Chapter 224: Chapter 223

Zane The instant that knock came at the front door, my wolf went on high alert. Whining, he paced and pawed.

| had to forcibly push him lower. The only reason nobody else thought anything of it was that all of their wolves were reacting the same way.

Gabriela moved through the living room so fast, none of us could stop her. She wielded a plastic spatula in one hand and ab utcher knife in the other. Neither would be better weapons than her own wolf's claws, but | got the hell out of her way.

“You all stay back,” she said. “Take care of those babies.”

“As if we wouldn't,” Xander grumbled through the link.

4 Fear radiated off Lanie in pulses. | moved closer to her with baby Stella in my arms. She didn’t try to take the baby from me, but leaned close to run her hand over $tella’s head. Lanie’s wolf flashed in her eyes.

All of us tensed as Gabriela peeked through the front window to see who was on the porch. She visibly tensed, then relaxed, at the sight. She looked over her shoulder at us.

“It's Rhiannon.”

As another knock rattled the door, Gabriela opened it and stepped aside to let the witch enter. My gut roiled at the sight of her, and Lanie looked up at me.

“She helped us,” she reminded me in a low voice. “Without her, we wouldn’t have the twins back. You don’t have to like her, but we should be grateful.”

| barely kept my lip from curling. | wanted Rhiannon gone, out of here, far away from the woman and the man | loved, and the pups we were all bound to love and protect. Most of all, | wanted her the hell away from me.

“Zane?” Lanie’s mind probed mine.

| subtly tried to shield myself from her, but it wasn’t working. As a Beta, there wasn’t much | could do against the innate power a Luna could wield, and even though she was still new and didn’t know how to access all of her gifts, Lanie was so much stronger than she thought herself to be. She knew something was wrong.

“Not because I’m the Luna,” she thought at me. “Because | love you. What the hell is going on? Why are you trying to stop me from sensing you?”

Mason looked toward us, and | felt a tentative touch of his attempt at listening in. Him, | could block, and | could tell it annoyed him by the way he grimaced.

“You can all just put your teeth away,” Rhiannon said sharply. “Oh, what big eyes you have and all that b ullsh it. Nobody followed me. | have a potion that alerts me if someone did.”

someone else a transmogrification potion, and this is only someone who looks like her?”

The witch put her hands on her hips. “Why by the stars would | do that?”

“Because you're a witch,” Xander put in. “And you hate wolves. You were quick enough to insist that Lanie be the one to use your potion to get into the facility. Maybe the plan all along was for her to end up getting killed. Maybe ‘Rhiannon’ never really wanted to help us at all.”

| always had Xander’s back, but it felt good to know that he would always step up to have mine, too. Even if he had no idea why | was so desperate to get this witch the hell out of here. Even if | knew that if he ever found out, there’d be hell to pay.

I'd have to face that if it happened. For now, | stepped between Lanie and Stella and the witch. “Prove it’s really you.”

Gabriela tutted softly. “Zane, we can all smell that it’s her.”

“We can smell a witch,” | countered grimly. “That doesn’t mean it’s the one you've all asked us to trust.”

Gabriela’s wolf flashed as her lip curled back to show her dropping canines. | knew I’d shocked her with my disrespect. Xander’s mother and | had always gotten along.

Rhiannon drew herself up. She had no wolf inside her, but her eyes flashed with something. Her lips quirked into a small smile.

“Fine. I'll prove it to you. And only you,” she added with a sharp glance around the rest of the room before she settled her gaze back on mine. “You come outside with me, and we'll have a little...chat.”

S hit. I'd stabbed myself in the back.

“Zane?” Lanie said aloud, her voice tense with suspicion. “Does this have anything to do with the invisibility potion?”

Xander’s head swirled. “I’m sorry, the what now?”

We'd been so caught up in our interpersonal dynamics Lanie and | hadn’t told him all the details of the escape.

“Zane,” Lanie repeated, this time in a harsher tone.

Rhiannon smiled, backing up toward the door. “Yes, Zane. Come outside with me, and I’ll prove that I’m exactly who | say | am.”

I had no other choice.

“Fine,” | said. “Let's go.”