Chapter 84 Luca
Patrol nights always felt colder than they should have even in early spring. Maybe I had picked up too much nervous energy from the pack that day or maybe I just hadn’t stopped thinking about Aria since she had kissed me goodbye outside her door. Her hoodie was still in my truck sitting on the passenger seat like it belonged there.
Rafe walked beside me through the trees. “You good?” he asked, squinting at me like he already knew the answer.
“Yeah,” I replied.
He snorted. “You were distracted all day. You almost walked straight into a thorn bush earlier.”
“That was once.”
“It was three times.”
I rolled my eyes at him but he wasn’t wrong. I had been on edge since Ms. Thorne had mentioned scent traces near the east border we didn’t recognize and nothing good ever came from that.
We kept walking, the moon hanging low enough that its light made silver puddles on the ground. The air smelled wrong, almost medicinal like something sterilized to hide the danger underneath.
Rafe slowed, lifting a hand. “You smell that?”
“Yeah.” Every muscle in my body tightened. “Hunters?”
“Has their stink all over it.”
Hunters hadn’t been near Silverpine territory in years according to the elders of the pack not since before I was old enough to patrol. The last time they had shown up, two wolves had died. One of them had been Mason’s older brother. I still remembered the way the pack had mourned for months.
We moved more carefully smelling the wind and scanning the ground. The trees thinned out ahead opening into a clearing I didn’t recognize which wasn’t good.
Rafe nudged me lightly with his arm. “Stay alert. Don’t get too cocky.”
“I’m not.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Luca, you’re dating someone. Wolves dating someone were always cocky.”
I couldn’t help the small grin that slipped out. “Shut up.”
We stepped into the clearing. That was when the wrongness in the air hit me full-force with metal, rust, and an almost chemical sourness that screamed man-made danger.
Rafe murmured, “Something’s here.”
“I know.”
I crouched, scanning the ground. Branches and freshly cut leaves were brushed aside. A lazy attempt at covering something but—
Snap.
My intestines twisted. Rafe’s eyes went wide. “Luca—STOP.”
But it was too late. The earth under my boot shifted with a metallic groan. A hiss followed sharply then something slammed upward, grabbing my ankle, and yanking me into the air before I could even breathe.
The trap snapped so violently my vision flashed white. Pain shot up my leg as the metal claws dug into my skin, burning through my denim like it was nothing. I tried to twist out of it but the thing was rigged with barbs that dug in deeper the more I struggled.
“LUCA!” Rafe shouted.
I hung upside down. The trap suspended me at least eight feet off the ground and swaying. My leg felt like it was being ripped open one second at a time.
“Rafe,don’t touch the tripwire!” I gritted out.
He froze mid-step. “Where?”
“There—left. Two feet forward.”
He swore under his breath and backed up slowly. Hunters didn’t set single traps. They made webs and traps catch the wolf then wires finished the job.
He circled, searching. “Hold on, Luca.”
“Doesn’t look like I’m going anywhere,” I spat through pain.
He shot me a glare. Yeah, that sounded like something I’d joke about on a normal day.
Rafe found the rig, a thin steel wire stretched low between two trees and crouched. “They anchored this deep. Whoever set this up knew what they were doing.”
“Just cut it.”
“I am. Stop yelling at me.”
I wasn’t yelling but whatever. The pain was crawling up my thigh, pulsing with my heartbeat. I could smell my blood and was getting lightheaded. Then I smelled something else.
Gasoline.
My chest tightened. “Rafe. Faster.”
“What?”
“FASTER.”
He looked at me, then at the ground, then at the trap. The entire system was rigged together with tripwire, snare, and ignition mechanism. If the wire snapped wrong, it could set off whatever was wired to the gasoline.
Rafe’s face went pale. “Fuck!”
“Don’t cut it,” I rasped. “Disarm it.”
“I’m trying!”
He worked quickly, his fingers shaking slightly though he’d deny that later. I heard the faint click of metal sliding free and the wire slackened just an inch and a bolt of pain exploded through my leg, ripping a groan out of me.
“Luca!” Rafe’s voice cracked. “Hang on there.”
“I’m hanging ,” I forced out. “Just hurry.”
He disabled the first latch, then the next, then another which was way too many for something that should’ve been simple. Hunters weren’t messing around after the first trap. This trap wasn’t meant to hurt a wolf, it was meant to capture one and keep it alive until they came back.
A cold chill ran down my spine.
Rafe finally managed to detach the trigger mechanism. He stepped back, breath heaving. “Okay. I can cut it now.”
He used his knife to slice the wire cleanly. My body dropped fast and he dove forward and caught me, breaking the fall with his shoulder under my back.
I gasped, the shock vibrating through me but the worst part wasn’t the fall, it was the trap still clamped around my leg.
Rafe knelt beside it. “Hold still.”
“I’m literally not moving.”
“This is going to hurt like hell.”
“It already hurts—AH—shit—!”
He pried the metal jaws apart, ripping the barbs from my skin. The pain was blinding but the moment the trap finally released my leg, the air rushed back into my lungs. Blood flowed freely down my calf, warm and sticky.
Rafe tore his jacket and tied it around the wound, tying it tight. “Keep pressure and don’t pass out!”
“You’re so bossy,” I muttered, but everything was spinning too much for the sarcasm to land.
He slung my arm over his shoulder and lifted. Even though I was taller, he carried most of my weight without complaint.
“Hunters were definitely here again,” he said, voice low. “We need to report again to your father.”
I gritted my teeth as we limped through the trees. “Great, you’ve saved me two times now.”
“Thrice.”
“Twice.”
Rafe gave me a look that was half exasperation. “You are always stepping on things.”
“Well, I’m immortal.” I smirked.
“Not to silver,” he muttered.
If Rafe hadn’t been beside me that night, I would’ve been dead and Aria would’ve found out in the worst way a girl could find out something like that.
Rafe tightened his grip on me as we walked. “I’ve always got you, Luca.”
AUTHOR’S NOTE:
OKAY, Luca’s always getting hurt and Rafe is always there to save him. He’s literally like “getting nearly murdered by a hunter trap” is just another Tuesday apparently?? And Rafe said “surprise, I’m your guardian angel now.” The way these boys stress me out... 😭🔥
If your heart rate is above normal right now, SAME. Anyway, comment, scream into a pillow my lovelies, and all that good stuff because the next chapter? Yeah, you’re not ready😏💀.