Free Alpha Moon (The Cain Chronicles) (Seasons of the Moon) by SM Reine Page B

desk. It was concealed by the fronds of a huge fern and an Asian-style room divider.
    “There’s no point in running,” Rylie said. “They’ll follow us.”
    “Unless they catch the werewolf,” Jessica said.
    Abel stiffened. “Not happening.”
    Jessica set down her purse and took a deep breath. “You were identified off of surveillance footage. That’s what he said, right? You and I are practically twins, sweetheart. A few years won’t be distinguishable through low-quality video. I’ll go out there.”
    “You could be arrested,” Rylie said. What she didn’t say was, You could get shot .
    Her mom seemed to understand both. She blew out a long, steadying breath. “They won’t hold me for long. They’ll realize I’m human soon enough.” She pointed at the hall. “Go.”
    “No,” Rylie said, but Abel was already dragging her away.
    He gave Jessica an appraising look over Rylie’s head. Her bigotry aside, he seemed to approve of what he saw. “Thanks,” he said, and then he turned to Bert, scooping up Rylie’s copies of the paperwork. “We paid you. The papers are signed. That land is ours , and you’ll turn nothing over to the OPA, or I’ll eat you.” He punctuated that statement with a flash of his very white teeth.
    Bert nodded frantically. Anything to get them out of his office.
    “You can’t do this,” Rylie said to Jessica.
    “I’ll see you soon, sweetheart,” she said, hand on the doorknob.
    Abel’s arm was an iron bar around Rylie’s waist. Even twisting with all of her werewolf strength, it wasn’t enough to break free.
    He hauled her down the hall and out the back of the building.
    The air was silent on the street behind Bert’s office—weirdly calm, after the tension inside. People were wandering between restaurants and shops, chatting quietly. Clouds drifted in the sky.
    Rylie tensed, prepared to hear the gunshot that would mean her mother had been killed.
    It never came.

EIGHT

    RYLIE WASN’T BRAVE enough to pick her mother up from the Office of Preternatural Affairs’s detention center, so Summer volunteered for the job—maybe a little too enthusiastically. There was a weird glint in her eye when she left. Rylie had a feeling that Jessica was about to “meet” her granddaughter, with total honesty this time. And she was really grateful she wouldn’t have to be there for that conversation.
    She sat on a tree stump with her knees hugged to her chest as Abel erected a tent-cabin nearby, waiting for word from Summer. Watching her mate work shirtless in the sun was enough to make the most impromptu camping trip interesting. She had been hiding on their new property since Friday afternoon. Rylie had been tense the entire time, expecting the Union to find her at any moment. But they hadn’t. It had been silent. Even peaceful.
    Their new property was perfect: two thousand acres of wilderness surrounding a supposedly uninhabitable valley of the Appalachian Mountains. Rylie hadn’t seen the entire thing as a human yet, but she had spent three days exploring its boundaries as a wolf, and the wolf was very satisfied. Dense trees, a river, cliffs, a hundred caves—she suspected it would take years to see every inch of her new property.
    Developers would arrive soon to build real cottages, set up generators, and dig wells. Until then, Rylie and Abel would live in a tent-cabin—better than sleeping on the grass under the empty sky.
    She blushed as she watched the flexing muscles of Abel’s back. Of course, there were worse things than sleeping with his arms as her only shelter.
    The clearing that they had chosen as home was bordered on one side by cliffs, and on the other by a small lake. A huge waterfall fed into it. Its top was so tall that the water misted before it reached the surface, leaving Rylie’s hair pleasantly damp when she stood on the shore.
    Soon, that little clearing would be occupied by Seth, by Summer and Abram, by the pack. For now, it was just Rylie and