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doll in her mother’s arms. I could only hope I was wrong, that the little girl was just knocked out, or maybe her werewolf abilities were strong enough to allow her to heal.
    In my heart I knew I was grasping at straws.
    As the smoke cleared, the hunters were gone, all except the one I had on his knees in the middle of the clearing behind the homes. The werewolves who survived slowly made their way back to the village to lick their wounds and fix their broken homes. Or so I thought.
    No, they were packing up.
    “Hey, where are you going?”
    Eyes swiveled toward me and I realized then that while Peter’s pack was peaceful, there was a serious drawback.
    Elena shook her head, her little girl cradled in her arms. “We leave. Run.”
    There was no fight in any of them. They were just getting their belongings to go somewhere else; somewhere the hunters wouldn’t find them. At least for a time.
    “They run. We hunt,” the hunter said, then snorted a heavy glob of bloody snot onto the snow.
    My jaw clenched and tightened. This couldn’t be allowed to continue; these were the most peaceful wolves I’d ever encountered, why would they be targeted over those who actually caused harm?
    The answer came to me slowly as I replayed the fight in my head. As soon as the tables had turned and I’d killed some of the hunters, they’d fled.
    They were cowards looking for easy kills, and what was easier than a group who wouldn’t fight back? Even if they were werewolves, they sure didn’t act like it. Fucking hell, this was bad.
    “Where do your hunters live?” He didn’t answer me so I wrapped my fingers around his neck and squeezed. “Tell me.”
    “You kill me no matter what I say.”
    Elena walked by us her child still and silent in her arms. I squeezed harder as the anger roared through my veins. It took everything I had not to choke him right there. “Yes. But how much it hurts depends on how much you tell me.”
    His eyes, dark blue and shadowed with fear, rolled up so he could look at me. “You do not have balls to torture.”
    That was where he was wrong. So very, very wrong.

Chapter Four
    T hey were almost back to the village when Liam caught the first whiff of smoke. The wind had been blowing away from them for most of the day, but with a shift, the scent of burning wood and blood filled his nostrils. Peter said nothing as they both broke into a sprint, covering the ground in leaping strides.
    All he could think about was the fact that Rylee didn’t have her weapons. He’d convinced her this would be a vacation, that nothing would go wrong.
    That he’d keep her safe.
    “Shit.” He growled through his teeth, furious with himself for being so naïve. He knew better, especially when it came to Rylee, knew better than to think things would go smoothly.
    Ahead, he could just see the tree line that separated the village from the forest. A few more strides and they were on it, but he struggled to understand what he was seeing. The edge of the village opened up into a mass of chaos that stopped him in his tracks. Every single home was on fire, and blood stained the few places where the snow had been left, where the ground hadn’t been torn to pieces. There wasn’t a single person left to be found.
    “RYLEE!” There was no answering call from her and his guts tightened with fear. She had to be here. He couldn’t lose her.
    “Be calm, we will track those who have fled the hunters,” Peter said, his voice soft.
    Liam spun toward him. “Hunters?”
    “Yes, there are those who would see all the werewolves dead, even though we stick to ourselves and harm no one.” The old man let out a sigh. “As peaceful as we are, they know we will not fight back.”
    “Rylee would have fought back.” He strode into the village, scenting the air as he went. Finding individual smells under the heavy flood of smoke was difficult, but he picked up her unique perfume as he drew close to the home they’d been