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Joaquin stepped up to my side. “Give me a name, Flor. Just a name, and no girl in your pack will ever have to worry about him touching them again. I’ll tear his hands off for you, my sweet little one, and give them to you to burn.”
“That’s the nicest gift anyone’s ever offered to me,” I said with a weak smile. “I might take you up on that.” I sniffled, hoping I wasn’t going to cry again.
I wiped one hand over my mouth to hide my wobbling chin, then felt something being pressed into my other hand. One of the chestnut-haired wolves—he was almost as big as Brand and looked a little like him—had handed me an energy bar. I thanked him. “I bet you’re related to Brand.”
“Second cousin,” he said. He shoved a shirt into my hand, then looked away as I stripped off my bloody one and changed. “Time to run.”
He was right; the fight was breaking up. Alpha Callaway was still gone, but I saw some sort of movement near the Pack House entrance that made me think that wouldn’t last.
“Right,” Patrick yelled loud enough for the sound to carry past the group. “Joaquin, you piece of shit. You shouldn’t even be here. The Games are for pack members, not half-rogue trash like you.”
Joaquin’s eyes glittered, and he answered in Spanish. They rushed each other, fists connecting with far less power and far more noise than normal.
“Now,” Brand’s cousin murmured, and he and two other shifters circled around me, hiding me as I moved as quickly as I could into the shadowed part of the ring. “We’ll get you out of here, one way or the other.”
“You’ve already done more than anyone in my pack would have,” I whispered, then ducked down as a huge roar came from the crowd. I didn’t look back to see what was happening. I was already across the compound yard and running for one of the few places I thought might keep me safe.
Behind the first row of houses was an old storm drain. It smelled horrific and was only one step above hiding in the latrines themselves. But it was perfect for what I needed.
I unscrewed the two bolts I’d worked loose a few years before, pulled the heavy metal grate away, and slipped inside. This was the tricky bit. My fingers were bigger than they had been when I’d first found this spot, and I had to snake them through the wire mesh and screw the bolts back in from behind.
In the dark. Silently. While I was panicking.
I dropped the bolts twice and had to hold my breath as I heard footsteps nearby once. Eventually, though most of the skin on my knuckles was torn, I managed it. I picked up two handfuls of muck from the drain interior and smeared it on the bolts, just in case my scent had rubbed off. Then I walked, bare feet squelching quietly in the warm mud, listening for snakes and other more dangerous predators.
I counted my steps. When I reached one hundred, I stopped, hunkered down, pulled the energy bar out, and let myself eat.
Then, after another count of a hundred, I let myself cry. For Del, for myself, for my mom, and for the unexpected kindness the other fighters had shown me. At least those final tears were happy ones.
I leaned my head up against the side of the cement pipe and whispered one last prayer of thanks that there were some honorable shifters in the world, even if none of them lived around here.
Then I slept.
The thing about my nightmares was it was almost impossible to tell if I was having one, or if I was awake and remembering. My nightmares were almost all things that had happened to me in real life. Memories that I couldn’t escape, once my eyes were closed.
It was nearly dusk, and gnats buzzed in swarms around my face. I probably still had food in my hair. Trevor Blackside had dumped his mashed potatoes on my head at dinner, saying I’d spit in them.
He hadn’t been wrong. But I’d been spitting in his food for months, so I assumed it was a lucky guess.
The entire pack was gathered outside the Pack House, milling around, buzzing with gossip. I knew better than to draw attention to myself. Mama already did plenty of that, with her raving and the seizures she had. But today, she was at work at the QwikMart, and I was on my own since classes had been canceled.
A few of the nearby males gave me long looks, though, and I crossed my arms over my chest and tried to slump lower. My clothes were too small, and my boobs had started to show. I wished they hadn’t, but I was fifteen—even if I was the very last female in my grade to hit puberty. At least Mama had helped me find a bra someone else had outgrown in the pack rag bin. It was only a little big, but I’d grow into it soon, she said.
When no one was looking, I dared a small wave at Mindy Pearson, who had been the teacher’s helper in my homemaking class the year before. She’d been picked as the focus of the Hunt the previous year, and she’d been caught after only four days by Jackson Billings, who was a huge, good-looking Enforcer. The other girls at school had been jealous, but Mindy was on her own right now, in the back of the crowd. Hiding, like I was, maybe. From the skittish way Mindy’s eyes moved over the crowd and the fading, finger-sized bruises on her upper arms, I knew being caught wasn’t anything to wish for.
Even if the one who caught you was hotter than the sun. Speaking of which… My own gaze moved like a magnet had caught it as soon as Luke Callaway stepped out of the front door of the Pack House. He’d cut his hair again, buzzed close to the scalp, and I wanted nothing more than to run my fingers over the stubble to feel if it was soft or prickly.
Although I’d settle for running my fingers over any part of him I could get.
“Stop drooling, Flor. You’ll get your shoes muddy.”
“I’m not drooling, Del,” I snapped back, though I knew my cheeks were flaming. I moved over, making room next to the tall pine so Del could lean against it. We weren’t allowed to sit down, not when the Alpha was speaking.
“You know what this is about?” I whispered, as the rest of the Enforcers poured out of the Pack House and stood near Luke, whose face was pale and weirdly expressionless.
“It’s… bad, Flor. Be ready to run,” Del choked out as the Alpha stepped out, with his Head Enforcer, Van Blackside, next to him. Alpha Callaway stared down at the closest female shifters, who preened and flirted wordlessly under his gaze. Blackside’s eyes moved over the crowd. Scanning, searching, and finding.
Me.
