I pressed hand to my belly, it was cramping but my eyes were on the male crouching beside me, blood coating his mouth and down his neck. My heartbeat pounded in my head, throbbing in my neck as I started at him.

He killed him.

Brandt had found me, caught me, and now he was dead. The male who had tormented hundreds, if not thousands, of shifters, attacked packs, ate humans, raped, pillaged, murdered, was dead. It was so... easy. The male had taken his throat, had ripped it out and now Brandt was dead. My eyes fell onto where his large body was pale and still on the forest floor.

Dead.

I kept expecting him to wake up, to move, to breathe, but he lay there, still and unmoving. Dead. Just like that. No fight, no challenge, simply gone, his throat torn out. He was dead

I could barely hear Luiz and another cramp in my belly had me wincing. Fucking thing, stupid fucking thing. It had started cramping and that's what had Brandt catching me. I couldn't keep running, I had fallen, and he decided to end the chase. I could still feel the terror in my veins as he had straddled my body, undoing his jeans.

He had smelled of sweat, booze, and the sourness of evil.

But now he was dead.

"Ezekiel, is that really you?" Luiz's words filtered into my head and I blinked at the hulking male who crouched beside me, his flat green eyes starting at my brother, a low growl rattling his chest. He was large, heavily muscled, scarred too. There was one on his face, from his forehead to his cheek, skipping over his eye. I tried to see Ezekiel in his form. It had been years since I had last seen him. Over ten years for sure. "Madre luna... it has to be."

I shifted, trying to sit up a bit more and his hand snapped out. I flinched but he didn't touch me, his hand hovered firmly, as if he were silently telling me not to move. His dominance was strong and I hesitated. "What the fuck happened?" Luiz seemed to be at a loss and his eyes landed on me. "Julieta..."

I swallowed hard and winced. "Brandt came after me." It was all I could say.

"You should have wait-"

"He came after me, Luiz. Kreegan was fucking dead and he came after me. There was no waiting!" I hissed the words out, my hand pressing harder to my belly as the baby shifted and I felt another cramp. "Do you think I wouldn't have wanted to wait? That I wanted to be chased all over when I'm fucking like this?" I gestured to my belly, agitation filling me up. "He came after me, Luiz. I had no choice!" She knew her brother was scared, he did his best to protect her, always had, but this wasn't her fault.

"But what happened?" He gestured and I closed my eyes slightly, swallowing hard.

"He got me down and now... he's dead." I opened my eyes again and looked at the large male. He hadn't taken his eyes off Luiz despite the growling that had stopped slightly. Even that hand he had held up to stop me, stayed in the air. He barely moved, barely twitched. He was breathing but everything was focused on Luiz.

"Dead..." Luiz seemed to look around as if seeing everything, truly seeing everything, for the first time. "Fuck! That's not-This isn't how this was supposed to go!" He was agitated, it thrummed in his words and his body and the male started to growl again, a dangerous and dominating sound. I could hear it telling Luiz to back off.

I understood Luiz's agitation though. We were going to lure Brandt out, have Luiz kill him, and then take over the illegal rogue pack so the females could get out. That was the entire plan but now... now it was fucked but I couldn't bring myself to care. Brandt was dead and I was glad for it.

"Look, if you're Ezekiel Ruiz or not, it doesn't matter. You just killed Brandt Antone, you now control the illegal rogue pack he ran." The words were sharp. "I was hoping to take that position so I could get Julieta to safety and save the other females before tearing down the pack and getting the hunters to arrest them all." It had been a good plan, except nothing was ever fucking fair. You never got what you wanted, fate would always decide to fuck with you in the worst possible way.

I watched as the large male shrugged, as if unbothered by the fact. I tried to see Ezekiel in him. I had loved him, my older brother's best friend. The world's worst cliché. When he had mated to Vera I felt like my world was ending. Except Mene showed how unjust and unkind she could be and he was banished after Blake won his challenge. I had hated looking at Vera after that.

To this day, even though I knew I had to leave such childish feelings behind, I would never ever forgive Vera for what she had done to Ezekiel. She abandoned him in the moment he needed her most. He had loved her, thought she hung the stars in the sky and she tossed him away. Back when I had been younger, a bit more hopeful, I had thought that I would have done that if he had simply picked me. But he had been over ten years older than me, and I was stupid kid sister, it would have never happened.

Then my world turned upside down and I couldn't carry around such stupid baggage like childhood crushes.

"You can't be serious! This illegal rogue pack has been terrorizing shifters for years. You have the power to do something to stop it!" Luiz was filled with righteous indignation and the male tilted his head. His hair was shaggy and long and I felt like there were some features to him that did remind me a bit of the Ezekiel I remembered but it was hard with how dirty and just... feral he looked.

I winced as my belly cramped again. This was bullshit, such bullshit. I knew that if I wasn't careful I would be bedridden, again. The last time it happened Kreegan had only let me because he had been half concerned about the baby, his 'heir' as he called it. It made me want to puke. But laying on a sleeping bag in a forest for several days wasn't my idea of fun, especially when Kreegan wanted to fool around and I had no choice because what was I going to do about it?

I shoved the thoughts away as Luiz let out a string of curses. "You need to do something." He gestured at the male and the male's eyes narrowed.

"No." It was a gravelly word that raspy from him with a low growl. I blinked and then blinked again, I didn't know why I thought that was attractive. I really shouldn't have. I kind of had enough of males at the moment.

"No? Are you fucking kidding me?" Luiz threw his hands up and started once again to pace back and forth. I grimaced and shifted, trying to sit up a bit more. "They are going to attack this next pack, Fort or something and you're just going to do nothing? Brandt being dead means literally nothing, they will still attack them!"

The words actually seemed to reach the male and I barely had time to react as he moved. He grabbed me under my arms and lifted me to my feet with a move that showed such strength I was left wide eyed and my mouth open. "Fine." He stared at Luiz for a moment. "I go." He tilted his head and then looked at me. "I no like," he pointed at me, "here, Julieta." The way he said my name had my breath catching in my chest and I coughed several times, almost choking on my spit.

The only person who had ever put that tiny 'h' sound on the 'J' in my name had been Ezekiel. A faint form of teasing over my intensely Hispanic name. And he stood there, covered in blood, after he saved my damned life, looking like he wanted to be anywhere but where he stood.

I felt that. I didn't want to be there either. I wanted it to be us, standing back at Provocatio, while he joked in the kitchen with Luiz as my brother made me dinner because our parents were dead. Back when life was simple and I didn't have to worry about survival or give my body to males to protect myself. My belly cramped and I closed my eyes.

I couldn't ever go back there.

None of us could.

We had to live in the life as it was dictated to us and Mene's love could be cruel. I could remember when I had been a naive little girl, thinking the world had justice, that good would win over bad. It didn't work like that, it never worked like that.

I opened my eyes right as I watched the male, no, Ezekiel, reach down and hook his fingers through Brandt's jaw and started dragging his corpse. My stomach churned so I looked away, my eyes fell on Luiz. He looked stressed. I limped towards him and he absently touched my back. "It's been years, Ezekiel." There was a plaintive sound in my brother's voice. He had missed Ezekiel, I knew he had.

The male just grunted and pointed into the trees. "Where?" There was nothing I could remember of Ezekiel in him. Not really. He was all hard muscle and feral eyes. His green eyes were flinty and his scars made him look menacing but I knew he probably wasn't going to do anything, at least not to me. I hoped against everything he didn't.

It was a strange thing, almost trusting another male. It tasted bitter on my tongue but I pointed in the direction where I knew the rogue camp was. "That way." I winced slightly at the newest cramp in my belly, pressing my hand against it. I didn't want to be stuck in a sleeping bag in a tent again. I just...

I wanted all of this to be over with.