How It Needed to Be Read online

  HOW IT NEEDED TO BE

  (OATH OF BANE, BOOK 8)

  By T. S. JOYCE

  How It Needed to Be

  Copyright © 2021 by T. S. Joyce

  Copyright © 2021, T. S. Joyce

  First electronic publication: December 2021

  T. S. Joyce

  www.tsjoyce.com

  All rights are reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the author’s permission.

  NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR:

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental. The author does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for third-party websites or their content.

  Published in the United States of America.

  Editor: Alyxandra Miller

  Other Books in this Series

  How It’s Supposed to Be (Book 1)

  How It Has to Be (Book 2)

  How It’s Meant to Be (Book 3)

  How It Is (Book 4)

  How It Will Be (Book 5)

  How It Was (Book 6)

  How It Started (Book 7)

  Contents

  Copyright

  Other Books in this Series

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Epilogue

  Up Next from T. S. Joyce

  Newsletter Sign-Up

  More Series from this Author

  For More from this Author

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  “Where are you?”

  Divar Stockton shook his head and hung up the phone on his Alpha’s voicemail. Krome thought he was the ruler of Divar, but the crow shifter was wrong.

  Divar’s inner grizzly was the only thing that ruled over him.

  He huffed a sigh as his phone started vibrating with another call. Amos this time. He’d thought joining this Crew would settle his animal down, but it hadn’t. If anything, it had made the monster inside of him worse. Harder to manage. More temperamental.

  Kill him.

  A man and a woman approached the fence topped with razor wire. The woman was a prison security guard, dressed in a form-fitting uniform. Her black, polished boots clunked against the snowy ground as she walked beside the inmate. She was talking low. Too low. Divar liked when she talked loudly and clearly so he could hear her voice. Pretty voice on a pretty lady who could obviously take care of herself. Women didn’t take jobs as security guards if they got spooked easily.

  She wore a hat with a brim that was pulled low over her eyes. He couldn’t see much of her face, but Divar had it memorized. Auburn eyebrows the same shade as the hair she had pulled in a tight, low bun in the back. Green eyes that seemed to miss nothing. Her hard gaze flitted to Divar’s old rust-bucket truck, and then away. Her lips were drawn into a thin line. He’d never seen her smile in all the weeks he’d been watching this place.

  She was the constant, night after night, but the men she walked with changed.

  This one was tall and lanky. He’d assaulted his girlfriend three years prior and found his way into the Fallon County Jail. Tonight was his release. Divar’s heart dropped as another car pulled up to the fence and parked.

  A petite blonde got out of the driver’s side, looking timid as a mouse. Her hands shook, but she must’ve been excited because she bolted around the front of the El Camino and launched herself into the lanky man’s arms.

  Divar recognized her from the evidence photos taken the night she was assaulted. Three years had given her plenty of time to heal up. Apparently she hadn’t used that time wisely.

  Poor girl was too dumb to leave him.

  Divar snarled a curse and gripped the steering wheel. He didn’t like when men hurt women.

  No, no, no, no, the bear snarled inside of him. He was supposed to be the one.

  “He’s not the one,” Divar muttered as he tracked the progress of the kissing couple to the car. “There’s no point in avenging a girl who doesn’t care about being avenged.”

  Enough! It’s enough. You drag us out here every night making your promises and then you make up some excuse why we can’t kill them—

  “Maybe I don’t want to kill.”

  Bullshit. It’s what we were made to do.

  Lie. Lie. He wasn’t meant to be a killer. If the animal inside of him didn’t exist, he would’ve been nice. He would’ve been helpful. He would’ve worked hard. Maybe had a lady. Maybe had some kids and joined a weekend bowling league, and complained about his nine-to-five job, but felt superior because he had a 401k plan. “No, it’s what you are made to do.” Divar smacked his head a couple times. “I’m good.”

  You are me and I am you, and we’re bad. Besides, you hate bowling. You can’t even fit your dumb fingers into the holes in the bowling balls. Kill him. Think of how good it will feel to kill someone who is evil.

  Truth be told, Bear was right. It would’ve felt good to give in again. He’d been pulled toward destruction all his life, but in a desperate attempt to save himself, he’d joined Krome’s Crew. It had been a beautiful distraction for a while, but it didn’t erase who he was, or the things he’d done…just camouflaged the darkness for a little while.

  He’d thought he could be salvageable, like the Bane brothers, but he wasn’t. The only thing he had in common with them was the same animal inside of him—a grizzly bear.

  He should leave.

  No. Kill him.

  The inmate, Gary Johnson, made his way back to the security guard and grasped the fence that had already been closed. He said something to her, and Divar watched the disgust on her face. And then Gary spat at her.

  A snarl ripped out of Divar’s chest and he gripped the wheel in a stranglehold in a desperate attempt to stay inside his truck. Gary talked shit the entire way back to the El Camino, but Divar could barely make out his words over the roaring in his ears.

  Fuck this.

  He shoved the door open and was to Gary in one second flat. He grabbed him around the throat and slammed him against the car so hard, it rocked. His girlfriend screamed from the passenger’s side.

  Let him go.

  “What?” Divar snarled, ready to snap this asshole’s neck.

  Let him go. There’s a camera. Let him go. Ruby says to let him go.

  “The guard?” How did the bear know her name?

  “What do you m-m-ean?” Gary stammered.

  He could feel the man’s racing pulse just under his thumb. Divar tested him and squeezed a little tighter. Gary made a squelching noise in his throat. Fragile human.

  “How do you know her name?” Divar demanded to the bear inside of him.

  “That bitch has been a guard on my block for—aaack!”

  “I’m not talking to you!” Divar roared in Gary’s face.

  It’s on her nametag, Dumbass. You haven’t been paying attentio
n. Let him go.

  “There’s a camera!” Ruby’s clear tone came to him over the roaring in his head.

  Divar glanced at the camera at the corner of the barbed wire fence, then shoved the man into the car and snarled at the woman inside, “Do better.” And then he slammed the door and jammed a finger at the road. “Go!”

  The snow was falling harder as Gary peeled out of the parking lot. When Divar dragged his gaze back to the guard—Ruby—she looked horrified.

  Fine by him. Humans should stay far away.

  He yanked his jacket hood up over his head and shoved his hands deep into his pockets as he strode for his truck.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow!” Ruby called.

  He must’ve misheard her. “What?” he barked, turning to glare at her.

  “You’re here every day.”

  He’d thought she noticed everything but him. He’d been wrong.

  “I won’t be back here.”

  He made to leave, but she said, “In that case, I should thank you now.”

  “For what?” he demanded, much louder than he’d intended.

  She shrugged one shoulder up. The snow was making it harder to see her, but her tone was clear as a bell as she said, “I guess for sticking up for me.”

  “You don’t seem like the type of woman who needs a man to stick up for her.”

  “Says who?” The corner of her full lips curved up in a heart-stopping smile, but it was tinged with a somberness he didn’t understand. “See ya when I see ya.”

  No, she wouldn’t. He wasn’t here for her. He was here for the monster inside of him, to make promises he didn’t intend to keep. A promise that tonight might be the night he let the bear do what he was born to do.

  There was no coming back after tonight. Not after Gary spat on her. He’d already been on the edge of what he could manage and that had changed everything. Tonight, he would finish a hunt. Tonight, he would break the no killing rule the Crow Blooded had put on his kind. Tonight, he would tell his Alpha it was time to put an end to him before the bear went crazy.

  He’d put this off for so long, but not anymore. Divar was ready.

  There was no coming back tomorrow because he would be in a shallow grave in Krome’s mountains.

  Divar pulled out of the parking spot and circled wide. The power steering in this beast was non-existent. Ruby watched him from behind the razor-wire fence, tracking him with her eyes until she disappeared behind him in the snow.

  1411 North Evergreen Way was where Gary would be staying with his girlfriend. Divar was a good hunter. He knew everything he needed to. Research was part of the fun. Tracking was part of the challenge.

  Gary’s tire prints made single tracks through the snow as Divar drifted down the two-lane road that cut through the woods surrounding the Fallon County Jail. All that existed out here was snow, darkness, pines, and wind. He liked stormy, cold days like this best. They weren’t gloomy to him, only peaceful. There were taillights ahead. Divar huffed a laugh. The idiots had probably slowed down to make out on the side of the road or something.

  They drifted around a curve and Divar hit the gas. As he came rumbling around the turn, his headlights illuminated a man standing in the middle of the road.

  Krome’s black eyes bore into him through the windshield. Divar cursed as he slammed on the brakes. His truck rocked to a stop inches away from his Alpha.

  Rage boiling in his blood, he shoved the door open and yelled, “What are you doing?”

  “Get out,” Krome demanded in a steely tone.

  The thing about Alphas that Divar hadn’t realized before he joined this Crew—they could throw out an order, and his body would obey. It was bullshit.

  He grabbed the wheel, but his lower half exited the truck anyway. He snarled as his hands released their death-grip on the wheel. The taillights had disappeared up ahead, and the bear inside of him roared his frustration at the interrupted hunt.

  “You’re on your way out, aren’t you?” Krome asked.

  Divar clamped his teeth closed and glared.

  Krome lifted his chin into the air and leaned against the front of Divar’s truck. “You think you’re slick. You’ve visited that jail fifteen times this month alone. At first you only visited every few days, but now it’s every single day.”

  “What are you, a stalker?”

  “No!” Krome barked. “You think I have nothing better to do than have you watched? Do you know what my job has been all my life?”

  Divar stared at the ground. He’d heard, but he wasn’t about to give answers to this asshole.

  “Watching bears! My whole life. That was the job. For generations, that’s what we’ve been doing. Watching you until you kill someone and your bear goes psycho and can’t stop killing, and then I come in like some damn clean-up crew, but you know what? I didn’t sign up for that. My life is different now.” Krome’s eyes softened. “I want it to be different. The Banes are doing okay. They’re paired up and happy, and they’re steady. They’re my friends now. Because of them, I allowed you in the Crew. I’m not going to let you drag me back into babysitting bear shifters.” He jammed a finger at where the taillights had disappeared. “That’s not your future, Divar.” He jammed that same finger into the woods. “That is.”

  Moore Bane stood there, his silver eyes boring straight through Divar. He was still as a statue, leaning on a towering tree.

  “What do you mean, that’s my future?” Divar asked.

  Krome backed up a few steps and smiled. “Your bear needs a fight? You fight Moore. You can control your bear and be like the Banes and we can all live happily ever after, or you can fight Moore your whole fuckin’ life.” Krome’s smile got bigger. “Your choice.”

  And then in a cloud of dark purple smoke, Krome disappeared and a huge black crow flew up toward the sky.

  A soft snarl dragged Divar’s attention back down to earth. Moore was striding toward him, peeling off his shirt as he walked. Shit.

  Divar tossed a middle finger to the clouds and hoped Krome was still low enough to see it, and then slammed his truck door so hard that the whole thing rocked. Moore’s bear ripped out of him, stood on its hind legs, and let off a roar that rattled Divar’s eardrums, and shook the sleeping birds from the trees.

  As the tingling of his Change began, Divar knew two things for certain.

  One, his hunting was definitely done for the night. And two?

  This was going to hurt.

  Chapter Two

  There he was.

  That was him. Right?

  Ruby Daughtry set her hot cocoa down and leaned closer to the front window of the coffee shop. The familiar man stood just outside of the diner across the street, pulling a forest green beanie over his short crop of dark hair. His cheekbones were chiseled and gave him a sharp shape to his face, and his eyes were that unnaturally bright silver she would recognize anywhere. She’d seen eyes like that before, and she could guess what he was. Maybe not his animal, but she could see even from here that he was a monster.

  His predator eyes tracked a man as he got into his car. He wore a dark green jacket that was unzipped to show a dark gray sweatshirt underneath. He was wide in the shoulders and built like a draft horse, but couldn’t be over five foot ten. His powerful strides entranced her as he jogged across the street toward the coffee shop she’d settled into. Even with the limp, he looked fast and strong. His boots were large and sank deep into the six inches of fresh snow, like he weighed much more than he should. He was limping deeply on his left side, but his face didn’t give away any pain. She hadn’t noticed a limp on him last night when he’d finally stepped out of his truck outside of the jail.

  He’d stuck up for her.

  Stupid Jeremy was supposed to assist her with releasing inmates, but he wiggled out of that duty more and more. She had to rely on the boys in the tower to help if anything went wrong. Another guard, Mo, had told her ‘sorry you got spat on’ and went back to eating his dinner when she’d see
n him later. But this man…this animal man…he’d wanted to kill Gary Johnson, and she believed down to the marrow in her bones that he absolutely could’ve.

  He’d really stuck up for her.

  He passed right by the window, and on a whim, she knocked on it. He jerked his attention to her, stopped on the snowy sidewalk, and trapped her completely in his feral gaze. When he stood this close to her, she felt like he was the size of a building. He blotted out the entire background, and all she could see was him.

  She forced herself to wave, and his dark eyebrows drew down. He flipped his hood up and over his head, then hunkered down against the stiff wind and strode off.

  It was him though. She knew it was him.

  Ruby bolted for the door and the bell above it chimed prettily as she shoved it open. The wind put up a fight, but she got the door open enough to squeeze outside. “Hey!” she called, jogging after him. She’d left her jacket inside and this sweater was too thin for these Montana winter days.

  He was a very fast walker. “Hey you!” she called, wrapping her arms around herself as she ran to catch him.

  “What do you need?” he asked, turning suddenly. His voice was low and snarly, and drew chills up her forearms that had nothing to do with the cold wind.

  “I…” Ruby frowned and shook her head. “Nothing. I don’t need anything, I just recognized you.”

  “You have me mistaken for someone else.” He turned to go, but she reached out and grabbed his arm.

  The man flinched away like she’d branded him. “You can’t touch me.”

  “Okay.” Ruby held up her hands in surrender. “I’m sorry.”

  “You can’t touch me and I can’t touch you.”

  Ruby shrank back. “It won’t happen again.”

  The man dragged a quick look up and down her body, and grunted with a nod. Then he turned and continued his journey toward his truck, which she could see parked just down the street.

  “See ya when I see ya,” she called.

  The man stopped. Just…stopped. Stood there in the middle of that snowy sidewalk, shoulders tense, looking like he froze into place in last night’s snowstorm.