“What?” Gentry asked, scrubbing snow on his hands, washing away ashes. He turned a blazing green gaze on Blaire. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, but your step-monster is a lunatic. She talked about stirring up the hive and making you step up, making your brothers stop being evil.”
“Again, we’re not evil!” Asher clipped out, his eyes so silver they were almost white.
“Well, you just dumped your dad’s ashes all over your brothers, so I guess we can just agree to disagree,” Blaire muttered.
“Well…at least I’m not banging outside of my species!” Asher yelled.
“She’s a human, not a hamster. Fuck you,” Gentry said to Asher as he kicked his dirty jacket toward Winter’s Edge.
“Fuck you, too!” Asher said.
“Fuck you both,” Roman said from where he was still scrubbing his mouth with snow.
“You three are a disaster,” Blaire murmured tiredly as she stared at the ashes that painted the snow.
Roman spat in the snow and leaned back on his folded legs. “Well, now we can all survive if we just get out of town in time to avoid the Bone-Ripper Pack.”
That sounded terrifying. “Bone-Rippers?” Blaire asked in a much smaller voice than she’d intended.
“I’m leaving,” Asher muttered as he walked past. “See you idiots at the next funeral.”
Gentry was staring at Blaire, his eyes sparking like green fire. He exhaled deeply through clenched teeth. “I’m not leaving.” He’d said it at normal volume, but it sounded loud in the silence of the evening woods.
“What?” Asher said, turning a furious gaze on his brother.
“If you saw the pack, you would understand. I’m not running. I can’t.” He looked at his brothers. “You two know as well as I do that Rhett will drive the people here into the ground. Not just the pack either, but the humans in this town. So they found out about me and Blaire. I made the decision already that I wouldn’t be able to hide her. Wolf won’t let me shove her in a den. He’s proud of her. I’m proud of her. So, she’s human…” Gentry shrugged one shoulder up and arched his eyebrow in an I-don’t-give-a-single-fuck expression.
“Rules, Gentry,” Asher barked out.
“Rules are for packs, Asher. I like her. I want her. Wolf won’t have anyone else. She’s human. Sucks. I wish she was a wolf, but she isn’t.”
“Rhett will put out a kill order,” Roman said from where he sat in the snow.
“Rhett can try to kill me.” Gentry’s voice was low and growly, like a demon’s voice. He stood with his back to the dark woods, fists clenched, shoulders bulging against his tight sweater. “I’m not Dad.”
“He killed Dad in an alpha challenge,” Asher said, like that made murder all right.
Gentry shook his head slowly. “I don’t think so. I think he killed him human. I think it was a coup to take the pack and done in the shadows.”
“What?” Roman barked out, horror etched into his face.
Asher muttered a curse and paced away, then back. “Do you have proof?”
“Not yet.”
Asher linked his hands behind his neck and shook his head for a long time as he stared off into the woods, but at last, he said, “So what’s your plan, Favorite?”
“To take back the town.”
Asher and Roman let off twin laughs that echoed through the forest. “As a rogue?”
“No. As three rogues.”
The smiles fell from both Asher and Roman’s faces.
“Nope. Not doing this. Uh-uh. I’m leaving,” they both said, stumbling over each other’s words. Roman stood and strode for the front of Winter’s Edge.
“Stay just until we can get a new alpha in place. Just until we can avenge Dad.” Gentry grabbed Blaire’s hand as he passed and murmured, “This involves you now, Trouble. Come on.”
“And who do you suggest we put on the throne of the Bone-Rippers?” Asher asked over his shoulder.
“Tim. Nelda. Hell, Mila would be better than Rhett.”
“Oh, good, a submissive alpha,” Roman said sarcastically as he lengthened his stride. “She’ll love that job.”
“Okay stop!” Gentry demanded.
Roman and Asher gave matching snarls and turned on Gentry. They looked terrifying, but when Blaire looked up at Gentry, he looked wilder than all of them. Profile rigid, eyes glowing, face twisted in some fearsome look she’d never seen.
“The Bone-Rippers will be at the Four Horsemen tonight. Eleven o’clock, and they should be gathered. One hour there and then make your decision whether to stay or go, and I won’t stop you. I won’t try to persuade you. I’ll let you go back to your lives, and we can go right back to the way it was. Just…give me one hour before you decide.”