When they all heard the first sounds of strange vehicles, everyone turned. The pinch in Kate’s chest told Ryan that she recognized them. He immediately launched himself at Will, bowling him over and just missing Kate in the process. But he was so damn pissed.

“You!” he yelled, latching his hands around Will’s neck. “How could you do this to her?”

“Do what?” Will choked out.

Dee and Kate were clamoring to get him off the man’s body, but Ryan was seeing red. These jackass Quades didn’t have a claim on Kate anymore. She was his—and a Trewitt—and he would battle for her if he had to.

Fuck them all.

“Ryan. Stop.” Bracken’s voice had some alpha power behind it, and Ryan sat up, holding his hands over his head.

“Okay, okay. I stopped.” He let Kate pull him to his feet, and allowed Dee to do the same for her mate, but he wasn’t done with William Quade. No. He wasn’t.

The trucks were all rumbling down the road, close enough for Ryan to smell the diesel exhaust. The Trewitts all circled up, with Kate in the middle.

“What are we going to do?” Beau asked, taking a flank position beside him. “It looks like he brought the whole damn pack.”

“Nothing,” Bracken said, firmly. “We’re going to do nothing. She’s bonded to me. He has no hold over her as an alpha. And Ryan’s her mate, so he has no hold over her as family. He has absolutely no right to her, and we’re going to get in our trucks and go home.”

But something pressed inside Ryan’s chest. If he didn’t take this chance to get Phillip Quade off Kate’s back once and for all, this situation was going to hang over their heads forever. They already had to deal with Christian Kyle, thanks to her grandfather’s scheming. He didn’t want to wait around for the old man to try something else. No. They had to handle this now. “Let me talk to him.”

“No,” Kate said. Her tone was firm, but he could feel her fear, and he stepped closer. “Let Bracken do it.”

“It’s not Bracken’s place.”

“But he’s the alpha. He’ll be able to reason with my grandfather. I don’t want you going anywhere near him.” Her voice was so laced with worry, it was almost palpable in the air.

Ryan pulled his brows together, frowning at her. “You don’t think I can talk to him?”

“I don’t think you can keep from killing him,” she said, the words quavering. “I can’t lose you. You heard your mother earlier…”

“You’re not going to lose me.” He kissed her forehead and pulled her into his chest. Ryan held her close as the trucks parked and shut off their engines, trying to calm her—and himself—so she would feel safer with the idea of him approaching Phillip.

Because it had to be him. After all, the old alpha wanted another rodeo star, and he could give him that… He didn’t much like the idea, and he was sure no one else would either, but there were at least twenty of them, and they looked ready for violence. There were only six on his side.

“I’ll let you make this call, Ryan,” said Bracken, moving behind Kate so they were all in a stand-off with the approaching pack. Dee was standing near the red truck, her arms wrapped around Will, looking back and forth between the alphas.

Ryan suddenly wondered if she’d pledged to Phillip Quade yet. Kate was right. Given what he knew of how the Quade alpha treated the women in his pack, Ryan wasn’t sure he liked the idea of Dee bonding with the El Paso alpha. Was Phillip trying to collect her, too?

“Hang on,” he whispered to Kate, releasing her. “I know what I need to say.”

She kept her hand in his, clutching him like she was trying to give him strength, but she didn’t have to touch him to do that. She believed in him. It poured strength into his veins.

Phillip Quade had on the black cowboy hat that he never seemed to take off, and he had a big dip of chew in his mouth. He spat on the ground as he approached them, leading his weird Johnny Cash army.

“Katherine,” the alpha called out. “You come here this instant.”

“She’s not yours to command anymore, asshole,” Ryan said, spreading his shoulders wide in front of her. “So why don’t you take your minions and go home.”

Phillip stared him down, then looked over his shoulder and snorted. “Katherine. You come here, or I’m going to kill your little puppy.”

Kate started to move, and Ryan held her hand, preventing her from going to the controlling bastard. Bracken and Beau stepped closer to his shoulders, so there was no room for her to get between them.

“You talk to me, Quade. I’m the one you wanted, after all. Aren’t I?”

The old man’s gray brows arched in apparent surprise. Rather than speak, he spat a big brown glob on the dirt between them.

“I heard you wanted to collect me. Or, rather, my offspring.” He tipped his had, negotiating. “You wanted Kate to have my children. This was never about Christian, was it? It was about the kids. The next generation of great rodeo stars that would bear the Quade name on the back of their jacket.”

“It’s true,” Beau whispered. “Men always have to take the Quade name when they marry into that family.”

Ryan had a full body shudder as he looked at the wicked, shriveled old man.

“That’s one of the reasons I said no,” Bracken said in Ryan’s other ear. “Whatever your daddy did wrong, you’re his son.”

A smirk played across Ryan’s lips. Yes. He sure was his daddy’s son.

“Look,” he called out to Phillip. “I have a compromise for you.”

“The only thing I want is Kate.”

“Kate is bonded to me,” Bracken said flatly. “You might have missed it, since you were late to the party, but she’s switched her allegiance.”

“You don’t think I can feel it when one of my pack takes a new alpha?” Phillip’s smile was creepy, to say the least. He looked like a cartoon movie villain with that weird white mustache. Ryan wanted to smack the damn thing off his face.

“Well, then you know. You have no claim on her.”

“The hell I don’t. She’s my blood.” The old man stomped hard on the ground and a little plume of dust came up around his boot.

None of the men standing behind him looked particularly pleased with what he was saying, but they all had glazed eyes. Empty stares. They almost seemed shell-shocked, which made sense given their alpha’s escalating behavior. Occasionally, one of them would glance over at Will, in his all-black matching uniform, standing apart from them. But they didn’t appear to have any reaction to what Phillip was saying. Were they all unfeeling? Or just idiots?

Or had Phillip managed to indoctrinate them so much, they didn’t know right from wrong?

Gods, what was Dee mating into? Ryan wanted, more than anything, to order her back to Oklahoma. But he wasn’t her alpha, and Bracken would never make her do something like that against her own will. Not if her mate wanted to stay in Texas.

Ryan hated this piece of the Moonbound world. There was no accountability between packs. Even Aaron’s summit was a free-will attendance event. Any alpha could have refused at any time, even when it might have put all wolves in danger by doing so. There was an all-wolf Ranger team, run by the government, that stepped in when alphas asked for help or arrest. But there was no one to stop a man like Phillip Quade from doing whatever he wanted to his own people.

It made Ryan want to kill him. But then he’d end up in shifter prison. Or executed. And he would lose the one thing that mattered to him.

“Katherine!” called out a female voice. Bodies parted like the black sea, and a white-haired, hobble-backed old woman came through them. This had to be the grandmother. Miranda Quade. She had not been at the summit meeting, so he didn’t recognize her.

Kate tensed, and Ryan squeezed her hand again, trying to ground her. He would fight for her if he had to. Kill for her if need be. But the Quades were her family, and despite the horrible things they’d done, that meant something. She wouldn’t want to see them die.

And the Trewitts were vastly outnumbered. If this came to violence, it was anyone’s guess who would walk away. And he’d learned long ago the violence had a habit of begetting more violence. There had to be a way to broker peace without bloodshed. For Kate’s sake.

“You get over here with us, girl,” the old woman croaked out, coming to stand next to her husband. She wore a red shawl over a blue dress that reached to the ground, but she had on running shoes, like she was ready for a fight.

“How many times do I have to tell you? She’s not yours to command anymore.” Ryan was starting to get downright pissed off. They had no claim on her. She was over eighteen, so they also had no legal claim on her by human terms. But these weren’t reasonable people.

“I rule over my own blood.” The old man’s jaw was set. His mind was made up. Ryan could feel fear coursing through his mate, and he knew…this was never going to stop. Not as long as Phillip was alive. He would never stop believing that he had a right to rule over Kate, and there was no one to make him listen.

Short of killing the man, there was nothing Ryan could do to make him stop.

He looked back down at Kate. She was trying her best to look resolute, and to Bracken and Beau, she might have seemed perfectly strong, but Ryan could feel the strings in her that were about to break. Bonding to a new pack and a new mate had been her only hope, but even that hadn’t seemed to stop her psycho alpha.

If death wasn’t an option, then Ryan had to come up with something fast to make Kate safe. Even if it meant losing the battle. He was ready to lose everything to keep her safe.

Ryan swallowed and prayed to all the gods past and present that this would work. “I have a proposal.”

“Let’s hear your compromise, boy,” said Phillip, resting a hand on his wife’s shoulder.

“Kate is bonded to me.” Ryan held up his wrists, pulling back his shirt cuffs so they could see the tattoos.

A ripple of surprise went through the Quades, with all the boys darting shocked looks at one another. One of their own had dared to defy their grandfather.

“And Christian is nowhere to be found,” Ryan continued. “So your plans aren’t going to work. But I know you wanted me first.” He took a deep breath, knowing this would not please Kate. But it was the only way to avoid bloodshed. To protect his pack and Kate. “So you can have me.”

“What?” Kate said, shock rolling through her, across their bond.

“No,” Bracken said, pulling on his shoulder. “No, Ryan.”

“I mean it.” Ryan stepped forward, away from both of them. “I’ll take the Quade name. I’ll go back to the rodeo. I’ll be the bulldogger you’ve wanted. Kate and I will have children, and they will also bear the Quade name. I’ll raise them to rodeo for you.”

“No. Ryan.” Kate came forward, grabbing him by the arm, pulling him back with her. “What are you doing?”

He let out his breath and put his hands on her shoulders. There were tears in her eyes, and they stung him, but he knew this was the only solution that would get them all out of there alive. “It’s the only way. Now that our bond is secure, the only way to get him to leave you alone is for me to give him what he wants.”

“Ryan.” Tears streamed down her cheeks. “We’ll never get away from him. Our…family…will never get away from him.”

“We’re not going anywhere.” He turned back to the El Paso alpha. “We’re going to keep living in Durant. Kate will stay pledged to Bracken, to protect her from you, but I will pledge to you today. And I’ll take the Quade name.”

Kate’s sobs echoed in his ears, and he knew it would hurt her to have him connected to the Quade pack. But if the old man got what he wanted—the next generation of Quade rodeo stars—then maybe he would leave them in peace. It was the only way to save both her and Christian.

“You’ll ride for me?” the old man said, raising a bushy white brow. “Your winnings, your trophies, they’ll come to me?”

Ryan swallowed, but he forced a nod.

Phillip and Miranda exchanged skeptical looks and then turned their backs on the Trewitts, huddling together and talking in voices so low, Ryan couldn’t hear them. They’d intentionally dropped out of his register.

He slid his arms around Kate. “I’m so sorry. I know you don’t want to be connected to them anymore. I don’t either. But we’re outnumbered here. He’s not going to stop until someone’s dead. I can’t take a chance that someone will be you, or someone else I love. There’s no way to stop bloodshed without sacrifice. I will be the sacrifice.”

She gripped him, tightly, sobbing into his shoulder. “But what about your pack, Ryan? Your plans. They’re all… You can’t do this. There has to be another way.”

He smiled into her hair. “I wish there was. But this is my penance now.”

They clung to each other while Bracken paced and Beau watched, soaking everything in, and the Quades all stood in stunned silence. Dee and Will clung to each other, and his cousin stared at him like he was crazy.

Maybe he was.

Miranda Quade looked over her shoulder, hatred in her eyes. Ryan’s hackles went up, and he touched Bracken’s arm with his elbow. His alpha looked so pissed. But he was handling his anger, channeling it into support for Kate. He was a good alpha.

“We have to do it,” Phillip’s whisper finally became audible, like he was getting angry with his wife and not able to control himself anymore. “What if we don’t get another chance?”

Miranda shook her head. “You’re making a mistake, Phillip.”

But the old alpha shook his head and turned away from her. He gestured toward Ryan and called out, “I have two conditions.”

“What are they?” Ryan asked, keeping Kate against him.

“You travel with us during rodeo season,” he said. “One of my boys will be with you at all times.”

“Done.”

“And you move closer than Durant. At least down to Somewhere, if you won’t live in El Paso. I won’t have you in another state. Or my grandchildren.” His voice was so hard, it sounded like he was ready to call the negotiations and start fighting.

Ryan hesitated. He hadn’t planned on moving away from Durant. He didn’t want Kate any closer to her grandfather. That was a deal breaker. She needed to not be anywhere near him. But Somewhere was still a full day’s drive from El Paso. And there were other wolves there. Good ones.

But it meant he would have to leave his pack completely. He wouldn’t be able to streamline the daily operations of the Trewitt ranch. The scaled-up breeding enterprise would become Bracken’s and Beau’s.

He didn’t want to leave his home. But keeping Kate and his brother and Bracken and Dee alive…well, that was more important. Kate needed to know how much he loved her. How safe she was with him.

“Done,” he ground out.

“And one more thing,” Phillip said, walking toward him, his hand out in a handshake.

Ryan reluctantly held his hand out in response, holding his ground until the alpha was practically standing in front of him. Then he took half a step in front of Kate to keep her protected from the old asshole.

Phillip grabbed him, pulling him close, and hissed into his ear. “You can die.”

And he didn’t even see the knife.