He Stole My Title, So I Took His True Heir novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: The Border Does Not Take Orders

Willa serves Bram in front of both patrols at the north gate and walks through. Greta arrives with the baby, and Willa's contractions begin a month early.

Six patrol guards stood across the north road, and a seventh stood in front of them with his arms folded.

He was the guard captain who had looked away from me on the platform.

"Luna, the Alpha's orders are that you go back to the hall," he said.

"I'm not the Luna," I said. "Read this."

I held out the stamped copy of my withdrawal.

He didn't take it.

A truck door shut somewhere behind the guards.

Cade Merrin walked up the road with his hands in his coat pockets.

He is the Alpha of Wind Valley, the next valley east, and he had stood on the platform last night as the neighbouring territory's witness.

I hadn't spoken to him since the rain, three years ago.

"Morning," he said to me. "My truck's warm."

"I haven't crossed yet."

"No. I'll wait."

He stopped beside me and not in front of me, and he said nothing else.

I looked at the captain. "You swore an oath to the Luna and the Alpha. Under territory law, that oath covers members. I withdrew from Ironwood at 11:52 last night, and the stamp is on this page. Read the stamp."

The captain's jaw worked.

"If you stop me now," I said, "you aren't guarding a Luna. You're holding a woman outside your pack, in front of a neighbouring Alpha, eight months pregnant, in the cold."

Cade rocked back on his heels. "I'd call that a violation," he said to nobody in particular.

The captain took the paper.

He read the stamp.

He stepped aside, and the others stepped with him.

I walked.

The road was frozen hard under my boots, and the gate posts were forty feet ahead.

Then an engine came up the road behind us, fast, and a truck slid sideways across the ice.

Bram got out of the driver's side with his coat open.

Greta climbed down from the other door with the baby, and she was still wearing my cloak.

Of course she was.

"Willa!" Bram called. "Stop. Whatever you think you're doing."

I turned around, close enough to the gate posts to touch one.

"I'm leaving," I said. "I signed your form, Bram, and you can keep it. I also filed for divorce and for withdrawal at 11:52. It's stamped."

He laughed once. "You can't file against a pending guardianship. My petition went in first."

"I know when it went in."

I watched his face change.

"The petition says any child born to me before the next full moon is recorded under your guardianship," I said. "Ironwood only records births on Ironwood ground."

He had never read that part of the territory code in his life.

"The guard captain just read my stamp in front of six witnesses and a neighbouring Alpha," I said. "I'm leaving the territory. The child will be born outside it."

"You're eight months along. You're not going to make it to wherever you're going."

"I will."

Greta stepped forward before he could answer.

She had her soft voice ready.

"Willa, please," she said. "Come home. It's freezing and you're exhausted. Think about the baby."

She turned the baby in her arms as she said it.

The grey blanket slipped, and the stitched edge showed for a second. She pulled it back over.

"Which baby?" I asked.

She didn't answer.

Bram came three steps closer. "Everything you did for this pack, Willa. Six years. You're really going to throw it away over a mistake?"

"A mistake," I said.

"A misunderstanding, then. You always do this. You decide I've wronged you and you take it somewhere dramatic."

It was the voice he used when the argument was already over.

"The widows' cabins," I said. "The relief fund. The funeral for your grandmother. Who wrote it all down for the reports, Bram?"

He opened his mouth.

"Nobody," I said. "Nobody did, because you told me it was instinct."

A low pain went through my back, and I stopped talking.

I put one hand on the gate post, because it was the nearest solid thing, and the post was three feet from the line.

The pain came again, tighter, and this time it wrapped around the front.

Cade was at my elbow before I could ask.

"Willa."

"It's early," I said. "It's a month early."

"I know."

Bram took one step toward us, and Cade turned his head.

He didn't growl. He didn't need to.

"The line's right there, Haldane," Cade said. "Don't."

Bram stopped, and I stepped across the gate.

← Chapter 1 · All chapters · Chapter 3 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend