Blackwing Wolf (Kane's Mountains Book 2) (11 page)

“No, no.” He shook his head hard. “Not me. But if something happens to me...”

She hated the sound of that. “Like what?”

“Or, you know, you might back out when you figure out who I really am.”

Emma smiled up at him. “Silly wolf, don’t you know?”

Dustin cocked his head. “Know what?”

Sliding her hands up his shoulders, she murmured, “I see you. The real you. Maybe the crew doesn’t yet, but I do. You didn’t hide well enough from me.”

Dustin searched her face with an unfathomable expression. His eyes glowed with such beautiful intensity, it threatened to take her breath away. He signed clumsily,
If I could have my way, I would give this all to you.

You will
, she signed back slowly in the simple alphabet so he could understand her.

His chest rose with his deep inhalation, and he pulled her into a hug, stood their swaying them gently from side to side in the middle of their pretend house as they watched the sun setting over the mountains. Dusk was putting on quite the show tonight. The sky was painted in soft yellows and pinks, and thin clouds dotted the horizon. The two towering mountains behind the trailer park created a perfect valley between them to watch the sun sink to the horizon.

Dustin sat on the concrete, right in the middle of what would hopefully someday be their living room, and pulled her down between his legs. It wasn’t often Dustin got quiet, and she would have worried except he was still touching her. He was still showing her affection, and the glowing in his eyes had faded with each passing minute.

Emma relaxed her shoulder blades against his chest as he wrapped his arms around her and settled his cheek against hers. “I got you something,” he said against her ear.

“A present?”

One nod. “I had all these plans for when I said ‘I love you’ for the first time, but earlier, it just felt like the right time.”

“It was,” she said. “It was perfect. I’ll never forget it.”

Dustin was quiet for a minute before he said, “Do you know what werewolves say about home?”

Emma shook her head.

“Home is where you rest your bones. It’s not a specific place, or person, or even somewhere permanent. Wolves roam. Packs roam. Settling territories is hard because no one wants us near their towns. And rightly so. We tend to ruin things. When I was growing up, we moved every year from rental home to rental home. I hated that the pack was always on the move, and my parents had to take us wherever the alpha decided. It’s not like with crews, you understand? There’s no working together unless we are hunting. There is the alpha’s law, and you just hope to get into a pack with a good alpha who will keep you alive longer. Pack is for survival, not for a happy life. There aren’t a lot of mated pairs for werewolves. What woman is going to put up with our shit? Most of the girls in the pack I grew up in were turned against their will and had nowhere else to go. They were always scared. Skittish. It’s how I thought women were supposed to be. My mom was one of them. Weak around my dad, strong for me and my brother. She understood the need for her sons to be dominant in the pack so we could be safe, and when I came along…” Dustin swallowed hard. “She wasn’t disappointed in me. She was disappointed that my life would be stunted. She could see my future. So could my dad, so could my brother, so could I. So she made sure I had the best shot possible to survive into adulthood. She pushed me in school where she didn’t with my dominant brother. It was hard because we were moving around so much, but she devoted herself to making sure I got the best education. Good schools, college—she was relentless. At the time, I didn’t understand why until Axton chose me for the pack he was building. Me, a submissive, and Axton was one of the most dominant wolves in the world at the time.”

“Why did he pick you?”

“Because I built a business that could support his pack.”

Emma turned her back on the sunset and settled between his legs facing him. “You funded your pack?”

Dustin nodded. “That’s what has kept me alive this long. I built teams of marketers, elite teams, and sold their services to huge corporations. That’s how I started out. It was beneficial to the teams because I could negotiate more money for them, and beneficial for me because I made huge commissions on each team I successfully sold to these companies. So if one of the pack lost a job, or had a hard time paying bills, or fuck, just didn’t want to work, I took care of them.”

Whoa, this was unexpected. Dustin was thoroughly educated and a clever businessman. All of his perverted jokes and lack of seriousness had thrown her way off track. “That’s how you afford your car.”

He huffed a laugh and rested his elbows on her bent knees, linked his hands behind her back. “That’s the one splurge I ever did for just me. Axton was pissed that I wasted pack money, but I didn’t care on this one. I earned all that money and fed it into the pack as an investment on my survival, but I wanted a fast car. I wanted somewhere I could just cruise when shit got too heavy. I wanted a place to sleep when we were moving around and fighting like fucking…well…werewolves.”

“Axton moved you around a lot?”

“Yeah, his reputation preceded him wherever we went to claim territory. He is a bulldozer and a killer. He’s killed a dozen of our own kind just to get to where he is, but that’s what alphas do.”

“Kane didn’t do that.”

“Kane’s not a werewolf. The culture is different, Emma. We’re separate from other shifters.”

Emma ran her knuckles along the short scruff on his jawline and rested her cheek against his arm. “Home is where you rest your bones. Sounds like a sad life to never understand what a real home is.”

Dustin stared off into the woods and shook his head. “I never knew what I was missing, and I never cared until I met you. Until I came here and saw how a crew could work. How it could be under Kane.”

“You want that now?”

He dipped his chin once. “When I was a kid, my mom, she planted flowers everywhere at every rental house we moved into. We would stay there a year tops, so she would never get to see her gardens in full bloom, and it was kind of tragic, you know? She was so sad with my dad, but she was all smiles when we would work in her gardens. I think she was bright before my dad put a wolf in her. One of those naturally happy people, like you and Winter and Rowan. So, growing up, each house we would move to, I would make a wish for my mom. Every time the clock turned to the number 11:11 or 10:10, I would put my finger on the numbers, close my eyes, and wish we could stay in a house long enough for my mom to see her garden in bloom.”

Emma’s eyes prickled with tears at the imaginings of Dustin as a sweet child, making wishes for his momma. “Did it ever work?”

Dustin’s lips pursed into a thin line, the expression at odds with his naturally smiling face. He shook his head. “Not in time. She stopped gardening when I was in college. She just…quit. Stopped smiling, stopped laughing. And anyway, my parents’ pack is still on the move. It’s the way the alpha likes to operate, so they do what he says. I asked her once what her favorite flower was. I remember we were in this rental house up in Portland, and it rained a lot while we were there, but that day, it was sunny. I was weeding. God, I was always weeding with her because it was mindless work and she was nice to me. She didn’t shame me for being submissive, so I was squatted down in the dirt, maybe ten years old, and I asked her, ‘Mom, what’s your favorite flower?’ She was standing beside me, the sun behind her like a halo, making her look beautiful, like an angel, and she smiled so big. It had been a bad week with Dad, and I’d missed her smile. She pointed to this green vine with these little purple flowers that looked like trumpets. Morning Glories, she called them. She said they were her favorite because they only opened up during the day when the sun was out. At night, the flowers closed up so they could keep the darkness away.”

Dustin reached into his back pocket and handed her a packet of Morning Glory seeds. “Last night I wished on 10:10 and 11:11 that I could plant you a garden here, and that I would live long enough to watch it bloom with you.” When his eyes filled with deep emotion, he blinked hard, then stood. “I’m going to grab a beer. Do you want anything?” His voice cracked on the last word.

Emma didn’t understand what was happening. “Dustin, you
will
live long enough, you silly wolf. Your wish will come true.”

“You don’t understand,” he gritted out. He angled his face away from her, and his teeth were clenched now. “Those wishes never come true.” He dipped his blazing gaze to the packet of seeds in her hand, then turned and strode for the trailer without looking back.

And now Emma was left with this hollow feeling, as if he’d given her all of his secrets and none of them, all at once.

Pocket buzzing incessantly, Dustin’s phone went off again. Only the Valdoro pack and the Blackwing Crew had this number, and he’d just spent all evening with the Blackwings, so it wasn’t them calling. He couldn’t put this off any longer.

He’d avoided Axton and Jace’s calls like the plague over the last few days, ever since they’d seen him and Emma in the woods. Ever since they’d called him, howling, drawing his wolf back. If Emma hadn’t been there distracting him, Axton would’ve succeeded. He would’ve dragged Dustin right back to him, and hurt Emma. Jace would have hurt her too, if Axton commanded it. They didn’t care about hurting women. They didn’t care about anything.

And once upon a time, Dustin had convinced himself he was the same as them. As if he was exactly like all the other psychotic werewolves in the world—normal for a wolf, even if he’d always been on the fringe. But over the past couple of weeks, such a strong desire to protect not only Emma, but the other Blackwings, had presented inside of him. He really was a broken wolf.

Somewhere in their history, wolves had separated themselves from other shifters and began culling their submissives. And without people to protect, their wolves had gone mad with bloodlust that, honestly, werewolves didn’t put much effort into controlling.

And Axton was the most dangerous of all.

Oh, Dustin had grown up with him. He’d watched him mature from a rambunctious pup to a heartless alpha who functioned best with blood on his hands.

It wasn’t as if Dustin had been ignoring the danger. On the contrary, he’d been watching Emma like a hawk. Stalking her like Beast had stalked him, but not for the same reasons. He was on a mission to keep her safe no matter the cost. Because if Emma didn’t exist in this world, it was nothing but a dark and empty place. Like Axton’s soul.

Dustin was going to die tonight.

He ran his hands through his hair and rested his elbows on his knees. He was sitting on the foot of his bed in the motel room. He’d been given one job by his pack, one that could’ve saved his brother—vengeance. And he couldn’t do it. Not anymore. Somewhere along the way, he’d grown this bond with the Blackwings and sewn his soul to Emma. Axton had called him a grenade. His brother had told him he would destroy the Blackwings, and therefore the Bloodrunners, from the inside out. Axton said he would tell him when to pull the pin, but now it was his pack who would lose out.

Dustin was nobody’s grenade.

He would die before he hurt the people he’d grown to care about in Kane’s Mountains. He’d die a thousand deaths before he hurt Emma.

She was confused. He’d put on the show for the rest of the night after he’d given her the Morning Glory seeds. He’d joked and annoyed the shit out of the Blackwings. God, he wanted a few more days with her, and with his new friends. Friends? Werewolves didn’t have fucking friends. They had pack. This crew shit had messed with his head so thoroughly he didn’t understand where he belonged anymore. Where he fit. Maybe he fit nowhere. Perhaps he’d always fit nowhere.

You fit with her.

His wolf was a wise one. He’d always had a level head for a monster. Dustin wanted to scream and trash the hotel room. He wanted to rip up the mattress, claw at the walls, overturn the furniture, ruin this room as his last act. But a flash of Emma’s journal flickered through his mind. It was the picture of him striding for her, desperation to hold her written all over his face.
I know you’re still good.

His last few hours should be a gift for Emma. She didn’t realize it yet, but she would. Emma deserved so much better than him. What was the point of feeding the anger and trashing the room as his last defiant act? It wasn’t fair he’d met her so close to the end or he’d gotten a glimpse of a happy life with the Blackwing Crew before he got his throat ripped out for real this time. But then again, life wasn’t fair.

He was going to miss everything. Emma turning vamp, her coming into her own power, the Blackwings solidifying into one badass, albeit fucked-up, crew. He would miss holding Emma every night and being there when she cried. He would miss hearing her sing. He would miss her big green eyes looking up at him like he was worth a damn. Her little heart-shaped birthmark on the inside of her elbow, the way she shifted her weight when she was flattered by something he’d said, how cute her ears were, even when she had the aids in. Her blushes, tits, wit, strength, curves, happy smiles, sad smiles, hair blowing in her face when the breeze hit her just right, her in firefly woods, her graceful hands as she signed to cuss him out or tell him she loved him.

He was going to miss her love.

Fuck. Dustin swallowed the howl of agony that clawed up the back of his throat and forced himself to stand. He pulled the phone from his back pocket as it vibrated again. “What?” he snarled out.

“Pack meeting, asshole,” Jace said. “Bring the girl.”

There was snarling in the background, the crazy kind.

“I don’t have a girl.”

“Fucking lie! If your voice didn’t give you away, the fact you haven’t answered our damn calls for three days does. And if both of those failed, we saw you fuck her, Dustin. Except it wasn’t fucking, was it? You were bonding to her. You were making love, like the stupid fuck you are.”

The snarling got louder. Axton was bad off. Jace was lucky to still be breathing. Axton was the grenade, and his pin had been pulled the day the Bloodrunner Dragon had destroyed the pack. Dustin used to hate Harper Keller for what she’d done, but now he could see it clearly. She’d defended that girl, Lexi. She’d avenged Axton and the pack’s attempted murder on her. Dustin would’ve done the same thing if the pack hunted Emma, and he wasn’t even her damn alpha. He’d wanted to save his brother, but now he could see Axton had brought all of these consequences on himself. He was the one who had gotten his pack burned and eaten by the Bloodrunner Dragon. It wasn’t Harper’s fault. It was Axton’s.

“Dustin! I swear to God if you don’t answer me now, we are coming to that shitty motel and dragging your bitch out by her hair. Fucking meet us. Two hours. Same spot we always meet. Just you and the girl, do you understand me?”

Dustin stared at a framed watercolor of a man in a boat fishing all alone on a pond. “Two hours, I’ll be there.” He ended the call.

There was no way in hell he would bring Emma to Axton. She was human and fragile, his to protect. He didn’t want her anywhere near when he went to battle to earn his freedom from the Valdoro pack. He wanted her to live. No, he
needed
it. She had to exist. He could go to hell easier if he took the rest of the pack with him into the flames. If he died for a reason—protecting Emma, the Blackwings, and the Bloodrunners—he could stomach leaving that sliver of happiness that had settled into his life over the last weeks.

Two hours.

Two hours to say goodbye.

When the alarm dinged on his phone, he looked down.
10:10
. Time to make a wish, and he better make this one count.

I wish Emma happiness when I’m gone.