Chosen by Fate by Virna Depaul

while at the same time vowing to reinstitute the War should the government fail to protect them the way it promised. That vow had almost been tested after the death of Prince Elijah.
    Unbidden, an image of his friend formed in his mind, as did the memory of their last conversation before the War had erupted.
    “Our loyalty to our people is just one thing we have in common,” the man had said, then laughed. “You, O’Flare, are a hound dog.”
    Shaking his head, Caleb pushed thoughts of his friend’s grinning face away. He fought even harder to make the images of Elijah’s bloodied face and body disappear. Their friendship hadn’t been a deep one, nor had it been very long, but Caleb’s relationship with Elijah’s sister Natia had sped it along. Caleb had felt a natural affinity toward the younger man who liked to play and laugh far more than he liked to fight.
    In the five years since Elijah’s death, the felines had only grown more volatile. It was as if they were looking for any excuse to once again war with humans; for everyone’s sake, that had to be avoided at all cost. Then there was the simple fact that a rapist was hurting females, no matter what their race. As a society, the United States couldn’t let that continue.
    After his part in Elijah’s death, Caleb certainly owed it to the felines to help. What’s more, he wanted to. Guilt filled him as he remembered the pain that had thrummed through Natia’s body as he’d held her. She was close to all her sisters, but to Morgana most of all. Caleb hadn’t known Morgana very well, but he remembered her being extremely shy, peeking around her mother’s leg when Natia had introduced them. She couldn’t be more than seventeen or eighteen years old now. The idea of her being raped by a coward who’d drugged her made him want to begin hunting him immediately. It just looked like he’d have to do it without Wraith.
    Sighing, he wearily swiped his hands over his face, straightened, and snatched his jacket up. He was shrugging it on when he heard footsteps.
    Mahone.
    Caleb glared at the man who’d wreaked havoc on his life from the moment he’d stepped inside the reservation’s bar. “Forget something?” Caleb snarled. “Or did you want just one more look at the mother of the groom so you can jack off tonight?”
    The instant the words left his mouth, Caleb regretted them. Worse yet, Mahone didn’t even look surprised by his vicious attack. It was a low blow, mentioning Mahone’s feelings for Knox’s mother, Bianca. The fact that Bianca had recently been reunited with Knox’s father had to be killing the other man. “I’m sor—”
    “Save it, O’Flare. I’m sure you and your teammates will get a lot of use out of that particular subject for years to come. Lucky for me, I don’t give a shit. I have more important things to do than cater to your knee-jerk salvos, the first of which is to get the Para-Ops team ready for its next mission.”
    “Yeah, well, the Para-Ops team’s numbers are fading fast,” Caleb shot back. “With Knox and Felicia on sabbatical and Wraith headed for God knows where, you better hope Lucy, Dex, and I can—”
    “Wraith isn’t headed anywhere. Not if you or I have any say in the matter.”
    Caleb narrowed his eyes. “And what makes you think I want a say in anything Wraith does?”
    Mahone looked at him chidingly. “Don’t play games with me, O’Flare. You want Wraith around more than any of us, so you’re going to do whatever you can to make sure she stays.”
    Trying to shrug off his displeasure that Mahone knew even a fraction of what he felt for Wraith, Caleb tried to keep his face blank. “You pitted me against her once before, remember? I’m not of a mind to put my head on that particular chopping block again.”
    Her offer of a booty-call aside, he knew his betrayal still weighed heavily on Wraith. Guilt ate at him, as well. He’d done what needed to be done for the benefit of the team, but he