Boarlander Beast Boar (Boarlander Bears #4)(44)

“But it’s against the law to register under crews now,” Ally gritted out, her face a mask of fury as she held a stack of papers folded in her hand. Her short, platinum blond hair was mussed from sleep, and in the morning light her tattoos down her arm were stark against her pale skin.

“Right, so they’ll be registered as lone shifters under no crew,” the taller police officer explained as Beck and Mason approached.

“What’s wrong, Momma?” Ryder asked, slipping his little hand into hers.

“I don’t know, baby.” He was small for his age and fine-boned like all bird shifters were, so she swung him up onto her hip and hugged him close.

“What’s going on?” Mason asked.

“I’m Officer Dunlap, and this is my partner, Officer Moore,” the shorter police officer said. He gestured to Beck. “We got a call from your ex-husband. He outed you as a non-registered shifter, along with your son and your mate. The registration process has begun based on the information he gave the Saratoga police department, but you’ll have to fill out the rest of the paperwork, and the three of you will be fined for disobeying shifter registration laws.”

Beck felt like she’d been slapped. Mason scanned the paperwork. “Mason Croy, Boar shifter,” he read aloud. Eyes blazing, he glared at the officer. “I’ll be the only registered boar shifter in the world. You’ll put a huge target on my back. I didn’t register for a reason.” His horror-filled gaze drifted to Beck and Ryder. “Please. I’ll pay the fines, do whatever you want me to do, but let me keep my animal off the record.”

“I’m sorry. We didn’t make the laws. We’re just supposed to enforce them.”

Ally huffed a furious breath. “I used to say that to justify what I was doing to innocent people. This is so messed up. How would you feel if you had to register your names in some screwed-up database? Your wife’s name, your children’s names. Huh?” Her voice pitched higher. “We’ve done what the government has asked—”

“They haven’t,” Dunlap said, pointing to Mason and Beck.

“Because they couldn’t!”

“Please,” Beck begged. “If I register, can you please give Mason and my son a pass? I’m asking you as a worried mother. As a worried mate. My ex is trying to get back at me for…I don’t know. It shouldn’t affect them, though.”

“You three remaining unregistered is against the law.” Dunlap’s eyes pooled with regret, but he still handed Mason a new stack of paperwork. “Your total fines are three thousand four-hundred-thirty dollars. You can pay them at the courthouse in Saratoga when you fill in the blanks on your paperwork. You have forty-eight hours.”

As the patrol car pulled a U-turn and drove out of Boarland Mobile Park, Mason scrubbed a hand down the three-day scruff on his jaw, then hugged Beck and Ryder up tight as he watched them disappear under the welcome sign.

The crew looked gutted. Harrison chucked a brick that had been sitting in the road as hard as he could into the trees and yelled a loud, resounding, “Shit!”

“I would not share pizza rolls with them,” Bash said as he rubbed Emerson’s belly gingerly. For the first time since Mason had come back to the Boarlanders, Bash wore a frown on his face instead of a smile.

“I need to Change,” Kirk muttered, his eyes blazing gold.

“Me, too,” Clinton said quietly as he followed the giant silverback shifter toward the tree line behind the trailers.

The others murmured their regret as they drifted off one by one, but Beck couldn’t move. Couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think straight. The world would know she and Ryder were snowy owls now, some of the last of their kind. The world would know about Mason and assume he was the last of the boars since none of the others had registered. She’d felt safe for the first time in her life up in these mountains, and now Robbie had stripped that away from her.

Beck blinked hard and looked down at Ryder’s sweet, frightened face. “It’s okay,” she murmured. God, she wished she could believe what she’d said, but when she looked up into Mason’s somber eyes, something deep inside of her said that nothing was okay.

Before, Ryder had a right to marry who he wanted when he grew up. He could’ve chosen a mate and avoided the bullshit laws that were forced upon shifters, but now, he was just as affected as the rest. He was on the list. He was a target.

Mason pressed his lips to her forehead, but his attention was still on the woods where the cop car had disappeared. They weren’t there yet, but now she and Mason could never legally wed. They couldn’t even register to the same crew. Claiming a human mate was illegal, but what about the mark she’d left on him? Was that punishable by jail time like it was with humans?

Their only chance at being anything more than they were right now, in this moment, depended solely on humans voting to reinstate their rights.

Beck wasn’t just building public relations for the shifters of Damon’s mountains anymore.

Now she was fighting for her son, and her mate.





Chapter Twenty


The papers in Beck’s shaking hands made a pathetic shuffling noise. To escape the sound of her weakness, she inhaled deeply, held the air in her lungs for a three-count, then hugged the paperwork to her chest.