Read Christmas Moon for Free Online Page B

had
been a cool, crisp autumn day and they’d taken one of Caesar’s old
college buddies to the park to get some family pictures. The one
with Ari rolling around in a pile of leaves she pulled out and set
aside, along with one of the three of them, wrapped in each other’s
arms.
    There were pictures of the Enforcement pack
she and Caesar had led. She recognized so many faces, faces that
had tried to back her after Caesar’s death. But just like her they
hadn’t understood the shift in their alpha, didn’t understand how
they hadn’t seen it coming. She swallowed. Then they’d pulled away.
Or had it been her first? God, she didn’t even know anymore.
    It had been a time of so much pain, all she’d
wanted to do was leave. Run. As far away as she possibly could.
    She pulled out another box of pictures and
kept going. There were so many memories. She hadn’t forgotten them,
but at the same time, she hadn’t let herself remember them either.
Picture after picture went by.
    But it was the Christmas ones that brought
the tears pouring out.
    Arianna in her pajamas surrounded by wrapping
paper hugging a large stuffed white unicorn. Arianna grinning in
front of the Christmas tree, her little fuzzy lion in one hand.
Caesar and her decorating the tree.
    Bree let the pictures fall to the ground and
buried her face in her hand and cried. Christmas had always been
their favorite time of year. From making snow angels in the sand to
picking out and decorating a Christmas tree. Lighting up the house
with decorations and laughter. Baking cookies for Santa.
    “Oh Ari.” She touched a picture of her
daughter sprawled out in the snow, her pink snow suit on. “I miss
you, sweetie.”
    She lost track of how long she sat there, but
the light faded leaving the room dark as the sun set outside. Bree
didn’t get up to turn on the light. She sat there in the quiet,
wrapped in the darkness, and let the memories sift through her.
With every smile, every laugh in her head, the memories finally
started to heal the wounds ripped open by Arianna’s passing.
    When it finally became too dark to see, Bree
grabbed the picture frame and dragged herself to bed, the image of
her daughter wrapped in her arms.
     
    ***
     
    Hunter paced the small quarters of the
Enforcement office. Tension knotted his shoulders and his head
ached from the constant grind of his teeth. Rylie’s place had been
empty, her phone was off so no one could trace it, and her whole
damn place had stunk of the rogue. And now, Hunter was at the local
Shifter Town Enforcement headquarters and told to wait.
    Wait his ass.
    He’d been up the entire night calling her
phone, her friends, the pack. Anyone and everyone he could think
of. Nothing.
    Exhaustion tugged at him, an ever persistent
weigh that settled along his shoulders and threatened to break him,
but Hunter refused to sit down. The moment his butt hit that chair
he knew he’d be out.
    The Hound poked her head out of her office
and waved for him. Thank God . He couldn’t wait much longer.
They needed to do something and standing around here wasn’t it.
    “I’ve contacted her family, no one’s heard
from her.”
    “I know. I called them last night.” The growl
edged in his words reminded her that he’d told her, she just hadn’t
believed him . Typical Hound . The thought crossed his mind
before he even realized it, the prejudice automatic.
    It was so rare to find a Hound actually on
the side of the shifters they were supposed to protect. The
dog-shifters were more inclined to protect their own and the
average human than they were shifters.
    And yet, something about Breanne Torres drew
him to her.
    This one made the hair on the back of his
neck stand on end. He didn’t trust her. Didn’t think she really
gave a damn about a missing wolf. She rattled on about what Shifter
Town Enforcement was doing to find his wolf, but it all seemed to
involve her sitting behind a computer screen. No one was actually
out there