Page 9 of Dutiful Wolf's Mail Order Mate

“Bullshit.” Elise stepped closer, eyes flashing. “You’re doing what you want with some walking, talking toy, consequences be damned.”

Red clouded my vision. The world narrowed to Elise’s smug face, her poisonous words echoing in my skull. My wolf wanted her blood.

“I don’t care what you say about me or to me, Elise,” I warned in a low voice that had even Orion shifting where he stood, “but you will not talk about her like that.”

“Or what?” she asked equally quietly. A sly flick of her gaze landed on Kai before she returned a feral smirk to me. “Shouldn’t your new allies know you’re only standing here because another pack allows it?”

Patience. She’d never outright disliked the Hollow wolves. Hell, Jude and Asher had dinner with her regularly since we’d averted an outright war and Jude chose to stay with her mate on the other side of the territory lines.

“Shouldn’t they know you’ve lost the numbers we once commanded and sliced off part of our territory for some fucking bears? How honest were you, really, when typing up your sales pitch?”

This was pain talking. Shame and embarrassment and regret. This was Elise spiraling.

“But don’t worry,” she added with a shrug, “I’m sure she’s dumb as rocks if she signed up to come here.”

“Enough.” The word blasted from my lips, word already thick with my inner wolf. “Shift.”

Elise’s jaw tightened, defiance blazing in her eyes. “You can’t be serious.”

“Do not make me repeat myself.” Every muscle in my body tensed, my wolf prowling just beneath the surface.

For a tense heartbeat, she held my gaze. I didn’t give her the chance to refuse again.

My voice dropped to a menacing rumble. “Shift. Now.”

I threw every ounce of alpha power into the command. The order hit hard, and Elise glared murder at me as her wolf leaked through. Her nails sharpened. Fur sprouted in tufts along her arms.

She could have let the change take over, not fought it. That she let it carry on slowly was a show of strength in front of the others and another ‘fuck you’ for me.

Elise held my gaze as the first snapped bone carried her to the ground.

I snarled as her human shape melted into the sleek brown of her wolf. I hauled my shirt over my head and kicked off my jeans, rough fingers and palms at odds with Madison’s soft touch just on the other side of the pack house door.

The day needed to fucking end.

My wolf ripped out of me with none of Elise’s delay. Teeth bared, fur standing on end, my paws hit the packed dirt of the yard.

Her muzzle wrinkled, a low growl vibrating in her chest. Stubborn till the end.

With a flick of my tail, I sprang forward.

We crashed together in a violent tangle of fangs and claws. I was stronger, my wolf larger and more powerful. But Elise fought with the desperate ferocity of the cornered and angry.

She threw herself against me with vicious intensity. Snarls slipped free between the savage snap of her jaws. She rammed my side with her head, trying to use her smaller frame to throw me off balance.

We whirled and whipped around, yanking out tufts of fur where bites didn’t connect. I sidestepped a snap of her jaws and lunged, my teeth nipping at her flank.

Hot, coppery blood filled my mouth as furious howls rent the night air. Elise thrashed against my hold until she twisted free, raking her back claws along my shoulder. She didn’t waste a single movement; bending her head and closing her jaws around my foreleg.

Rage lent me strength, let me shake off the white-hot pain of fangs sinking deep. I was the alpha, and I would have her submission.

We crashed together again, our snarls intermingling into a feral chorus. Elise’s muzzle grazed my throat, teeth bared to tear it out. With a vicious shove, I knocked her off-balance and surged on top, my jaws clamping around the back of her neck.

She thrashed once, twice, then went limp beneath me with a whine of submission.

I held her there a moment longer before releasing my grip and stepping back. The fight drained from me in a rush, leaving a bone-deep weariness. I shouldn’t have had to do this. Not with my own pack. Not with Elise, who I would have pledged to in any other timeline.

But I was alpha, and that burden meant making the hardest calls. Shouldering that weight no matter how much it crushed me inside. I couldn’t afford an out-of-control Elise riling up what was left of the pack. Couldn’t allow another challenge to my position when there was so much else to worry about.

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