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Theo makes a wounded sound behind me, but he does not reject the truth. He kneels beside us and places one hand over Ezra’s and one at my back.

“I love both of you,” he says. “No one comes into this house and takes my people.”

Ezra closes his eyes. “I love you too.” Then he looks at me. “Both of you.”

“This is my pack, and I love you too. But I want to say it again when we’re not fending off bad guys and town curses.” My words come out fierce.

I kiss Ezra, then pull Theo into it. It’s a messy tangle of three mouths, fear, and love—it is perfect.

Theo’s phone vibrates on the desk.

Wes. One minute out. Movement near east wall.

The camera feed flashes. A motorcycle waits beyond the cemetery gate. Then the image goes black.

The house gives one hard knock. The bell tolls. Fear tears through my stomach again.

I let it.

I’m scared, but I’m also furious and motivated. I have the knowledge, the map, and generations of women who kept the truth alive until I was ready to understand it.

The Saints think they’re coming for a frightened omega, a desperate alpha, and a dying beta.

They’re wrong. They’re about to meet a Vines witness and her pack.

In the immortal words of my students, come at me, bruh.

Chapter 40

Pepper Vines

The motorcycle waits outside the cemetery gate, but its rider is gone. On the monitor, the bike leans beneath the Sweetheart Haven Cemetery sign while the east camera feed shudders, clears, and fills with white static.

“They’re here,” Ezra says.

The house knocks hard inside the wall.

“I know.” Theo reaches for the shotgun.

At the far edge of the remaining camera view, Wes’s truck turns onto the cemetery road.

My fear tries to take over. Hammer is here.

The Saints think I am the key. They want Ezra alive only as long as he makes Theo useful.

Solve the next part. I repeat the mantra over and over as I grab the release-route map and drag it across Ezra’s worktable.

“Theo, text Wes. Tell him not to come straight to the house.”

His attention snaps to me. “Why?”

“They’re watching the road. If he drives directly here, he confirms where we are and where we’re protecting everything.”

“Protecting what?” Ezra asks.

“Exactly.”

Both men look at me.