Page 76 of Unwilling Wolf

“Close as you’ll get.”

“You’re so…so…”

“So what?” he asked, arching a dark eyebrow higher in challenge.

“Stubborn!”

He snorted and brushed past her and Lenny. “Says the most stubborn woman this side of the Mississippi.”

“Fine,” she snapped. “Don’t apologize. See if I care. I am unaffected by you.”

“Lie,” he called blandly, and then shut the door behind himself.

When she turned to Lenny to complain, Lenny was looking at her with her chin tucked low and her eyebrows raised.

“What?” Eliza asked.

“It’s a little early to be baiting the wolf, don’t you think?”

“I bait nothing.”

A smile cracked Lenny’s pretty face. “You bait everything with that man. You’re doing it wrong, Eliza,” she said as she made her way into Eliza’s room, carrying an oversized canvas bag.

“What do you mean?”

“You can’t tame a man like that with willfulness.”

“No one this side of the Mississippi could tame that biscuit-eater,” Eliza muttered as she closed the bedroom door behind them.

“Not by trying to force him to do things. He’s an Alpha, and not used to being managed.”

Eliza crossed her arms over her chest. “I thought you were my friend.”

“I am,” Lenny said, rifling through the bag she’d brought.

“Then why can’t you just stick up for me and be on my side?”

Lenny shrugged. “That’s just being a friend. It’s not being a good friend. A good friend would want you to be happy, and baiting that werewolf for the rest of your life won’t make you happy. You can’t out-stubborn a Shaw.”

“He yelled at me,” Eliza grumped. “In front of everyone.”

“Do you know what would’ve happened if one of those wolves bit you?”

“Excruciating pain, comparable to the cactus I fell into?” she guessed.

“Yes, but also you would grow a wolf inside of you, and you wouldn’t be you anymore. Not only that, but the wolf who bit you would have a claim on you.”

“A claim on me?” she asked.

“Yep. He could take you as his mate, and if we tried to stop it, that wolf could drag in the elders. They could order the annihilation of our entire Pack for ignoring werewolf tradition. We could put up a good fight to try and defend you, but eventually the numbers would be too big. We wouldn’t be here anymore.”

Eliza gasped, clutching her dress to her chest. Chills rippled up her bare back where the loose laces brushed her skin. “But…I’m married to Garret.”

“You aren’t mated to Garret. Marriage is a human tradition. One bite from one of those wolves last night, and you would belong in the Jennings Pack. Do you know Garret and Burke got into it last night, after you were in bed?”

“N-no.”

“Garret went outside and was losing it, and Burke tried to settle him. Tried to talk logic, but Garret’s animal had snapped. We all had to split them up, or Garret would’ve killed him without even having his mind or remembering it this morning. An Alpha only snaps like that if something big happens.”

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