Chapter 16

“Let me know what you think of this,” Brooks said with a grin as he slid two plates in front of Lana. “Max asked me to come up with something special for you since I had grill duty today.”

She looked up and was momentarily distracted by the sight of Brooks standing there in a pair of shorts and a muscle shirt. And man, was there a lot of muscle there to fill out that shirt. She loved Max with every fiber of her being, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t appreciate a fine-looking man when she saw him.

She forced her attention away from Brooks—who insisted he was dressed like he was on the chilly November day purely because it was so hot over by the grills—and leaned over to smell the food. She let out a little moan of appreciation. “This smells amazing. What is it?”

“Two grilled portobello mushroom burgers with Cajun spices and a little onion jam on the side, along with grilled sweet potato wedges spiced up with lime and cilantro.”

Lana glanced at Max, who shrugged and shook his head. “What can I say? The big man has some mad skills with the grills.”

Lana laughed and picked up the mushroom burger, taking a bite. “It’s awesome!” she said around a big mouthful of tasty goodness. She knew talking with her mouth full was poor manners, but it was so good.

Brooks grinned again. “Glad you like it. You need anything else, let me know.”

Giving them a nod, he headed back to his grills over by the volleyball court, where he’d spent the better part of the afternoon working hard to feed all the people attending the monthly SWAT cookout. Team mascot, Tuffie, and Lacey’s dog, Leo, sat beside him, patiently waiting for their specially made plates of food.

“That does smell damn good,” Remy said from the other side of the table, where he sat with Triana. “Can I have a piece?”

Lana cut off a piece from the back side of the burger and passed it over to him. Remy took a bite with as much gusto as she had.

“I can’t believe what I’m seeing,” Diego murmured from the other side of Max as he dug into his bloody rare steak. “A Cajun werewolf eating mushrooms instead of meat. Your family would probably disown you if they found out.”

Remy chuckled and licked his fingers clean. “My family would eat cardboard if you put Cajun spices on it.”

Lana laughed along with everyone else at the table. “I’m glad so many people were able to come today.”

Max looked up from his barbecue chicken and around at the compound. “Yeah. We’ve never had this many people here before. Though I have to tell you, these events are usually a lot louder than this.”

“I can’t say I blame anyone for not being in a partying mood,” Remy said, the jovial expression gone from his face. “The wounds are still a bit raw for everyone.”

Lana couldn’t argue with that. This was her first cookout, but even she’d noticed the event seemed a bit subdued. That was understandable. Although the Pack had been lucky to make it out of the recent encounter with the hunters in one piece, it was too soon to be laughing and joking.

Thankfully, Gage, Diego, and Hale had completely recovered from the wounds they’d sustained during the fight with Boyd and the other hunters. In fact, unless someone had told her, she’d have been hard-pressed to know how close they’d come to dying that day. Dr. Saunders had tried to give her and the others much of the credit for the antidote, but Lana knew whom to thank for saving Max’s life.

Since he’d been shot three times in the chest, Max’s recovery had taken longer than the others. Two weeks later, he was still moving a little slower than normal. Last week he’d gone up to Alaska with her for Denise’s funeral, and that had nearly worn him out, but he was getting stronger every day, and Lana had no doubt that he’d be back to his old self soon.

On the bright side, Max no longer seemed to have any issue controlling his inner werewolf. Maybe it was an outcome of saving Terence and his family, or maybe it had come from saving Lana. Either way, his fangs and claws hadn’t made a surprise appearance since that night.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t much of a bright side when it came to Zane, which was probably the biggest reason there was a dark shadow hanging over this entire event. Yes, they’d all lived through the hunter’s attack, but one of their kind had paid a steep price.

Zane was supposed to be at home on bed rest for at least another week, but he’d insisted on coming to the cookout. He’d never missed one before, and he said he didn’t intend to start now, arm in a sling or not. While the antidote had cleared the poison from his body, the stuff had still been in his system for nearly two days, doing an unimaginable amount of damage. Something as simple as getting out of bed was a chore for him at the moment, but yet here he was.

It was the injury to his arm that had everyone worried, though. The antidote couldn’t replace muscle that was no longer there, and even though Dr. Saunders was hopeful the werewolf gene might allow some muscle regrowth to occur, the fact was no one knew if it would.

Zane wasn’t handling the possibility of being disabled very well. And Trey—who essentially believed he was responsible—was handling it even worse. The medic hadn’t left Zane’s side all day unless it was to grab more food for his pack mate.

Not everyone at the cookout was feeling down, though. At the far picnic table, Coletti was sitting with Kari, their heads close together, grins on their faces. Max had told Lana about what had happened between Coletti and the beta werewolf at the compound right before the SWAT team had left to raid the clinic. No one seemed to know what Kari had said to the man, but afterward, the detective hadn’t asked Max for any of those details he’d been demanding earlier.

Brandy was there, too. She’d finally accepted an invitation from Chris, and now they were sitting on a bench on the other side of the volleyball court, talking. Lana could have eavesdropped but refused, especially since they were obviously having a good time together.

Terence and his sisters were on the volleyball court, playing with Megan, her human boyfriend, Zak, and some of the other kids. Megan was completely healed now and seemed to have a calming effect on the recently traumatized kids.

Their mother wasn’t smiling as much as Terence and his sisters, but she was trying to put on a good face for her children’s sakes. Lana hoped Eileen and her kids became regulars at the SWAT cookouts. They fit in here.

Lana was absently nibbling on her sweet potato fries, thinking she and Max should take the Wallace kids to a Cowboys game, when Gage and his wife, Mac, came over to their table and sat down.

“I was hoping your mom and dad could make it today,” Gage said to Lana.

“I was hoping so, too,” she said. “Dad is doing much better, but there’s no way his doctor was going to let him out yet, even if all he’d do was sit at a picnic table.”

Gage nodded. “I can understand that.”

“Everything is okay between you and your father now, right?” Mac asked. “Your dad is on board with you and Max being together?”

Lana smiled and reached out to take Max’s hand. “Yeah. Max and I have been hanging out with my parents almost every night. Dad finally got around to apologizing for how he treated Max—and for hiding my werewolf nature from me. We’re really good now.”

“I’m glad,” Gage said, then glanced at Diego. “How’re you feeling? Any long-term effects from the poison?”

Diego shook his head. “Not really. My ab muscles are still a little tender, but it’s fading fast. I’ll feel a hell of lot better when the son of a bitch who shot me goes to trial.”

Diego was talking about Seth, the only hunter who’d made it out of the raid alive. He was currently in Dallas County lockup, awaiting arraignment.

“Seth Oliver’s looking at the death penalty for the attempted murder of the deputy chief, not to mention shooting you at the clinic. That’s a given,” Gage said. “But I might as well tell you the latest news before you hear it through the grapevine.”

“What?” Diego asked warily.

“There are least six other states that want to question Seth relating to his possible involvement in a series of unsolved homicides. Bottom line, the guy will probably avoid the death penalty for years because he’ll be traveling around the country, getting charged with other murders.”

“You’re kidding me, right?” Diego said.

Gage shrugged. “I wish. Then it wouldn’t hurt so much.”

Remy took a swig of beer. “You think Seth is in contact with the other hunters out there?”

Gage shrugged. “We have to assume he is because he sure as hell is never going to tell us voluntarily.”

The SWAT commander should know. Everyone on the SWAT team except for Zane had paid Seth a visit in jail, trying to get the man to crack, but no luck yet.

“How long do you think it’ll be before more hunters show up?” Max asked.

Gage sighed. “Based on what Lana overheard, we know Seth and his crew were nothing more than hired killers on a leash. The man pulling the strings is still out there, and we don’t have a clue who he is or what his motives might be. It’s a safe bet they’ll try again at some point, especially now that they know exactly who and where we are. My concern is that next time, we won’t see them coming until it’s too late to do anything about it.”

“But we have the antidote to their poison,” Triana pointed out. “And Dr. Saunders said he’s going to start giving small doses of the drug to every werewolf in town to help build up some kind of resistance to the poison. Like a vaccination.”

“And that’s a good thing,” Gage said. “But there’s nothing to say they’ll use the same poison the next time they show up. I’m worried about the weapon program Lana overheard them talking about. Something tells me they may have more than poison bullets in their bag of tricks.”

Max cursed. “Great. Now we have to worry they might have something even worse than wolfsbane the next time we tangle with them.”

“That may be the least of our problems,” Gage muttered.

Diego stopped, his burger halfway to his mouth. “It gets worse?”

“If you consider the possibility of someone in the DPD knowing about us and actively working with the hunters to kill us to be worse, then yes,” Gage said.

Lana and Max had been talking about the same thing since the night at the clinic. The man who’d told Boyd she and Zane were at Dr. Saunders’s clinic had to be high up in the DPD organization. Very few people had known Zane was injured, much less where he was. The thought that there was a cop out there working with the hunters was absolutely terrifying.

Gage and Mac hung out at their table for a little while longer, but Lana could tell the SWAT commander’s mind was a hundred miles away. No doubt he was worrying about protecting the rapidly growing pack from the hunter’s next attack.

“He blames himself because he didn’t see this coming,” Remy said quietly after Gage and Mac had left to talk with some omegas and betas at another table.

Triana frowned. “That’s silly. He did everything he could.”

“I know,” Remy agreed. “But he holds himself to a higher standard than that. The werewolves in his pack got hurt. He’s going to be beating himself up about it until we stop these hunters for good.”

Lana and everyone else at the table were still trying to figure out what they could do to help Gage carry some of the burden of protecting the Pack when the sun started going down. Beside her, Max looked a little worn out. Since he’d never admit it, she had to make certain decisions for him.

“Why don’t we head home?” she suggested softly, leaning in close. “I’m beat.”

Max gave her a look that told Lana he was onto her, but he didn’t call her on it. Instead, he smiled and kissed her. “Then let’s get you home.”

She and Max made the rounds of the compound, saying good night to everyone, then walked hand in hand out to his Camaro. As he started the engine and drove out of the parking lot, heading toward his apartment they were now sharing, Lana realized he was more quiet than usual.

“Hey,” she said. “Are you feeling okay? Should we stop in and see Dr. Saunders?”

He shook his head. “I’m okay. I’m was just thinking about stuff.”

“What kind of stuff?”

He shrugged. “About how crazy it is for us to be trying to have a relationship while we’re wondering when the hunters are going to show up and try to kill us again.”

Lana reached over and grabbed his hand, squeezing it hard, something that was a lot easier to do now that she had access to all her werewolf abilities.

“You can stop wondering right now,” she said firmly. “I just got you back, and I’m not wasting a second of our lives together worrying about what may happen with those hunters. If they come back, we’ll deal with them.”

Max didn’t say anything for a while, but then he looked over and smiled. “I’m glad you feel that way because I’ve been putting a lot of thought into not wasting time either.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah,” he said, turning his attention to the highway again. “What would you say if I told you I wanted to get married?”

Lana’s heart did a little happy dance. She’d learned enough about the legend of The One over the past couple of weeks to know it meant that Max and she were going to be together for life. After almost losing him to the hunters’ bullets, she realized she wasn’t interested in waiting around before starting that life. It was nice to know Max felt the same.

“I guess that depends,” she said coyly, “on whether you’re actually asking me to marry you or simply talking hypothetically.”

He suddenly pulled over to the side of the road, stopping in the grass. Cars sped by them at seventy miles an hour, but Max ignored them as he turned to look at her.

“I’m definitely asking.” He grimaced. “I’m sorry if this isn’t as romantic as it should be, with a ring and everything, but if I learned anything from going up against the hunters, it’s that things move fast—even when you’ve found the person you’re going to be with for the rest of your life. I don’t want to waste a second of the life we have together, Lana, so yeah, I’m asking you to marry me. And if you say yes, I’m completely okay with heading to the airport right now. We can be in Vegas by midnight, have a diamond on your finger an hour later, and be married by the time the sun comes up.”

She laughed and leaned over the console to kiss him. “The answer is yes, I’ll marry you, Max. And while a whirlwind wedding in Vegas would certainly do the trick, how about we slow things down just a little and see if we can set up something local? I don’t need much, just my parents, my friends, and the Pack. I want this moment to be perfect for both of us, okay?”

He tipped her head back and kissed her hard enough to make her almost change her mind. Then he pulled back and flashed her a grin.

“Okay, that’s the plan then. We get married as soon as we can pull everything together. A Christmas wedding, maybe. What do you think?”

Since it was almost Thanksgiving, that would give them a little more than four weeks until Christmas. She smiled. “I think that sounds good to me.”

Max suddenly turned serious again. “One thing, though.”

“What’s that?” she asked.

“You have to be the one to tell your dad. He’s just now starting to like me, and if I tell him we’re planning to get married already, he’ll probably shoot me.”

Lana laughed and kissed him again. “Don’t worry. I’ll handle my dad. You just figure out where you’re taking me on our honeymoon.”

“I can handle that,” he murmured against her mouth. “Anywhere with you will be perfect.”

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