Kiera's POV

"Easy there, Ghost. You're safe now."

Sable's voice cut through the fog in my head like a lifeline. I tried to sit up, but the world tilted sickeningly, and a sharp pain shot through my neck where something had bitten into it. My hand flew to the spot, finding a small bandage covering what felt like a needle puncture.

"Where…" My voice came out as a croak. I swallowed hard and tried again. "Where am I?"

"Steel Vultures bar," Jack's gravelly voice answered from somewhere to my left. "Back room. You've been out for about six hours."

My vision slowly focused, taking in the familiar surroundings of our makeshift medical bay, just a cot, some basic supplies, and the smell of motor oil and leather that meant home. Jack stood near the door, his weathered face grim, while Big Mike and Razor Eddie flanked him like sentries. They all looked like they'd been through hell, torn clothes, bandaged knuckles, the hollow-eyed exhaustion that came after a serious fight.

Then memory hit me like a sledgehammer.

The warehouse. The trap. Someone grabbing me from behind, the sharp sting in my neck, and…

"Eli!" I bolted upright, ignoring the way my head spun. "Where's Eli? Is he…"

"He's fine." Sable's hands pressed gently but firmly on my shoulders, easing me back down. "He's sleeping in your room. Kid was scared as hell, but he's not hurt."

Relief flooded through me so hard I almost sobbed. "You're sure? He's really okay?"

"Go see for yourself in a minute," she said softly. "But first, you need to tell us what happened out there. One second you two were gone, the next we're getting reports of Black Howl bikes surrounding some abandoned warehouse twenty miles out."

I pressed the heels of my hands against my eyes, trying to piece together the fragments. "It was a trap. Had to be. They found us too fast, like they knew exactly where we were heading."

"How?" Jack's voice was sharp, suspicious. "You covered your tracks. Even we couldn't have followed you that quick."

The mate bond. The golden thread that tied me to Darius whether I wanted it or not. But how could I explain that to humans? How could I make them understand that I carried my own tracking device in the form of supernatural connection?

"I don't know," I lied. "Maybe they had scouts out, maybe they got lucky."

Jack's pale eyes narrowed, and I could tell he didn't believe me. But before he could push, I changed the subject.

"How did you find us? How did you get us out?"

"Wasn't easy," Big Mike rumbled from his position by the door. "Those bastards had the place locked down tight. Must have been thirty bikes surrounding that warehouse."

"We had to get creative," Sable added with a grim smile. "Jack called in some favors. Turns out the Reapers owed us from that job last year, and they were happy to help even the odds."

The Reapers. Another outlaw MC from two towns over, bigger and meaner than the Steel Vultures. If Jack had called them in, things must have been desperate.

"They hit the front while we came in the back," Razor Eddie spoke up for the first time, his quiet voice carrying easily in the small room. "Created enough chaos to grab you and the kid and get out before the wolves could regroup."

"Anyone hurt?" I asked, though I could see the answer in their faces.

"Tommy's got some broken ribs," Jack said flatly. "Couple of the guys needed stitches. Could have been worse."

Could have been, so Tommy came back for me. But it was still my fault. These people had bled for me, had risked everything to pull me out of a trap that never would have existed if I'd stayed gone.

"I'm sorry," I said, and meant it. "This is all my fault. I should never have come back after…"

"Stop." Jack's voice cut me off like a blade. "You don't get to decide that. We knew what we were getting into the moment we took you in five years ago."

"You didn't know about this," I protested. "You didn't know about the wolves, about what I really was…"

"We knew you were running from something bad enough to steal a man's bike and disappear into the night with nothing but the clothes on your back," Sable said firmly. "We knew you were desperate enough to risk everything for your kid. That was enough then, and it's enough now."

But I could see the doubt in some of their faces. Big Mike kept glancing toward the door like he wanted to be anywhere else. Razor Eddie's usually steady hands shook slightly as he lit another cigarette. Even Tommy, who'd apparently made it back despite his broken ribs, looked like he was questioning every life choice that had led him to this moment.

"Jack," I said quietly. "Maybe it's time I moved on. Found somewhere else to…"

"Like hell." His voice was granite-hard, brooking no argument. "You're Steel Vultures. That means something. That means we don't cut and run when things get rough."

"Even when 'rough' means werewolves?" The question came from behind him, and I looked past Jack to see more of the MC members crowding into the doorway. Their faces ranged from worried to outright terrified.

"Especially then," Jack said without turning around.

"Easy for you to say," one of the newer prospects muttered. "You didn't see what those things could do. They moved like... like they weren't human."

"They're not," I said quietly, and the room went dead silent. "They're faster, stronger, more dangerous than anything you've ever fought. And they won't stop coming."

"So what do we do?" Sable asked. "We can't run forever, and we sure as hell can't beat them in a straight fight."

It was the question I'd been dreading, the one I didn't have a good answer for. The Steel Vultures had heart, loyalty, and more courage than any human MC had a right to. But courage didn't stop claws, slow supernatural healing, level the playing field against creatures who could track by scent and communicate across miles through pack bonds.

"We get creative," Jack said before I could respond. "We use our advantages, we know this territory better than they do, we've got friends they don't know about, and we're not bound by their rules."

"What advantages?" Big Mike asked skeptically. "They're fucking werewolves, Jack. What do we got that can match that?"

"We've got something they don't," Sable said suddenly, her eyes lighting up with the kind of dangerous gleam that usually meant she was about to suggest something crazy. "We've got their Luna."

All eyes turned to me, and I felt the weight of their expectation like a physical thing. They were looking at me like I held all the answers, like my supernatural nature made me some kind of secret weapon in this war I'd accidentally started.

The truth was, I felt more powerless than ever. Cut off from my pack for five years, I'd let my wolf side atrophy, had suppressed the very instincts and abilities that might have helped us now. I was Luna in name only, a title without power, a queen without a kingdom.

"They want me back," I said slowly, thinking it through. "Alive, preferably, but they want me back. That gives us some leverage."

"How much leverage?" Jack asked.

I thought about the look in Darius's eyes when he'd seen Eli, the way his whole body had gone still like he was seeing a miracle. "More than you might think. It's not just about me anymore. It's about him claiming his son."

"So we use that," Sable said. "We make them come to us, on our terms."

"And then what?" I asked. "Even if we could somehow beat them in a fight, what about the next pack? What about the ones who'll come looking when the Black Howl doesn't report in?"

The silence stretched long and uncomfortable. Because the truth was, there was no good answer. We were human and wolf, outlaw and pack, two worlds that were never meant to collide. And now that they had, I couldn't see a way out that didn't end in blood.

"One fight at a time," Jack said finally. "That's how we've always done it, and it's how we'll do it now."

I nodded, but inside I was screaming. These people had saved my life, had given me and Eli a home when we had nothing. Now I was going to get them all killed.

Unless I could find another way.

Unless I could give Darius what he wanted before he decided to take it by force.

The thought made me sick, but it was starting to look like the only choice I had left.