Chapter 21: Darren's Last Move

Nobody on the river bank moved.

Odette stood very straight in Darren's arm, with her chin lifted and the blade at her throat.

She was not crying.

"Val," Darren said. "You look well. I've missed seeing you in your own face."

"Let her go."

"I will. When I've said what I came to say."

Mathias had risen beside me.

I put my hand flat on his chest, and felt him stop.

"Say it," I said.

"The Range alpha has lost," Darren said. "Fine. He was stupid. But I'm not him, and nobody here has a claim on me."

"You've been exiled twice," the eldest said.

"By men who are about to be on the wrong side of this."

He tightened his arm, and Odette's breath caught.

"Here's what you'll do. You'll give me a truck, and a month of your timber money."

"And you'll let me walk out of here with her."

"With Odette?" I said.

"She's mine."

"She is not a thing you carry."

"She's mine," Darren said, and his voice cracked.

"I'm the one who got her what she wanted. She wanted to live."

"I gave her a body. She'd have died in that bed without me."

The silence was awful.

Then Odette spoke.

"Darren," she said.

"Quiet, love."

"No."

She said it in a small, clear voice, and every wolf on the bank heard it.

"You didn't get me anything," she said. "Jasper did. You carried his messages."

His arm jerked.

"Odette."

"I loved you. I'll say that to everyone, because it's true."

She turned her head a little, so the blade moved against her skin, and she did not flinch.

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