Midnight Wolves

Chapter Three: Echo

It had been three years since Callie had last seen Caleb. Three long years during which he'd met and mated with his moonmate and become the renowned alpha of the Magnum pack.

Once upon a time they had been friends, something more. So, Callie thought as she pulled up on the Magnum packlands, it was ridiculous for her to be so nervous about seeing him. But it was precisely the fact that they'd once been something more that had her palms sweating and heart quickening in her chest.

Watching Caleb meet his moonmate had been particularly brutal, especially as at that point Callie hadn't known until she saw him that she still loved him – having watched him kill her moonmate after he'd tried to forcefully mate with her, Callie hadn't been able to look at Caleb for a long time, let alone consider something more.

But then he'd come back to Rootbridge for the memorial. And Callie had seen him and realised that it didn't matter, not any more. That she wanted him. As he had wanted her.

And then the wind had changed, and in the blink of an eye their future had evaporated.

It had broken her heart.

She switched off her car engine and slowly climbed out. She'd given her name at the gate and Caleb had been informed of her arrival, and that was assuming J hadn't already given him a call to tell him. Yet still, he wasn't there to greet her.

Instead there was an old woman that Callie recognised from so many years ago now when she'd first met the Magnum pack. The woman's eyes shone with tears as Callie walked towards her. This woman knew Callie, had known her before she was taken from the Magnum pack as a child. For whatever reason, Callie meant something to this women, even if Callie didn't know her name.

"Callie. I'm so glad you came back to see us." She swept Callie into a hug, making her freeze at the touch. The old woman pulled back, not outwardly put off by the frozen block of ice that Callie had become. "Come, meet the rest of the pack. The alphas will meet us there too."

Callie nodded tightly at the mention of the alphas, surprised at how much it hurt that Caleb hadn't come to meet her. She'd meant something to him once. Or at least, she thought she had.

Walking through the packlands was a strange experience. Her wolf, for starters, had shrunk to a terrified shell. Fear trembled her every step. And although Callie didn't recognise the tarmac'd hill that they climbed, or the large house at the top with the light blue deck and porch swing, there was something eerily familiar about it.

She knew that there was a notch out of one of the steps leading to the deck even before they neared it, but she wasn't sure how she knew that. Yet, she knew it with the same surety that she knew in the winter the porch swing creaked, the sound resonating right up into the attic where a small bedroom with pink walls and a border of daises had once been.

She paused on the bottom step of the deck, unable to go any further. The woman beside her had been talking about something. Perhaps the weather. Perhaps something more important, Callie didn't know, didn't care because there were memories hidden like landmines all across this place.

Her breathing came hard, fast, shallow. Something hammering in her head until she could barely think past the incessant rhythm. The world was too loud, too much. Callie's wolf shot to life out of no where, taking her moment of weakness as an opportunity to lunge for control.

Callie barely stopped her in time. Biting back the growl that urged to slip from her lips as her world slipped into monochrome and claws split from her fingers. She might have even transformed into her wolf if it hadn't been for Caleb. He appeared in the doorway, eyes trained on her and a furrow in his brow. Had he sensed her, sensed her panic?