Eva’s cheeks darkened. “Crowds overwhelm me. I’m not very good at shutting out everyone’s emotions.”
“It will come with time,” Bass said. “If you’re anything like your brother, you’ll adjust in no time.”
“Hopefully,” Eva murmured.
“I remember my first shift,” Katalina mused, thinking back with a shudder. “I was terrified, and it hurt like hell.”
“Really?” Eva answered, clearly shocked.
Katalina suppressed a laugh. “Yes, really.”
“Sorry.” Eva looked to the floor. “It’s just you always seem so brave and together. I can’t imagine you feeling like I did when I shifted,” Eva explained.
“Eva, I am so far from fearless and put together. I never knew I was a wolf and didn’t shift until I was brought back to pack land at eighteen.”
“Does it get easier?” Eva asked quietly.
“Yes. As easy as breathing,” she reassured.
Mathew chose that time to come bounding into the room and scrambled up the back of the sofa and in between Eva and John. Big blue eyes stared at them, his curly locks sticking this way and that. Katalina wouldn’t admit it aloud, but secretly she understood why John and Eva had taken Mathew on. There was a presence about him that drew you in, softening your heart until it was all but melting.
“Hey, monkey,” Katalina greeted with a smile. “Thought you were meant to be in bed?”
He shook his head, curls bouncing about as he did.
John pulled the boy into his lap and ruffled his hair. “Didn’t want to miss out, huh?”
Katalina’s phone rang, cutting through the conversation. Pulling it out of her pocket, her stomach did a flip as Jackson’s name appeared on the screen.
Cage.
Bass’s hand slipped onto her knee and squeezed, giving her the courage to answer the call. “Dad, what’s up?”
“It’s Cage,” Jackson began, stealing Katalina’s breath. “He’s woken up.”
“Jesus, Jackson,” Katalina growled. “Lead with that next time!”
His laughter filled the line. “Sorry, I’m still in shock…. I really thought we were going to lose him, Kat.”
“I know,” she murmured. “I’m coming over. See you soon.” Putting down the phone, Katalina hugged Bass. “He’s awake.” She repeated what he’d have likely heard over the phone.
“Told you he was strong,” Bass reminded her. “Do you want to go see him now?”
Pulling back, she searched his face. “Do you mind?”
“Of course not,” Bass said.
Katalina took in Eva, John, and Mathew. “Can we talk about this party another time? Maybe over a coffee date if you’re feeling up for it, Eva? Don’t know about you, but I’m fed up of being trapped on pack lands. Time we got out into the real world for a bit.”
“That sounds nice,” Eva nodded. “I’d almost forgot there was a life beyond these trees.”
Bass and John didn’t seem as impressed by their plans though. Slapping Bass’s knee, Katalina jumped to her feet with a laugh. “What’s the matter, babe? Wishing for another threat so you can keep me under lock and key?”
He climbed to his feet. “Give me a day or two to get used to this new life.”
Laughing, Katalina glanced at John’s disgruntled expression. “Don’t worry, John. I’m perfectly capable of keeping Eva safe.”
She was teasing and joking, but the truth was, Katalina needed a day or two as well. The idea of leaving pack grounds and being safe from attack was a foreign concept to her now. Something she’d longed for, for many months, but the reality of it was altogether different. Fear wasn’t just shut off overnight. Protective instincts weren’t washed away after the last enemy fell. It was going to take time for all of them to adjust to this new life, and until Katalina did, she’d joke and laugh, covering the truth of her emotions with a smile on her face.
They walked them to the door, Mathew waving a shy goodbye, and as Katalina stepped out into the cold night, Bass turned back and placed a hand on Eva’s shoulder.
“You’ve been a member of this pack for some time now, but I’m going to say this anyway.” The wolf filled his eyes, causing Eva’s to do the same. “Welcome to my pack, Evaline,” Bass finished, pulling her in for a hug. “May your life here be a good one.”
After a final goodbye, Katalina and Bass slipped into the darkness of the trees. Turning to face, Bass, she walked backward, a grin on her face as she slipped her coat from her shoulders. “Race you there.”
Her clothes disintegrated around her as fur burst from her skin, the change happening between one breath and the next. Dashing between the trees, she wove around them, laughter in her soul, and the cool winter air in her lungs as her paws flew across the snow-covered wilderness, a black wolf on her tail.
And though they were in mourning and friends had been lost, as the two of them played through the night, they could have sworn they felt their lost ones’ happiness in the air. Their souls at peace.
For they had won. The packs were free. And their new dawn would finally be given a chance to begin.
Epilogue
Katalina
3 years later
“So, how are you really feeling about this?” Eva asked Katalina.
Katalina studied her surroundings. Fairy lights twinkled in the trees, snow covered the ground in a pretty blanket, and light fell from the pack’s school, which had been cleared to host her twenty-second birthday. Four years since she’d lost her parents in a car crash that had changed her life, three years of peace, and was she really ready to celebrate this day instead of mourning it? Katalina wasn’t sure. What she did know was that her packs needed this day to be one of joy
