Haunted Wolves: Green Pines, Book 2 by Moira Rogers Read Free Book Online

“And now you’re an enforcer.”
    “I’ve been an enforcer all along. Fletcher and Shane, too.” He shrugged one shoulder. “For all the good it’s done. It’s like sticking your finger in the dike when the next good storm’s going to—” His teeth clacked together audibly. “It doesn’t matter. Being a pack enforcer is better.”
    “You’re outnumbered,” she said without thinking. “We all are.”
    “By bad guys?” Colin sighed. “No, there are more of us than there are of them, I think.”
    Most people weren’t evil. There were other emotions that kept them from fighting back—fear, exhaustion, sickness, even ennui. There was no way in hell Jay could triumph over all that, not unless he planned to drag every wounded wolf in the Southeast to the farm.
    Lorelei leaned her head against the seat and closed her eyes. “Giving up isn’t an option.” She’d tried it before.
    But Colin must have heard something else in her words, something that dulled his tone. “No, you’re right.”
    The hint of resignation, of shame , scraped at her. “I was talking about myself, Colin.”
    “You? Hell, sweetheart. You’re about as far from giving up as I’ve ever seen.” He squeezed her hand before pulling away. “I could take lessons from you.”
    He thought so because he didn’t know anything about her. “If you knew all the ways I’d failed, or how many times I just wanted to stop fighting, you might not think so.”
    “You think not?” He gestured toward the road ahead of them. “Where are you now? Wanting to give up isn’t the part that makes us weak. Giving in to it is.”
    “I can’t let everyone down.”
    He went silent for a moment before inclining his head. “I see the distinction. You don’t feel like you’re far from giving up.”
    “I know I’m not.” A brutal truth, but one he deserved to hear before they waltzed into God only knew what in Memphis. “Don’t worry. I’ll get this done.”
    Colin nodded. “You don’t need to hide it from me, you know. If you’re scared, if you’re hurt… Hell, I know I’m no good at this shit, but I want to try.”
    She just wanted to get it done , to get there and find out what they needed to know. “Have you ever been to Memphis before?”
    His jaw tightened, but he accepted the change of topic. “Once or twice, just passing through. Is that where you’re from?”
    Lorelei shook her head. “Little Rock, Arkansas. You?”
    “Corpus Christi. Texas.”
    “Is that how you wound up in… Where was the pack where you met the others? Houston?”
    “Yep.” He reached for his coffee. “I joined up when I was a teenager, and I was in my early twenties when Fletcher rolled in. I’ve known him the longest. Shane drifted in a few years later, and Jay was the last. He’d barely been around a year when we left.”
    Interesting. “So…why? Why did you leave?”
    Colin considered the question as he slowed to take a lazy left turn onto the highway. They joined the few cars cutting through the early-morning gloom, their headlights reflecting off the lingering fog. Fletcher’s restored Corvette hummed as Colin accelerated. “It’s a rite of passage, I guess,” he said finally. “When you’re young, you follow a strong alpha out of respect. And when you’re older, or tired, out of loyalty. But when you’re strong and coming into your power, you have to fight.”
    As natural as breathing—for alphas. She’d seen Kaley do the same thing, could see it in the distance between the girl and their new alphas, Jay and Eden. An instinctive distance, and necessary, because maybe the wolf inside Kaley never knew when she would have no choice but to fight them.
    When Lorelei didn’t reply, Colin shrugged again. “Some people get over it. Pretty sure I did. Fletcher… He has a lot more resentment to get past. I don’t know if he’ll ever be able to follow.”
    Fletcher acted like a man who’d found his place and lost it, not like a man still