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Lake could do this She could

I wanted to believe it I wanted to tell ood, and that I wouldn’t have been any kind of friend at all if I’d kept her fro we’d been through together, despite what she and the others had done forup insideher

"Takein my own throat

"Excuse le second, he looked so anored the low ruone ashen besidethe flash of horror and denial I could feel through the bond

"Are you suggesting that if I win, you’ll abdicate the rule of your pack to your second-in-couely a he would do toto letto let hi"

Devon could take care of the pack once I was gone, he could be their alpha, and I could put my life on the line to save Lake

Shay’s face hardened, anized the eo The blood, the screams, my human parents The smell of mildew and bleach as I backed myself farther and farther under the kitchen sink Even dead, the Rabid still haunted my dreams, and I knew that Shay wanted that He wanted me to coanted to wear hly of yourself," he said, his eyes pulsing with bloodlust, and the ht it back "But at the end of the day, you’re human You’re frail, you’re weak, you’re breakable You’re h the bond, I felt her conflicting desires to lash out and shrink back froht out and say that Lake would ht as well have, and no , running, running and never getting far enough away

Bryn, if we lose, I’ with her Dev met my eyes from across the room as the silent words passed fro other than the aniht have taken a moment to consider what it would mean to lose Devon and Lake at the sao with her

Instead, I gritted o

Shay flicked his eyes from Devon’s tohad passed unspoken between us

"So the stakes aren’t changing" Lake tossed her hair over one shoulder and twirled the pool cue absentot that over with, you want to break, Shay, or should I?"

Lake threw out the challenge, looking cocky and young and like the type of person ould rush into a bet like this one without thinking things through, but I knew better Her bravado was a familiar mask, a special brand of fearlessness that she could put on at the drop of a hat

She was s She could do this I repeated that to ain

"You can break" Shay walked past her and picked up the longest pool cue, twirling it lightly "I spent most of the fifties in pool halls If I broke, you’d never even get the chance to shoot"

Shay e out of Caroline’s book and pronounced hi a shot

Unperturbed, Lake racked up the balls and walked the peri with forced carelessness, her eyes registering every angle, every contour, every ball She placed the cue ball just to the left of the table’s center and leaned over, lining up her first shot Numbness worked its way up rip on her stick

Shay smiled

And then she took her first shot

The cue ball ricocheted off its target, and the rest shot outward, like an explosion had gone off at their core

I felt, rather than saw, the first ball drop into one of the center pockets, and I forced myself to breathe

There were tooon this ainst every instinct I had--as an alpha, as their friend, as a person who knehat it ht for survival every second of every day--to just stand there, watching and willing Lake to sink one ball after another after another

It hurt to hope

It hurt to breathe

Lake eon, mid-operation, and the more shots she took, the closer the