Finding My Breaking Point Read online

  I easily invaded the barrier I had placed around the trespasser to explore the magic that she held. On the surface, she felt like a wolf with an average amount of power. Any human ancestors that she may have had were a least three or four generations past, which made her close to a full-blooded wolf but not quite as powerful. I dug deeper, looking for any hidden wells of magic that she might be trying to conceal, but after searching through every crevice, I found nothing. I was confident that this was a regular wolf, not another fae in disguise.

  I dropped my hands and took a step back. “She isn’t anything more than a wolf,” I announced out loud. I looked down to where she laid in the sand. Her panting had slowed, but she looked frightened and was glancing nervously between the two twins. “I need you to shift so we can talk,” I told her gently. “We’re not going to hurt you.”

  She looked up and searched my eyes hopefully before giving a wolf nod and getting to her four feet. She closed her eyes and changed to her human form as we had instructed her to, so I hurriedly pulled Cody’s hoodie over my head and dropped my barrier long enough to toss it to her. She pulled it on to hide her nudity and tugged her mass of wavy brown hair from underneath the collar.

  “Just because she isn’t fae, doesn’t mean she’s not dangerous,” Mason told me. “We need to be cautious-”

  “I know,” I interrupted him. “We can be nice until we have to be mean. But if we start off as mean, she’ll never believe the nice. Believe me, I don’t trust her.”

  Mason grunted in acknowledgment.

  “What’s your name?” I asked the girl softly.

  She licked her lips and darted her eyes at Jason still circling her before answering. “Emily.” She looked to be in her late teens with a pretty face and wavy long brown hair. She was a couple inches shorter than me but still taller than the average human female.

  “State your business here,” Mason said coldly.

  She shrank down and hunched her slender shoulders in. “I was looking for Anna,” she mumbled. “Jessica said I could find her here.”

  The twins exchanged glances. I knew Jessica was definitely the wrong name to mention to them. Jessica was a wolf who had been sent to Seaside by Austin’s father long before I had come here. Mr. Zilker had intended her to be Austin’s mate, but she had spent her time in Seaside terrorizing the entire pack with her outrageous demands and princess attitude. The twins had both been frequent victims of her abuse, and that experience had colored their view of female wolves. Initially, they had not been pleased when Austin told them he was bringing another female into the pack – me. But they had warmed up to me once we spent some time together and they had been among the first wolves in the pack to accept me and show me what it really meant to be a wolf. Much to her delight, Jessica was now pregnant by Austin’s brother, Justin.

  “You’re in the Zilker Pack?” Jason asked unsympathetically.

  Emily nodded but didn’t say anything else, probably because the twins had her too scared.

  “Why don’t we go inside?” I suggested. “We can find Emily some clothes and sit down to talk about why you’re here.” I gave Emily a warm smile to try and soothe her nerves. I had offered to help Jessica through her pregnancy, so I could only guess that Emily was here for a similar reason.

  “Why were you running down the beach in your wolf form?” I asked curiously as we walked along the path back to the house. I kept a barrier around Emily as we walked because I was still paranoid and didn’t want to take any chances. My instincts told me that she was harmless, but I wasn’t going to bet the twins’ lives on it. I’d be friendly towards her, but I’d also be ready in case of an attack.

  Emily blushed. “I knew your home was somewhere along the beach, but I wasn’t sure exactly where, so I was looking for your scents to lead me to you.”

  “You shouldn’t have exposed yourself like that,” Mason chided her. “You should have stayed out of sight - anyone out on the ocean or walking through the forest could have seen you. We aren’t the only ones out here.”

  “I’m sorry,” Emily whispered as she kept her head down.

  “Do you have a bag of clothes hidden somewhere nearby?” I asked. We might want to retrieve her things before someone else got to them. Austin’s property extended out to the beach, but he had chosen a home that was set back into the woods instead of right on the beach to give our pack more privacy. There was a short path that led across the lawn, through the forest, and out across the sand so the ocean was never far. But if you weren’t sure exactly where to look on the beach, it might take you a while to search our property line to find the path back to our house.

  Emily shook her head at my question. “Not really. I didn’t want anyone to realize that I was leaving, so I didn’t bring anything but the clothes on my back. I left those a few miles from the bus stop near the park.”

  The twins exchanged glances. “I thought you said Jessica sent you?” Mason asked.

  “Um…” Emily bit her lip. “It’s kind of complicated.”

  “Okay,” I told her before the twins could interject. “We’re going to get you some clothes and some food, but you have to tell us everything.”

  “I don’t think we should let her in the house until Austin gives the okay,” Mason told me with the bond.

  “She won’t be able to get into the house if she means us harm,” I reminded him. “Think of this as a test.” With the help of Talen and my father, I had placed two barriers on our property. The first covered our big chunk of land around the house and would merely give an alarm if someone came through that meant us harm. That alarm hadn’t gone off when Emily crossed onto our territory, so I didn’t think she was a threat. The second barrier would physically prevent anyone who meant us harm from coming into our house. I could make that one stronger because it covered a much smaller space.

  The barriers weren’t fool-proof. One major problem with them had been that they protected anyone who had been inside them when they went up. Gemma had already been in the house, so the wards had recognized her as someone to be protected, not as a potential threat. My father had also been here while we put up the wards, so I couldn’t trust it to protect us against him. Another major problem was that they read intentions. Someone could come in with the intention to just talk but change their mind once they were inside. Because of this, we kept the details of the barrier a secret. We didn’t want to give away the trick to getting past them. I had been very naïve to think that the barriers would keep us safe in our home, but Gemma had taught me the error of my ways.

  Emily walked into the house without causing a problem, and I gave a small sigh of relief. So far, she didn’t appear to be a threat to us. But that didn’t mean that she hadn’t been sent here to cause trouble for us. I dropped the barrier around her because it was taking too much of my energy to both maintain it as she moved and to keep it hidden from her. But just because I was releasing her from my magical prison didn’t mean that I trusted her.

  “Jase, would you mind grabbing some stuff for Emily out of my room?” I asked sweetly. He shot me a ‘are you kidding me right now’ look. “Mace and I can keep an eye on Emily for a couple minutes.” He crossed his arms in defiance until Mason intervened. I couldn’t hear their discussion through their bond, but Jason ran upstairs with a scowl.

  “Are you hungry?” I asked Emily. I didn’t know how long she had been out running, but she was probably low on reserves after shifting twice in a short amount of time. The more magic a wolf had, the easier the shift was for us. A powerful alpha could shift back and forth effortlessly in a short amount of time, but a wolf with a recent human ancestor would struggle.

  Emily’s head perked up. “Well, if it’s not too much trouble? I was too nervous to eat breakfast this morning.”

  I glanced over at the clock, which showed it was almost two o’clock in the afternoon. “I would be starving right now if I were you.” I walked into the kitchen and started pulling sandwich stuff out of the fridge. “Ma
ce, you want roast beef?”

  “I can get it,” he grumbled. “Have a seat.” He pointed Emily to one of the stools. “Stay there, and don’t move.”

  Her eyes widened at his gruffness, and I could see her pulling at the sleeves of her borrowed hoodie nervously as she climbed onto the tall barstool at the counter. “So, Emily,” I said nicely, trying to put her at ease as I started to put together sandwiches for her and Jason. “What brought you to Seaside?”

  She chewed on her lip nervously. “I’m due to go into heat soon,” she blurted out. My eyebrows raised. I had been expecting her to tell me that she was pregnant and ask for help with keeping the babe. What could she want if she wasn’t here for that?

  “We’re not in the market for any females,” Mason interrupted. “And we’re certainly not in the business of impregnating wolves as young as you.”

  Emily blushed. “I just turned eighteen.”

  “Exactly,” Mason grumbled.

  Jason thundered back down the stairs and threw some pants, a hoodie, and socks at Emily. To my relief, they were pieces of clothing that actually belonged to me. I had gotten in the habit of frequently stealing hoodies and sweats from the other guys instead of wearing my own clothes. None of them really minded because it meant that I was wearing their scent, but I wouldn’t have been comfortable with Jason giving Emily some of his or Mason’s clothes to wear.

  “Guys, turn around so she can have some privacy,” I chastised them. Jason sighed and turned around, but Mason glared at her for another moment before doing the same. Emily slipped into the pants first before taking off Cody’s hoodie and replacing it with one of mine. “Okay, you can look,” I told the guys as I took Cody’s hoodie back from Emily but hesitated to put it back on. Her scent was now on it, and I didn’t like the way it had mingled with Cody’s masculine musk. I tried to focus on Cody’s scent to calm me down, but I had to fight the urge to throw the hoodie across the room.

  I didn’t even realize I was growling under my breath until Mason came over to rub my back. “Sorry,” I said with an embarrassed blush.

  “It’s not really a good time to have strange females in the house,” Jason told Emily.

  “Oh, you haven’t gone into heat yet either?” Emily asked me.

  I shook my head. “No. For me, it’s usually between Christmas and New Year’s Day.” I looked at Mason in confusion. Would that really be affecting how I felt about Emily? I hadn’t grown up in a pack, and I had lived in fear of meeting another wolf for my entire life. I had only met the guys in Seaside a few months ago, so this would be my first time going into heat around other wolves. To say I was nervous and apprehensive would be an understatement. I wasn’t really sure what to expect.

  For most of my life, I had tried to keep the part of me that was a wolf repressed so that I could blend into human society. It worked well enough that I had managed to convince myself that ‘my wolf’ wasn’t really a part of me, but more of a foreign presence. The guys had helped me to realize that my wolf instincts were an essential part of who I was. It had taken a while, but I had managed to truly accept those parts of me that made me different from humans.

  Mason pulled out a stool on the opposite side of the counter for me. I pushed the plate with the sandwich I had made for Jason towards him before taking the seat that Mason had pulled out for me. Neither of the twins sat, they both stayed alert as Emily took a bite of her sandwich. “This is really good,” she said with a grin. “Thanks!”

  “Why would you come here if you’re about to go into heat?” I prodded Emily.

  She swallowed the bite she had been chewing before answering. “Because I’m not ready to have pups,” she said quietly. “It’s not that I’m unwilling to, eventually.” She looked up at me. “It’s just…”

  “Not the right time?” I suggested.

  “Yeah.” Emily nodded. “Everyone knows that pregnancy is risky. I just want a little more time to live life before…you know.”

  I sighed sadly. I did know. Female wolves were fewer than males because they often didn’t survive childbirth, and female pups were born less often than males. All of that made female wolves a valuable commodity in our world. In some packs, they were treated like queens and given everything they could ever want in return for bearing the next generation of wolves. In other packs, females were treated little better than slaves and bred until they died.

  “Have you talked to Justin about it?” I asked her. Justin was an asshole, but surely he wouldn’t allow teenagers to be raped in his pack.

  Emily picked at the remnants of her sandwich. “He’s the one that wants to mate with me.”

  I gasped in surprise while the twins had looks of disgust on their faces. Neither of them was a huge fan of Justin. He and Austin were brothers by blood, but they had a complicated and challenging relationship. When Justin had taken over his pack after their father went missing, some pack members had wanted to defect to Seaside, which had only added to the tension between them. Justin had blamed Austin for undermining him and trying to steal his wolves.

  “What about Jessica?” I asked. The last time I had spoken to her, she had thought that Justin was going to make her his official mate now that she was pregnant with his pups.

  “Well, she’s not happy about it. But Justin’s the pack master.”

  “Hmmm.” That explains why Jessica would be willing to send Emily here: she wanted to get rid of her competition. But having Emily here put us in a tough situation. Justin had already accused Austin of trying to steal wolves from his pack. If we tried to keep Emily with us, Justin could bring this to the council. Stealing a young unmated female from her pack was a major crime in our world. But forcing her to mate with the pack master? I didn’t hold out much hope that the men on the council would be on Austin’s side. Once I told Austin what was happening, of course.

  While I was learning that it was common for male wolves to share a female, I wasn’t sure how often a male would have multiple females. It seemed like it might cause problems with other males in the pack who felt jealous or bereft because they were left without a mate, and especially if the pack master forbid them from having relationships with humans. But personally, I didn’t see a problem with a male having multiple females if everyone in the relationship was happy. I would never have expected to find myself with multiple mates, but it was honestly the best thing that had ever happened to me. I loved my guys with every part of my heart and soul and couldn’t picture my life without any one of them.

  “What did Jessica expect us to do about it?” Jason asked rudely.

  Emily looked at me with tears in her pleading eyes. “She thought Anna could help.”

  “How?” Mason asked. “You belong in the Zilker Pack. Justin isn’t going to let you walk away from him without a fight. Does she want us to go to war with them over you?”

  “Well, we’re not going to stand by and let Justin start raping teenagers,” I interrupted. “Austin will be back in a couple of hours, and we’ll decide what to do then.”

  “I already texted him.” Caleb’s voice appeared a moment before he did. Caleb was leaner than the twins with more of a swimmer’s body. He was the sweetest of my wolves, with warm brown eyes and soft brown hair. He was also the tech expert for the pack and all-around computer genius.

  “He and Cody are cutting inspections short and heading back now,” Caleb said with an embarrassed shrug. Austin and Cody had gone to inspect the new housing that we had put together for our pack members who were returning from the middle east this week. One of the significant sources of income for the pack was Austin’s military contracting company that provided jobs for a good number of our ex-military pack members. Austin had decided not to bid on another contract when the current one expired and instead bring everyone home to Seaside.

  Caleb smiled at me and came over to give me a hug before greeting Emily. A part of me was delighted that he had come to me first instead of immediately inspecting the new arrival. I gave him a kiss
on the cheek before offering him the second half of the sandwich Mason had made for me, and he took it with a happy grin.

  I felt James coming with our bond before he even made it halfway up our driveway – and he was not happy. “Did you also text James?”

  Caleb gave a sheepish shrug. “You know he would kill me if I didn’t.”

  James was tall, dark, and deadly. He was prior military - just like the rest of the pack - but not even Caleb could get into his mostly blacked out file. He was the second in command in our pack but left the warm and friendly parts of the job up to Austin and Cody. James was in charge of security for the pack, and he oversaw most of the military operations. He was also an asshole to the majority of people he came across.

  James stalked into the house, and I hurriedly got to my feet to intercept him. I didn’t want Emily to be completely terrified. “James,” I called out as I rushed towards him. “I’m glad you’re back.” He allowed me to stop him with a hand but glared at Emily over my shoulder. “James.” I tried to bring his attention back to me.

  “Anna.” He glanced over me quickly, as if inspecting me for any damage. His nostrils flared briefly as he must have caught Emily’s scent mixed with Cody’s on my hoodie. He gently tried to move me aside, but I clung to his arm like a stubborn barnacle. He must have decided it was a lost cause to free himself from me because he instead turned his glare on the twins. “What the fuck? You two shitheads need to get your heads out of your asses. Letting Zilker wolves waltz in here?”

  “I invited Emily in,” I interrupted. “She came to us for help.” I kept my eyes on James, not willing to let go of him until I calmed his temper. His glower was intense to even the most bad ass wolves in our pack, and I didn’t want Emily to be so afraid that she felt she couldn’t trust us to help her.