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“No?” He’s smiling. The fool thinks I’m cute. “And what’s my real problem, Zahra?”

“Your real problem, Eamon, is you put Declan Greene’s mate in a cage.”

The smile slips. Just a little.

“Do you know what that man did the first time he smelled me? He ripped a steel table out of a concrete floor. Chained. It took eight men and three tranquilizer darts to put him down, and all it took was his lawyer stood between us.” I shake my head. “You shot two of his men, drugged me, and locked me in the thing his wolf hates the most. What exactly do you think is going to happen?”

No one speaks. Two of the men by the door look at each other.

Then Eamon takes a sip of his coffee.

“I can see why he likes you,” he says mildly, recovering. “You got a mouth on you. Here’s what happens next, Mrs. Greene. Your husband’s across the city kicking in the door of a cannery I haven’t set foot in in ten years. He’s going to find six of my boys and a cell phone. The phone’s gonna ring. And I’m gonna tell him that if he wants his pretty wife back in one piece, he’s going to sign over every contract the Greene family’s got. He’ll come alone. He’ll come unarmed. And he’ll come on his knees.”

I smirk. “And then you’ll let us go.”

He chuckles. “I like your style. And then I’ll shoot him in the head. I’m sorry, sweetheart.”

I keep my face still.

“He won’t come on his knees.”

“For you? I think he will.” He gets up and strolls to the cage with his hands in his pockets. He’s a wolf. I can tell by how he moves, by the way his nostrils flare when he gets close. He leans in and takes a long, slow sniff, right through the bars. Then he stops. His eyebrows go up. He sniffs again. And a slow, evil smile spreads across his face.

“Well, well, well,” he says softly. “Does he know?”

I wanna spit at him. “Does he know what?”

He tilts his head, humming. “It’s early. A week, maybe two.” He laughs. “That’s fucking perfect. I thought I was getting one Greene. I’m getting two for the price of one.”

I don’t understand… then I do. The pancakes I couldn’t finish. My breasts aching, being hot all week, hungry, thinking my heat’s getting close… It wasn’t the heat.

Dec smelled it on me but we were both wrong. It was never my heat. It was…

My hand goes to my stomach all on its own.

Oh. Oh, my God!

There’s a little being inside me right now.

And this monster standing here laughing about killing it.

And all of a sudden the fear just goes. It burns right off. What’s left is cold, clear, and absolutely fucking furious.

That’s my baby. Our fucking baby. And this smirking piece of shit is not touching one single hair on its head.

I step up to the bars and look him dead in the eye.

“I take it back,” I tell him. Real quiet. “I said your problem was my husband. I was wrong. You’d better pray he gets to you first, Mr. Callaghan. Because if he doesn’t, I will end you myself.”

He blinks and for one second, his stupid face goes blank.

“Watch her,” he spits at his men, and he walks away.

I sit back down on the concrete, put my back against the bars, and wrap my arms around my stomach.

Hi, little one. It’s your mama. I know it’s scary. But daddy’s coming.

I close my eyes and reach for the bond and push as hard as I can. I send him everything. The cage. The smell of rust and fish, the hooks, the broken windows, everything I can see. Eamon’s voice. My hand on my belly.