Chapter 92

Tyler POV

Wright House

Sitting straight up in bed, my entire body went on alert as Wynd woke to the sound of Rayne shouting in my head: "Tyler! I love you! Help!"

Wynd howled in my mind with a fury which snapped my muscles tight on my bones. I felt my body ready itself to shift and forced my breathing to slow, my heart to steady, and my mind to move faster.

'Our mate needs us. Don't shift! Being a wolf won't get us to her any faster.'

I was so grateful my wolf was awake, my whole body was trembling with excess energy. I slipped out of bed and made my way to the closet where I found athletic wear. It would be easier to shed if I did have to shift in a hurry. I'd gotten my feet shoved into sneakers when a strange female appeared at my elbow from nowhere.

"Sorry in advance for this. No time to explain. Rachel needs you."

Her fingers clamped down on my wrist as firm as any pair of shackles then I was nothing more than thoughts, my body gone in a blink, and I felt as if I had been torn from life straight into the ether of eternity. I opened my mouth to scream only I had no mouth and no voice and then I knew nothing at all until my awareness returned with the sharpness of a slap to the face.

"What?!" I yelled, raising my arms to defend myself only to feel a complete fool as I looked around to see myself in strange surroundings.

"We don't have time to explain. I need to get you to Rachel before she loses control and stress-shifts."

I let the tiny woman tug me in a run through trees until we broke free of the forest edge to see a line of cabins ahead. She led me to a one-room structure where I followed her inside drawn both by her fleet feet and the scent of my mate on what light breeze blew.

"Tyler?" Rachel mumbled, her face drawn and pale with terror I could practically feel as she stared at me with only partial understanding.

I crossed the wooden floor to reach for her. I swung her up into my arms before sitting on the bed in the cabin. This must be Moonglow Pack territory. I was grateful for the lack of air-conditioning as the sudden heat helped ground me in reality again.

Holding Rachel as tightly as I could, I rocked her back and forth steadily as I asked, "Can anyone explain? I don't know what's happening and it's causing me some problems with my wolf."

None of us would benefit from an Alpha wolf losing control though I could detect the faint scent of another Alpha's fury fading around us. My thoughts went to Nathan Lewis as he was the only one not present in our strange group.

Art Windsor shook the female's hand before she vanished again. He seemed to think nothing of her disappearance so I chose to feign interest in it myself. I had never dealt much with magic-users, but I'd be damned if I acted a fool in front of the Alpha Inspector. He had a big enough ego without me feeding it.

"Lewis went a little off the script because of your female. He's been neutralized. Justice works for the Alpha Council. She's cleaning him up so we don't have to explain anything to Moonglow. This is their territory. We can't flash you in and out here because of the iron borders so Justice brought you to the edge of the property and led you in. We'll have to take you out the same way."

"I'm not leaving," I started to say only to be interrupted by Rachel screaming out, "No!"

Her hands fisted in my t-shirt with enough ferocity in her grip to damage the material. I didn't give a fuck if she tore the thing right off me: I wanted to comfort my mate.

Shushing her, I tightened my hold on her body, "No, no, no. I'm not going anywhere. Don't worry. You can come up with an explanation, Windsor. I'm not leaving my mate."

Who knew what Lewis could have done to her to make her so out of control? She was scared on a level I'd never seen before. I wondered if he'd shifted and realized I was glad I didn't know as much as I was grateful I'd arrived after he was 'neutralized' whatever that meant.

"We have to get permission to bring you onto Moonglow territory. You know you can't just waltz in here as an Alpha from an unrelated pack with no agreement in place. It's an act of war, Wright."

I felt ready to go to war for Rachel.

"I don't care. Deal with it, Windsor."

What use was the Alpha Inspector if he couldn't even take care of my mate for a day? I glared at him as he glared back. Neither of us wanted to give the other ground.

His teeth were clenched together as he gritted out, "How would you like me to do that? Lie to them and say you're a figment of their imagination?"

I didn't care how he did it. I shrugged, raising a brow as I didn't bother with a verbal reply.

As far as I was concerned, this situation was all Windsor's fault: he could clean it up.

He cursed as he stalked from the door to the bag on the floor at my feet. I watched him rustle through it for a moment before he brought out a cologne bottle.

Brows drawing in confusion, I asked, "What do you think you're doing now, Windsor?"

"It's a scent suppressant," he snapped, "I'm cloaking our scents so we don't have to deal with any awkward questions tonight."

Art sprayed the substance into the air once and then vanished himself. I drew in a sniff to test the effectiveness only to find myself unable to smell anything at all.

The sudden lack of smell stunned me. I must have had a strange look on my face because Rachel let out a sound of amusement almost like a giggle.

I was so glad to hear her making any kind of normal sound, I didn't care she was laughing at me.

"Feeling better? You must be if you're laughing at me."

Searching her face, I was gratified to see the shock which had frozen her features was fading. Color was returning to her cheeks and she looked as if she were on the verge of smiling.

I poked at Wynd in his corner of my mind and my wolf sent out a mental call to his mate, 'Rayne?"

'Wynd!' Rayne cried making us both give very real smiles of relief to one another.

"Glad to hear we're all awake again. Do you want to tell me what happened? Or do you want to just take over Windsor's bed for a little while?"

Rachel trembled in my arms as if from a deep freeze. She had a faint sheen of sweat on her brow which worried me. I could see scratches down her arms and abdomen and even on her thighs. I focused on even breathing as I forced myself to remain calm in spite of how wrecked my mate appeared.

"Can you hold me? Just hold me?"

I nodded, "I can do that. Here. We'll use this quilt. Do you feel cold? You're trembling."

I shook the folded blanket at the foot of the bed to open it up before draping it over Rachel. Doing all of it without dropping her or letting her go was difficult, but the death grip she had on my upper arms helped.

Apparently Rachel wasn't in any hurry to let me go.

"Is this better?"

"B-b-better," she agreed, "Not cold. Just---"

Words seemed to fail her. She only shook her head helplessly as tears started to stream down her cheeks.

I was grateful for the lack of scent as I wasn't sure I could handle smelling my mate's blood, sweat, and tears all at once with my wolf newly awakened in my mind. Wynd was trying to catch up with Rayne while I rocked Rachel; I was glad I could tune out the wolves speaking to each other in our minds.

"Wynd and Rayne are glad to be back together again."

Rachel nodded a 'yes' as I slowly smiled at her wider and wider until she was smiling too. I hugged her to me hard and felt blessed when seh hugged me back.

Murmuring into her hair, I promised, "I'm never letting you go again. You're my mate. We belong together. You know that now, right?"

"I know. I don't want to wait either. Mark me. Make me yours again."

Rachel tilted her head to the side to expose her throat to me; Wynd surged to the surface of my mind, sharpening my teeth into fangs and turning my vision red around the edges with the intensity of his need to claim his mate once more.

My teeth sank into her bare neck and, inside, our wolves howled at their reunion.