The first thing I notice when I wake up is the smell of saltwater. I lift my head as it wafts under my nose. The familiar scent helps pull me back in the direction of consciousness.
The very next thing I notice is the pounding ache on the back of my head.
I groan and move my neck, checking to make sure I still can.
I open my eyes but it takes a minute for things to come into focus.
There are no lights on, except a single dim bulb to my right.
Shadows cloud my vision but I'm keenly aware of a strange rocking sensation. Am I on a boat?
Beyond the throbbing in my skull is a gentle lapping sound, as if waves are breaking nearby. I'm definitely on a boat.
I squint to see better as my eyes adjust. Decking runs under my feet toward a pair of sliding glass doors.
Between the door and me sits a dining table and chairs, enough to seat a party of twelve.
Surrounding the deck are shiny white, waist-high walls and beyond them blackness. The night sky and the midnight ocean merging to become one ominous void.
I am on a boat. And not just any boat, a luxury yacht. Not that I've ever been on one before but I've watched enough reality TV to know one when I see it.
My pulse quickens.
Have I been kidnapped?
Why me? Why would anyone take me?
I lurch forward, and am immediately flung back against the waterproof cushions. My hands are strapped to a pole with cable ties.
What is going on?
My lip quivers, even though I tell myself to keep it together. I need to stay calm. But panic is rising in my throat like bile.
A light flicks on inside the cabin, spilling its glow onto the deck––I freeze. My fuzzy eyes have just spotted a dark shape, at one end of the dining table.
I squint into the light...It's Alpha Jericho! He's strapped into a chair at the head of the table, as if he's about to have dinner.
His large head is hanging against his chest. He's out cold.
He's been kidnapped as well. Does this mean he wasn't behind Aisha's abduction?
"Where is she?" a familiar gruff voice asks somewhere behind me.
It sounds like one of the rogues from Rogue City. Scarface?
"Said she'd be here by midnight," another scarily familiar voice responds. That's definitely Tattoo.
Two of the rogues who kidnapped Aisha are here on the boat!
"He's heavier than he looks," Scarface says, grunting.
Their footsteps thump up some steps behind me and then a body lands with a clump on the deck.
Jasper!
His unconscious form is sprawled over the decking, his hair swept messily across his face, his hands tied behind his back.
They threw him on his face, those assholes!
Scarface and Tattoo stomp onto the deck, grabbing Jasper by the arms and dragging him along. They drop him down against a wall where he slumps over himself.
First, they abducted Aisha––now Jasper, Jericho, and me. Who are they working for?
"Look out," Peanut––the third rogue musketeer––says, emerging from the cabin with a carving knife in hand. "Here she comes."
She?
The rev of an engine roars into my periphery, a smaller boat maybe?
I lean back trying to hear better. The engine is switched off and a splash of water hits the back of the boat.
Tattoo rushes down the stairs. I hear murmurs and then footsteps.
Tattoo lumbers back on deck, moving to stand behind the alpha with Peanut . Scarface lingers at Jasper's side. And finally, their boss, the person they've been waiting for, appears.
"Eleanor?!"
What the actual is she doing here?!
And, oops, did I say that out loud?
Suddenly, all the conscious people on the boat are staring at me.
"Oh," she says. "You're awake. I thought you'd be the last to come to."
"Did you know he was awake?" Tattoo asks Scarface and Peanut who shake their heads.
Eleanor grins and saunters over. She's wearing the same black dress from the party. We can't be too far from the Hamptons if she hasn't had time to change.
She looks like the same old Eleanor, only something is different.
There's a wild sort of excitement in her eyes that makes my legs go wobbly.
"Eleanor, let me go," I say.
She laughs. "But then you'll miss all the fun."
"What are you doing?" I ask.
"Taking what I deserve." She spins to address the rogues. "Wake them up!"
Scarface and Tattoo slap Jericho and Jasper across their faces until they start to wake.
Jericho is the first to open his eyes and immediately begins to struggle.
"Settle down, pet," Eleanor says leaning over the table. "We gave you a sedative." She turns to me and shrugs. "Never know when the big guy is going to go berserk."
Jericho is trying to speak but his mouth isn't working properly.
"What's the matter?" Eleanor asks Jericho teasingly. "Cat got your tongue? I hope you don't mind us borrowing your yacht, it was just sitting here all empty."
"Dad!" Jasper calls out. He's awake, so apparently he and I didn't warrant a sedative. I don't know whether to be relieved or insulted.
"Jasper."
He turns to face me and he looks completely broken. He pulls at his restraints, grinding his teeth and grunting but it's no use.
"Those bindings are wolf proof," Eleanor says. "And don't think about shifting or we'll shoot you."
Tattoo pulls out a gun and hands it to her. Jasper stops struggling.
"What do you want?" he asks.
"Me?" Eleanor points at herself. "I just want the same thing as everybody else. Someone to bring home to daddy."
"You're doing all this for a mate?" I ask.
She spins to look at me, barely resembling herself.
"We can't all be as lucky as you, Max. Fate didn't want me to have nice things. They wanted you to have them." She points the gun right at my face and I flinch.
Who is this person? I always thought Eleanor was a bit unhinged, but in a type-A, high-achiever sort of way, not in a psychopathic killer sort of way.
"I don't understand," I say.
"Of course, you don't. The Moon Gods have given you everything."
"What are you talking about, Eleanor?"
"You two know each other?" Jasper asks. His desperate eyes find mine––they're frantic and questioning.
"That's right, pretty boy," Eleanor says. "Max and I became acquainted recently."
She approaches him, pointing the gun at his chest. "You and I, on the other hand, we've known each other our entire lives. And yet somehow Max is the one who can remember my name!"
I catch Peanut sniggering behind Eleanor's back, but he stops quickly when she glares in his direction.
"Who am I, Jasper?" she screams in his face. "Who am I?"
He glances at me before turning to Eleanor with an icy glare.
"I don't know."
Eleanor presses her shaking hands against her temples and screams.
"My father works for your father, you asshole!"
At the table, Jericho is studying Eleanor. His face is ketchup red and a vein in the side of his neck looks about ready to blow.
Is his finger twitching?
All the times Eleanor mentioned her father's proximity to the alpha start running through my mind. She was always so quick to drop that she had a connection to Jericho into conversation. But I never found out exactly what her father does.
"God! You're so self-involved," she continues. "My father is a good man. He's been driving your father around since before you were born and you can't even recognize his daughter."
"My dad's driver?" Jasper asks, trying to join the dots. "You're his...daughter?"
Eleanor's dad is Jericho's driver! His chauffeur? She made it sound like they were business partners or college chums.
Something clicks into place in my mind. The town car in Rogue City.
"You abducted Aisha," I say.
If I wasn't tied up at gunpoint I might feel a little guilty for having suspected Jericho, but we have more pressing matters to attend to right now.
Eleanor spins around once again. She smiles at me and drags the tip of the gun along her bottom lip.
"I was going to kill her too," she says. "If you hadn't intervened before Daddy could make the trade."
"Why didn't you just have the rogues kill her?" I ask.
Eleanor's shifty eyes dart from side to side. "We couldn't afford it."
I glance at the rogues, Eleanor's goons for hire. How much is she paying them to abduct the alpha and his son?
I feel like I'm taking an algebra test I haven't studied for. So much of this still doesn't make sense. Eleanor's dad paid the rogues to abduct Aisha so that Eleanor could take her out but why?
"Anyway, your little interruption in Pittsburgh didn't matter in the end. Killing Aisha wouldn't have done much good." Eleanor takes a step closer to me, as lightning strikes out over the ocean.
"Why?" I ask.
"Because I kidnapped the wrong wolf. Whoopsie."
A cold chill of recognition runs down my spine.
Eleanor thought Aisha was Jasper's mate. She wants to kill Jasper's mate...but that means...me.
"I'm glad we had our little heart to heart earlier," she says. "Cleared up a few things."
My voice catches in my throat but I force myself to ask the question, "Why do you want to kill Jasper's mate?"
"Isn't it obvious? To take your place."
What?! SHE wants to be with Jasper?
God, I wish she would stop flailing that gun around.
"That's not how it works," Jasper says.
"Isn't it?" Eleanor asks. "You were going to reject poor little Max and choose someone else anyway. Gosh, what privilege! Some people get to choose whoever they want to be their mate! Must be nice."
"What I mean is," Jasper sneers, "you can't just replace him. I have to mark you. And that will never happen."
"You'll choose me," she says, then levels the gun at me. "Or I'll kill him."
My eyes lock with Jasper's and I can feel the energy flickering between us. I know he's trying to think of a way to save me without sacrificing the mate bond. I can feel it. But Eleanor's gun isn't giving him too many options.
"So make your choice," Eleanor says.
Jasper glances at me, his face stricken with panic and confusion. I shake my head just enough for Jasper to see. At this point I'd rather be shot than lose our bond.
"Choose!" Eleanor yells. Her finger hovers over the trigger, she moves to pull it...but has to dive out of the way as the dining table flies across the room, crashing against the wall and smashing into a million shards.
Eleanor jumps back and Alpha Jericho, torn free from his restaurants, steps in her direction. His fists are clenched and his muscles are bulging like nothing I've ever seen.
"That's enough!" his voice thunders.
In an instant, Eleanor has her gun trained on him, and her three rogue henchmen step forward, pulling knives from their belts.
"Eleanor," Jericho says, trying to speak calmly. "My son may not know you. But I do. Your father is a good man, he has worked for me for a very long time and he wouldn't want you to do this."
She scoffs. "Who do you think paid for the rogue entourage?"
Jericho scans the faces of the rogues. All three are staring at him like they're hungry and he's the Thanksgiving turkey.
"We had to save for a long time on my dad's pitiful salary," Eleanor says. "Lucky for us you've pissed these rogue creeps off so much they were willing to cut us a deal."
"We can work this out," he says. "You're obviously confused."
"Confused about what?"
"My son doesn't have a mate."
It begins as a scoff, then becomes a giggle, and then finally Eleanor erupts into a full-on cartoon-villain style cackle. Jasper and I glance at each other.
Is she about to spill our secret?
"You don't know?!" she asks.
Jasper turns to his father looking more afraid than he did when wild Eleanor had a gun pointed at him.
"Jasper and Max are mates," she says. "That's why we're all here!
Unorthodox, I know, but they'd make a cute couple if you think about it."
Jericho doesn't look my way, but he stares at his son with more intensity than a supernova.
Eleanor chuckles. "It's a shame I have to split them up."
Jericho growls, his top lip curling upward.
"It's not possible," he says.
"Dad…" Jasper has tears in his eyes. "...it is."
Jericho finally glances in my direction, his eyes darting between me and Jasper. Something registers in his expression, some kind of awareness, then confusion, as if he should have known all along, and then disappointment "Dad, it's true," Jasper confirms once more before turning to me. I want to cry, I want to bust out of my restraints and hug him so stupidly hard.
"Max...is my mate."
Despite the gun, and the knife wielding rogues, and his father's silence...Jasper keeps his eyes locked with mine. He even does this lopsided grin that makes my heart explode.
"You're my mate," he says to me. "The person I'm meant to be with."
I can't wipe my tears away because my hands are still tied, but I feel like I've been freed from some other intangible prison.
I bite my bottom lip and smile back at him.
"I think I'm going to be sick," Eleanor says, destroying the moment.
Our attention snaps back to her. "So you see Jericho, unless you want your whole pack to know what a disappointment Jasper is. You'll let Jasper reject Max and choose me."
"Dad…" Jasper says, shaking his head. Eleanor spins, pointing the gun in his direction, shutting his mouth.
But his pleading eyes stay locked on his father.
Jericho's expression is unreadable. Disbelief is furrowing his brow, as if he doesn't recognize his own son.
As if the person he's raised, the son he's molded to follow in his footsteps and lead the pack, the son who was to become the next alpha has vanished.
And it's all because of me.
My hands ball into fists. He's going to let Eleanor win.
Why would he choose me when there's so much more at stake?
Letting Jasper mark Eleanor is the only way he can save face with the pack. The only way he can claw back any shred of his ideal future.
"Enough stalling, big guy," Eleanor says. "Make the call."
"You want me to welcome you into my family?" Jericho asks Eleanor. "After you point a gun at my son and his mate."
His…wait...what did he just say?
Jericho takes a step forward. "Not a chance in hell."
Bam!
Jericho folds over clutching the gunshot wound in his stomach.
Smoke rises from the barrel of Eleanor's gun. The alpha collapses onto the deck, blood pouring out of him and pooling on the polished floor.
"No!" Jasper cries and struggles to free himself. Scarface slams him back to the floor and Eleanor moves her aim back in my direction.
"What a let down," she says with a sigh. "Now, Jaspy, you can either make the same mistake as your daddy, and let the big guy bleed out while I shoot Max here in the head. Or you can reject Max and choose me."
Jasper glances at me. His whole body is slouched in defeat––we both know there's only one choice he can make.
I nod to let him know it's okay, even though nothing is okay right now.
"Fine," he says, breathlessly. "You win. I'll do it, just don't kill anyone."
Jericho groans in pain, trying to stand, but he can't. The deck is covered in alpha's blood.
Unable to move, I watch in disbelief as Eleanor signals for Scarface to stand Jasper up and free him of his restraints.
Scarface's knife rips through the cable tie. Jasper rubs his wrists and takes a step forward. There's no point fighting now. Eleanor's gun remains pointed in my direction and her finger never leaves the trigger. Scarface keeps his blade pressed between Jasper's shoulders.
He's led behind Eleanor where he places his hands on her shoulders.
My face is on fire and I keep trying to shake the tears out of my eyes.
My heart is thumping in my ears, my stomach is in my throat. The boat is rocking like we're in the middle of a maelstrom.
I grind my chattering teeth as Eleanor pulls back the collar of her dress exposing her neck. She lifts her chin and steels herself for the sting of Jasper's bite.
This is really happening. It's all about to end and there's nothing I can do.
Jasper glances at me one last time, tears dripping down his cheeks, and he mouths the words… "I'm sorry."
I hold my breath as he elongates his fangs, opens his jaw, and bites down…