Who's My Triplet's Alpha Daddy? Novel

Chapter 111 Dec 18, 2025 POV: Thalia The explosion that separates me from my team happens so fast I'm three buildings away before my brain catches up to the fact that I'm now alone, pursued, and absolutely fucked. Military-trained merc on my six, moving with the kind of competence that says he's fought supernatural targets before and survived. Professional, methodical, tracking me through the compound with thermal imaging that makes hiding pointless.

I lead him away from my people deliberately because that's what Luna means-drawing fire so they can regroup, making yourself the target so others survive. Noble and stupid in equal measure but we're past the point where smart decisions are options. The armory building looms ahead, door hanging open, interior dark enough to hide or die in depending on how the next three minutes go. I duck inside and the smell hits immediately-empty, stripped, nothing here except me and whatever's coming through that door. He enters thirty seconds later, rifle raised, thermal scope sweeping the darkness.

I'm pressed against the wall in wolf form, white fur that should make me visible except shadows are forgiving when you're desperate. "You're the Luna, right?" His voice carries that particular American military accent-Midwest, maybe Iowa. "The white wolf. There's a bonus on your head. Fifty thousand for confirmed kill." Fifty thousand. I'm worth fifty thousand dollars to whatever hunter organization is coordinating this. The absurdity almost makes me laugh except laughing would give away my position.

"Come collect it, then." I let the words rumble out in that half-shifted voice that's more wolf than human. He fires where my voice originated but I'm already moving, using supernatural speed to close distance before he can track. My claws tear through tactical vest, find flesh underneath, paint the empty armory with blood that smells wrong-human, enemy, threat. He's good though. Trained for exactly this scenario. Rolls with the hit, gets distance, brings the rifle back up and fires center mass.

The bullet catches my shoulder, burning through fur and muscle with the kind of pain that makes vision white out temporarily. I'm still moving, still closing, because stopping means dying and I promised three kids I'd come home. Second shot catches my thigh. The leg gives out, dumping me on concrete that's significantly less comfortable than it looked. My wolf is screaming to shift back, to heal, but human form means vulnerable and this asshole's still standing with a weapon. We're too close for rifles now.

He ditches it, pulls a knife that's probably silver-edged, and suddenly we're fighting the way wars used to be fought-brutal, personal, close enough to smell each other's fear. He's got reach and training. I've got desperation and the absolute certainty that my children are not growing up without a mother because some Midwest mercenary needed beer money. The knife catches my ribs, slides through fur and skin with precision that says he knows wolf anatomy. I ignore the pain-getting good at that-and lunge for his throat with jaws that were designed specifically for this.

Teeth close around windpipe. I taste blood and victory and the particular satisfaction of killing something that was trying to kill me. He goes down hard, gurgling, hands clawing at my muzzle trying to make me let go. I don't let go until he stops moving. Sitting in the aftermath is when reality hits. Blood everywhere-his, mine, can't tell which is which anymore. Shoulder wound bleeding steadily. Thigh wound worse. Ribs on fire from the knife that definitely hit something important. I shift back to human because staying wolf means bleeding out faster.

Naked, wounded, waiting for either my team to find me or more mercenaries to finish what this one started. That's when the bond pulses. Not the weak flicker from yesterday but full-strength connection that slams through me with Kieran's terror, his desperate search through pack links, his absolute panic at not being able to locate me. I send back what I can through the bond-alive, hurt, here. Location feelings instead of words because the bond doesn't work through language, just raw emotion and instinctive knowing.

Minutes later-could be five, could be fifty, time does weird things when you're bleeding-the door crashes inward with enough force to take it off hinges. Kieran. Not his team, not Lysander's rescue party. Just him, alone, covered in blood that's clearly not his, looking like he fought through hell to get here and would do it again without hesitation. "Thalia-" "I'm okay. Mostly." The words come out weaker than intended.

"The other guy's significantly less okay." He's across the room in seconds, lifting me with hands that shake despite his strength, checking wounds with the kind of methodical panic that only comes from medical training warring with absolute terror. "Don't you ever-" His voice cracks completely. Can't finish the thought. "I know." My hands find his face, force him to look at me instead of the bullet wounds. "I'm here. I'm alive." "If you died-" He's got one hand pressed to my shoulder wound trying to stop the bleeding, the other cupping my face.

"If I lost you after we just got the bond back, after I-" "I know." I cut him off before he can spiral further. "But I didn't. I'm right here." The bond between us is screaming, loud and sure and absolutely certain. Drowning out every doubt I've carried, every question about whether this is real or just biology forcing compatible genetics together. I chose him. Before the bond completed, I chose him. And facing death made it crystal clear that I'd choose him again, choose this life, choose the complicated perfect mess we built together. "I want you." The confession tears out raw and honest.

"Not because the bond says so. Because you're you and I'm me and together we're something neither of us could be alone." His forehead presses to mine, careful of the wounds, breathing me in with the desperation of someone who thought they'd lost everything. "Say it again." "I want you. Choose you. Love you." Each word costs me but they're true, they're real, they're everything I've been too terrified to say until facing death made me realize cowardice is just another way of dying.

"Bond or no bond, I'm yours." He kisses me and it tastes like blood and relief and the kind of certainty you only get when you've almost lost something and gotten it back. The door opens again-Lysander this time, taking in the scene with Alpha assessment that shifts immediately to relief when he sees we're both alive. "All three teams?" I manage around the pain that's getting harder to ignore. "Survived." His voice carries the weight of that miracle. "Casualties but no deaths. Sarah took a round to the leg, Marcus's nephew has a concussion, three others with various injuries that'll heal.

But everyone's breathing." The relief that crashes through pack bonds is palpable enough to taste. "And we found something." Lysander's pulling up his phone, showing documents that Caroline's already started analyzing remotely. "At Kieran's location. Proof that Lia's been operating out of a facility near Yellowstone. Real location this time, not another dead end." He scrolls through images-facility layouts, supply manifests, communication logs that are definitely Lia's writing. Evidence that she's not just coordinating remotely anymore.

She's physically there, planning whatever comes next, vulnerable for the first time since this war started. "We have her." Kieran's voice goes cold, calculating, the CEO brain already mapping assault vectors. "Finally have a real target." "Then we end this." I try to stand, make it approximately three inches before my leg gives out and Kieran catches me. "After medical attention. And possibly several hours of unconsciousness." "Definitely medical attention." Lysander's already coordinating evacuation through his phone. "Caroline's got medics standing by at the retreat.

We move everyone back, treat the wounded, then plan the final assault." Final assault. The words taste like hope and terror combined. We're going to end this. Going to find Lia and stop whatever army she's building and make sure my children can grow up without constant threat of hunters burning down their lives. Or we're going to die trying. Either way, we're done running. Done being prey. Done letting my sister's vendetta define our existence. Kieran lifts me carefully, mindful of the wounds that'll heal but currently hurt enough to make breathing tactical. "Let's get you home." Home.

Not the mountain retreat or the corporate offices or any physical location. Home is wherever he is, wherever our kids are, wherever the family we built exists. And I'm going to fight with everything I have to keep it. Archer