Kyle heard the car door slam a bare second before he heard his apartment door break open. He already knew who he’d find in the living room. 

“Landlord’s going to take that out of my deposit, Pops,” Kyle said as he pointed at the busted doorframe. 

“Screw that. I taught you how to fix that when you were fifteen. What I want to know is just what the hell do you think you’re doing?” 

He pointed to the waiting backpack resting against the wall next to the older man’s feet. “Thought that was obvious. I’m going to get her back and kill the bitch that took her.” 

Richard’s hazel eyes went flint-like. His voice dropped into his soft growl. “Are you out of your damned fool mind, boy?” He pointed his finger at Kyle as if it was a revolver. “Do you even have the slightest idea of what you’re going up against? Because I sure as hell do! If a woman, who by her own admission, was that weak and did to those men what we saw her do, I don’t even want to imagine what a dragon could do at full strength! I damned near pissed myself at that roar of hers. I haven’t felt fear like that since the day we lost your parents!” 

Kyle glanced away, chagrined at his grandfather’s brutal honesty. “Look at me, Kyle.” He met his grandfather’s eyes. “Just what do you think these,” he shifted his left hand and raised his claws, “are going to do against a creature whose scales are harder than a diamond? Unless you have a nuke in that backpack, this Lilith is just going to be picking fur out of her teeth. Even then, I’d give even odds she’d survive it!” He lowered his hand and spread his arms wide out, pleadingly. “Please, Kyle. You go out there on this insane quest and I will be burying an empty coffin. I love you too much to let you do this son.” Tears began to form in the old man’s eyes. “Please, don’t me order you as Alpha to not do this. Don’t push me that far.”

Kyle felt his blood boil at that. He even thought for a split-second of challenging his grandfather right then and there. He knew what he was doing was almost certainly a suicide mission. He didn’t care. He didn’t have much left to live for at this point. It was time to tell the old man that.
“You can try Pops,” he said in that matching rumble. “I don’t care about the odds. I don’t care if I die doing this. They killed Becca. She was my mate in all but name, Pops, and they took her from me.” His voice dropped to an icy whisper. “Becca was my entire world. If I die, I’m willing to, just so long as I drag that bitch to hell with me. You can’t stop me. If you ordered me to, I’ll go rogue.”

Richard took a half-step back in shock as his face went ghost-white. His mouth opened and closed a few times as he tried to get words out but failed. Finally, in the angriest tone Kyle had ever heard from his grandfather, the old man roared. “Don’t you even joke about that! Being a rogue is being packless, an outcast! Any Wolf would be within their rights to gut you on sight! Rogues are the scum of our society, the true things that go bump in the night. They are only cast out when they commit a crime so unspeakable…,” Richard couldn’t finish his sentence. 

He took a step closer and placed his hands on Kyle’s shoulders and looked at a matching pair of hazel eyes. “I can’t bury anymore family Kyle. I can’t. I know you’re hurting son. I know your pain. It’s the same when I lost Lizzy and when I lost Sarah. You want to tear everything in sight apart. You want to sink your fangs into the thing that took them away from you. But I’ve got news for you son. You can’t tear into a dragon anymore than I could the cancer that took my mate. Do you think you’re hurting now? Try six months of chemotherapy, watching the woman you love slowly waste away a little more each day. Try seeing her acting like nothing’s wrong as you walk into the kitchen after you see her crying at the sink as she pulls a little more of that chestnut hair that you ran your fingers through every day out of the drain and you wanted to give her a little dignity as you hid in the hallway and prayed to God that she didn’t hear you. Try holding her after the doctor tells her that there’s nothing more they can do except make her comfortable at the end and fighting every instinct to not rip his tongue out and shove it down his throat.” Tears streamed down his face.  “There are things in this world we just can’t change Kyle.  I’m begging you, please. Don’t go.”

Kyle felt his entire body go slack. “Ok,” he softly whispered. “Ok, Pops. I won’t go. It just hurts so damn much. We were supposed to be married an hour ago. What am I going to do now Pops,” Kyle finally let loose the tears he’d been holding since the attack ended. “What am I going to do?”

The older man held him tight. “I don’t know son. I don’t know. But we’ll figure it out together. I promise. If I can, I’ll make sure she comes home too. She was my daughter too.”

In the fading sunlight, the two men held each other and let their grief out over the loss of one of the most wonderful women either had ever known.

***

That night, as an exhausted Kyle lay in his bed, he kept trying to not think about the fact that there should have been a warmth next to him. 

As much as Pops is right, we’re still in danger. What if Lilith isn’t satisfied with her prize and decides to finish the job.  She knows what she’s facing now so I’m sure she’ll come prepared. She could take out Pops, me, the entire pack if she wanted as retaliation for what we did at the house. Do I want to spend the rest of my life looking up over my shoulder wondering if I’m about to be roasted? Could I live like that?

Are you kidding, hotshot? You know we couldn’t. As weird as it was, Kyle was getting used to hearing his wolf’s sighs and moods. But we don’t know where to start looking or who even to be looking for. You heard Kiera. She’s got to be going by a different identity by now because it would sure be hard to explain a supermodel octogenarian wandering around. 

There’s someone out there who knows. I just have to kick over enough rocks until I find him.

And if that rock kicks back?

Doesn’t matter.

He heard the sigh in his head and grimaced. Look, if we’re doing this hotshot, then we need a plan. A smart hunter catches his prey, a rash hunter becomes prey. 

Where the hell did you pick that up?

Pops. You may have forgotten what he taught you in basic wolf craft, but I didn’t. Oh, just so you know, I am totally on board with tearing the bitch into bite-sized morsels. I’m positively drooling about wondering what dragon meat tastes like. However, hotshot, unlike you, I plan on us living until we’re as gray as Pops and enjoying that memory for the next couple of centuries. 

Are you sure you’re my wolf and not Jiminy Cricket?

If it gets you to pay attention to me, I’ll grab a tophat and start singing songs about wishing on stars. 

Kyle started imagining a bronze and copper wolf, wearing a top hat, holding a cane while balanced on two legs, and singing to the North Star.

Not funny, hotshot.