The Lost Pack (Paige) novel Chapter 237

A sneer from one Alpha who likes to pretend he’s not one attack away from losing his borders entirely.

I keep my tone smooth. “We’ve spent decades fighting each other because it suited the old rules. The hunters adapted. We didn’t. Phoenix, River, and Midnight just proved what happens when we stop playing by the old rules.”

“Or what happens when you let a goddess into the mix,” someone counters.

There’s a beat of tension, and Bastian’s eyes narrow. “Rumours.”

I don’t correct him, not here, not on this call. Because I’d heard them too. The Luna of Phoenix. The one who burned silver and gold and healed wolves from the inside out.

I’ve never met her, but the stories had even made their way here, to Mountain Ridge, and I’ve learned that stories have a habit of becoming truths.

The meeting drags on for another half hour, filled with strategy and uneasy agreements and the subtle flares of power that came with any attempt at unity. When it finally ends, I shut the tablet off with more relief than I care to admit.

Bastian stands from his chair beside me, already pulling off his shirt. “Run?”

“Please,” I sigh, pushing away from the table. “If I have to look at one more pixelated Alpha pretending his Wi-Fi isn’t the issue, I’ll start a war out of spite.”

Bastian snorts a laugh, which is the closest thing to real laughter he ever does.

We’re halfway out of the lodge when two of our wolves, Jude and Shay, step into our path, both still in human form but oozing with the restless energy of a shift too close to the surface.

Jude is one of our best trackers, broad-shouldered, dark-eyed, always too observant for his own good. Shay is smaller, sharper, with a mouth that runs almost as fast as his wolf. Both of them looked keyed up. That’s never a good sign.

Bastian pauses. “What’s up?”

Shay doesn’t bother with a greeting. “We went into town.”

Jude shoots him a look, like, ‘I told you not to lead with that,’ then turns to me. “We heard something about the new girl at the coffee shop.”

Bastian frowns. “The crazy one that talks to herself?”

“Yeah,” Shay smirks. “Crazy coffee girl, except… she’s not crazy.”

My wolf stirs at that, faint but curious. “Explain.”

Jude takes a breath. “People have been whispering for weeks about her talking to herself, about how she looks like she’s listening to something no one else can hear.”

“That’s not exactly rare,” Bastian says. “Half the humans in town talk to themselves.”

Shay’s eyes flash with his wolf. “This is different.”

Jude nods once. “We watched her closely.”

I exhale slowly and nod. “We will go tomorrow.”

Shay’s shoulders relax and Jude nods once, satisfied.

Bastian turns toward the woods, already kicking off his boots. “If she’s trouble, we’ll know.”

I follow him into the trees, but my mind doesn’t fully come with me. Mountain Ridge doesn’t get surprises. We are the pack other packs avoid. The ones who occupy the higher land and the old mountain passes. The ones who never needed alliances to survive, yet lately the world has been shifting under all of us.

Hunter groups vanishing. Packs uniting. Rumours of goddesses and resurrected wolves, and magic that feels older than the moon. And now a strange girl in a coffee shop, marked by something our wolves can’t name.

My wolf paces with anticipation; he senses the change coming.

When morning comes, I tell myself it is a simple recon mission. Bastian and I don’t need theatrics. We don’t need a parade of pack members or a show of power. We’ll go in, observe, and then leave. That is the plan.

This plan lasts exactly three seconds. The bell above the coffee shop door chimes, and she looks up, and I’m done for.

I’d expected… I didn’t know what I’d expected. Someone unsettling, someone strange, someone who might look wrong in a way humans couldn’t see, but we could.

Instead, I find myself staring at a woman with a mouth made for trouble and eyes that look like they’d seen too much for someone her age.

She is wiping down the counter, pretending she hasn’t noticed us even as her entire body goes still. Her scent hits me, overpowering the bitter coffee and sweet syrups. My lungs stall. It’s not floral or sweet, or anything so simple. It’s like the night air before rain, and something else beneath it. Something I can’t place. Something that makes my wolf slam into the front of my mind in a way he never has before, like he has been waiting for her this whole time with one clear word ringing out… Mine!