Page 2 of Cold Foot Curse

“Why did that sound like a lie?” Misty asked.

“I think I want to stay here,” Jess amended, confused. Even she could hear the lie in her voice though. “I want to stay here and just be Promised to Kade.”

“And be alone forever? Because again, Kade isn’t coming back. You’re getting older, and you are one of the few remaining females here, and your duty is to bear offspring for the next generation of Sister’s Edge.”

This was where everything got muddy. She’d met Kade. She’d been accepting, and didn’t mind being around him when he’d courted her, but that courtship had been very short. The Alpha had asked him to make a decision on her quickly. She barely knew him, but she’d had hope, and then that hope had been dashed, but her heart was still confused.

He’d chosen her right after the accident.Rightafter. He’d still picked her after she’d been damaged.

And that choice had made her animal loyal to him for reasons beyond her control or understanding.

She didn’t want to be Promised to Connor. He was choosing her after the reconstructive surgeries. He hadn’t given her a single thought until she’d healed, and the scars had been minimized. Connor hadn’t even looked her way until recently.

And yes, she realized most of her imaginings of how Kade probably was as a man were just that—imaginings. They were fantasies. They were derived from her hope that his lawyers would find a way to shorten his sentence, and she would have a chance to get to know him.

But reality was this: Kade was locked up in Cold Foot Prison for the rest of his life, and she was locked into Sister’s Edge for the rest of hers.

“Are you ready?” Misty asked again.

Jess inhaled deeply and stood, then nodded. “I guess I am as ready as I’ll ever be.”

Chapter Two

“Stop, stop, stop!” Reed yelled, and Kade released the controls of the excavator.

The shop wall was only halfway up, and Reed and Wreck were pulling on something just out of sight. Something was jammed.

Kade pushed open the clear door and asked Cash, “What’s up?”

Cash was grinning down at his phone, but at Kade’s question, he looked up at him and frowned. “What?”

“Dude, where is your head at? Your Alpha is pulling chains under a huge wall and you’re flirting with Harley.”

“She’s sending me titty pics. If Wreck needs help, he’ll holler.”

“Cash!” Wreck barked out. “Come hold this.”

Kade snorted.

“Balls,” Cash muttered as he strode over there, dragging his feet bad enough to kick dirt on every step.

Kade sank back into the seat of the excavator and kept the door propped open with his foot so he could hear what was happening. In the cup holder, his phone screen lit up.

A quick glance down at it told him an unknown number had texted him. Probably spam.

“Can you try to lift it again?” Wreck called to Kade.

Kade eased the arm of the excavator higher, trying to keep the drag smooth so it wouldn’t put any extra pressure on the chain that was holding the heavy section of wall. The chain was too thin for his liking.

This shop out behind their cabins was turning out to be a pain in the ass to build. Everything that could go wrong had done it. The kit for this shop was the most inefficient build ever.

The materials were wrong, the blueprint was wrong, the instructions were ridiculous and made no damn sense.

He eased the wall up and held it steadily there while the boys went to work bolting the metal to the steel frame. Their cussing echoed across the mountain because nothing was lining up. This was the part that Kade wished he could abandon the excavator and help with the brute strength, but he was the only one trained on this machine.

His phone lit up again, and that same unfamiliar number flashed across the screen.

He frowned at the part of the text he could read from here.

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