“Even if Emerson Elliot asks you to Turn her, you can’t.”
“Well…can I marry her?” he asked. “Can Emerson take my last name?”
Officer Holman looked sick as she shook her head, and Emerson’s face crumbled as twin tears streamed down her cheeks. No. No, no, no. She dashed away the dampness under her eyes with the back of her hand. “But he’s mine,” she said in a pitiful voice. “This isn’t fair.”
“This isn’t my doing,” Holman said. “You have caught the attention of people who are much higher up than me. We’re only here to keep the peace.” She pulled a pad of paper from her pocket and scribbled across it.
“What are you doing?” Brackeen asked in a harsh voice.
“Stand down,” Holman barked out when he got too close to her. Illuminated by blue moonlight reflecting off the river, the tough-looking woman ripped off the piece of paper and folded it in half, then approached Emerson slowly, exposing her neck to Bash. Holman lifted her eyebrows high and gave Emerson a loaded look she didn’t understand. “If you have any questions about changes in the laws, call me on my cell phone. Here.” She shoved it in Emerson’s palm and backed away. “Or you can come talk to us at our post. We’re located right off the main road on the boundary of Damon’s land.” Holman twitched her gaze to the paper in Emerson’s clenched fist, then back to Emerson’s face. To the others, she said, “I’m sorry we had to introduce ourselves to all of you like this. We just arrived at our post to a missing person’s report and thought Ms. Elliot was in trouble. Damon, we need to set up a meeting—”
“Maybe tomorrow,” the dark-headed, silver-eyed dragon shifter ground out. “Tonight my people have been dealt a blow.” He leveled the officers with a dead look and said, “Leave now, and next time you enter my land unannounced, it would benefit you to keep your weapons holstered.”
“Is that a threat?” Brackeen asked. “Huh?”
Holman grabbed him by his vest and shoved him toward the trees.
“Or else what, dragon?” Brackeen shouted over his shoulder.
“Or else he’ll chomp your ass,” Willa shouted from across the river. “Right Beaston?”
“Chomp,” Beaston agreed in a deep, echoing timbre from the shadows of the trees.
Glowing green eyes and a Cheshire cat grin were all Emerson could see of Beaston in the dim light, and another wave of chills blasted up her arms. She didn’t even want to know what the Gray Backs meant by that.
Holman looked like she would retch, but instead she murmured, “I’m really sorry,” right before she and her partner disappeared into the woods.
Hands shaking, Emerson unfolded the paper and squinted at the dark scrawl across the center of the note. It wasn’t Holman’s phone number.
Call Cora Keller of the Breck Crew.
Chapter Seventeen
“Cora is going to call us back from a burner phone,” Harrison muttered as he continued to pace the gravel in front of his trailer.
Bash sat heavily on the porch stairs and pulled Emerson into his lap, apparently as unconcerned with getting dressed as the rest of them. Dicks everywhere, but Emerson didn’t have enough mental energy to be embarrassed. Shifters cared nothing for modesty. Even Audrey was tits out right now as she sank down next to Bash. She was crying, so Emerson held her hand.
When Audrey looked up at her with those big brown eyes, she looked so sad. “You won’t get to be bound to Bash, and I won’t get to be a Boarlander.”
“What do you mean?” Emerson asked, sitting up straighter in Bash’s lap.
“I haven’t registered with them officially yet. We were going to all go to the courthouse and do a big celebration afterward, but now, I’ll remain listed as a lone shifter with my old address. Crewless.”
“Oh, my gosh,” Emerson whispered. She’d only been thinking about how this new rule affected her and Bash, but Audrey and Harrison were being cut deeply, too. She’d waited her whole life to find a crew like this, and now she wouldn’t be an official Boarlander.
Harrison looked gut-punched as he approached Audrey. She didn’t get up from her seat on the stairs, so he pulled his mate against his leg. Audrey rested her cheek on him and let off the most heartbroken sob.
The phone rang, and Harrison’s voice broke as he answered, “Hello?” Clearing his throat, he put it on speaker phone.
“Harrison, I didn’t know you were pairing up or I would’ve talked to you about this as soon as it began happening last night,” Cora said. “The government knows.”