-link, steady and warm.

“How is she holding up?”

I glance at Paige, smiling softly as she tries to point out the coffee shop that used to sell burnt croissants.

“She’s okay,”! send back. “Distracted.”

Callen’s reply comes instantly. “Good. Keep her that way.

If she spirals before we even see Greg, we’re turning the cars around.”

“Agreed,” Remy says.

Paige gives me a suspicious look. “Are you all talking about me again?”

“No,” Remy and I both say at once.She narrows her eyes because she knows we are absolutely lying.

To maintain the illusion of innocence, I gesture at an old petrol station. “Remember that place?”

Paige squints. “The one where you told me diesel and petrol were the same thing and nearly destroyed my dad’s car?”

I groan. “I was seventeen.”

“You were an idiot.”

“And you kissed me anyway.”

She tries not to smile, but she fails.

Her laughter is soft. “I can’t believe my dad let me take his car out. We were kids, and I’d only passed my test three days before.”

“Not anymore,” I murmur, pulling her hand to my lips.

The moment we touch, the bond pulses bright and warm between us. It’s different now… stronger, more layered.

The Dawn thrums through her veins, but underneath it… something else stirs.

A new rhythm. A softer power. A whisper of life.

I don’t comment on it. I don’t even let my thoughts fully form around it. Because today is not about that. Today is about safety, closure and survival. If I’m sensing what Ithink l am, it’s an issue, or hopefully a celebration, for another day.

Ronnie, sitting on Paige’s other side, clears his throat. ” Paige, when we arrive, stay close to your mates. Your energy is fluctuating. I don’t want you wandering too close to Greg before we evaluate the situation.”

Paige nods. “I won’t approach him unless I feel ready.”

Callen breaks in again over the mind-link, including Paige in it this time. “I’m not sure it helps, but I’m going through this file again, and Christ, doesn’t he look like a stack of wet cardboard? What the hell did you see in him?”

Paige snorts a laugh. “Honestly? I have no idea. But tell him thanks; that actually helps more than he thinks.”

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