was obvious they didn’t know what to do, who to follow. Before Freki could issue any commands, and

before any of the werewolves could react, Roman dived at his queen, standing only a few feet away. She

swung around, ready to face him head-on, but she wasn’t as fast in her human form as Roman was in wolf

form, and his jaws lashed across her throat like two sets of sharp knives.

Freki went down on her knees, growling and spitting blood.

The rest of the werewolves tried to recoup, but without their queen they became confused, chaotic.

Shifting to full wolf form, Kevin jumped at the nearest one, knocking the creature down and savaging its

throat until it lay still. Another came at him, but Roman hit him head on. Between the two of them, they

started making short work of the bewildered remaining wolves. They were larger and stronger than the

others, and working together made them even more formidable. Kevin and Roman lashed out with flashing

teeth and claws. They dragged long gouges in soft bellies, slashed eyes, snapped steel-trap-like jaws

down on fur and bone, wrenching bleeding chunks of their enemies loose. Some of the werewolves tried

to shift to full wolf form. Some even tried to become men in their confusion.

The sounds of savage battle and screams—animal and human alike—echoed through the dark forest,

driving birds from trees and making deer scamper in every direction. Blood painted the old, whorled

trunks of trees, painted the grass and underbrush, and soaked into the forest floor. Blood got into the river

and was quickly carried downstream.

Within minutes, the few werewolves still alive started limping away into the forest. They realized there

was no way they could out-fight two Pedigrees fighting side-by side.

Kevin shifted back to human form, covered in bruises, scratches and blood, and licked his lips and

bloodstained teeth. “Should we go after them?”

Roman shifted too, but said, “No. Let them run. They are Orphans now; they have no leader, no future.

They will soon go their separate ways. If their injuries don’t kill them, trying to live without a pack will.”

“Is is over, then?” Kevin asked hopefully.

But before Roman could answer his question, someone grabbed Kevin and spun him around. It was Freki

in werewolf form. She towered over him like a rabid bear, blood bubbling from her mouth and the wound

in her throat and painting her white fur scarlet, her foaming jaws wide and snapping. She tried to go for

his throat, but Kevin lifted the Wolfsbane around his neck and stuck the medallion in her mouth and down

her throat as she lunged.

Freki screamed and her flesh burned from the inside out and bubbled. Her whole body began to convulse

with the poison inside of her, and soon her flesh and matted fur began to slough off her bones. Roman

shifted to werewolf form and leaped upon her back, burying his muzzle of teeth in the back of her neck.

His weight forced her to the ground. His teeth snapped together and there was an audible crack that

echoed through the woods as he broke Freki’s neck.

Freki, now a shambling, skeletal thing, tried in vain to push herself up. She offered Kevin a look of hurt,

insult and surprise, and then collapsed to the ground and shifted back to human form as she died.

Roman stood over his longtime captor and queen, waiting until the last twitches were gone from her body.

Then he looked up at Kevin with dour wolf eyes and nodded. “Now, it’s over.”

***

Chapter Thirty

“A man’s gotta be a man,” Ron was muttering into his scotch and soda.

Kevin took his keys and hung them behind the bar on the pegboard. He picked up the phone to call the man

a cab. “Yeah, Ron, you’re right,” he said. It was just another night at the Barracuda, a normal night like so

many—pickups, spats, breakups, drunken ramblings about life—but there was something to be said for

normalcy, Kevin decided.

Three weeks had passed since they had killed Freki and had disassembled the pack. And in all that long

he hadn’t seen either Roman or Fenrir. The thought made him sad, it made him feel alone, but he was

learning that being sad and alone wasn’t the end of the world. He wanted companionship, of course.

Craved it. He was a wolf without a pack now. But he now knew that if he was forced to live on his own,

he would cope.

He was no longer the young, desperate pup, willing to cling to any hope. He’d fought and killed enemy

werewolves. He’d helped kill the queen. He’d set Roman free. He was strong and independent. If he

wasn’t an alpha yet, then he was well on his way.

And he knew that Roman had a lot of cleaning up to do. He’d had to dispose of multiple bodies, get in

touch with all kinds of mucky-mucks to ensure loose ends were tidied up and the secret of the werewolf

underworld was preserved. That was important. If the humans found out about his kind, there would be a

war, and only one side would survive. It would probably not be the werewolves.

Besides, the time apart had allowed Kevin to comfort Hannah over her loss of Matthew. She’d been an

emotional wreck in the beginning and she had needed him desperately. But Hannah, being Hannah, never

let anything get her down for long. She wasn’t a hundred percent just yet, he knew, but slowly she was

working her way back to her usual optimistic self. She was strong like he was.

Kevin was glad for the time alone they’d had to talk and sort out their feelings. It had allowed them to

bond, and Kevin knew that he would always think of Hannah as part of his own personal “pack” no matter

how many werewolves he ran with in the future. Hannah kept him ground, kept him human.

And yet…after three weeks of not seeing his lovers, Kevin couldn’t help but feel the quietly gnawing void

of their absence in his life. He knew it would not kill him, but it still hurt so much to be a lone wolf once

more. It seemed so unfair that just as soon as he’d found others of his own kind, he’d also lost them—

helped to destroy them, in fact.

“Couldn’t be helped,” he told himself as he mixed a Vampiro for a young undergrad checking him out. A

corrupt pack was no pack at all. He’d rather be alone than be the slave of some sadistic leader.

Hours later, as he was washing down the bar, he felt the little hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He

turned and glanced at the end of the bar where he had first encountered Roman on that now long-ago night

and saw him sitting there, prim and beautiful, just as he had the first time they’d met. Kevin sucked in a

sharp breath. Abandoning his cleaning, he rushed around the bar to Roman.

Roman jumped to his feet and the two men embraced, warmly and without words. Roman yanked Kevin’s

head forward and kissed him roughly, his tongue going in deep, his teeth playfully nipping his lower lip.

They nuzzled each other in greeting and their wolves spoke silently to each other’s hearts. When he finally