Page 6 of Rejected By the Alpha King

Wonderful. I really needed to curb my tongue and become as boring as possible. “You are right, of course. Parker was a bastard, but I’m sad that he’s gone. Are you replacing my babysitter?”

Jax grunted but didn’t say anything. As he sipped his beer, I took a deep breath. “Please. I don’t even know how he died.”

“Suicide.”

“Suicide? No fucking way. You’re wrong. So wrong.”

With his beer halfway to his mouth, Jax narrowed his eyes and stared at me. “Shut up.”

“No, I’m sorry. I can’t do that. Parker wouldn’t commit suicide. He wouldn’t…he wouldn’t leave me.” Tears rose in my eyes, but I struggled to hold them back. I was weak in almost every single way that mattered, but I couldn’t be weak now. One person had shown me some decency in my life. He’d been drunk, abrasive, and incredibly offensive at times, but he’d respected me.

I would not let his death be written off as suicide. I just couldn’t.

“And here I was thinking that Parker killed himself because of you,” Jax said harshly.

“That I put him in charge of a woman I should have killed years ago, and in doing so, I stripped him of all his friends and family. He killed himself because he had nothing but you.”

If he was aiming to hurt me, his aim was dead-on, but I didn’t back down. “Parker told me that his son had been away for years before I came here, so you can’t pin that on me. And we both know that Parker didn’t have friends. What makes you think he killed himself?”

“Because he put a gun to his head and left a note.”

My hands started to shake, so I clasped them behind my back. “And what did the note say?”

“Wondering if he killed himself because of you, my dear?” With a smirk, he drained his beer and stood. “I’m here to promote Danny. He’s your new manager, and as you call it, your new babysitter.”

Bile rose in my throat. Of course Danny was the new manager.

“I quit.”

Jax cocked his head. “No.”

“You can’t keep me here against my will.”

“I can, Anna. Did you think this was a job? This is your prison, my dear. You leave when I say you leave. Do what you’re told, and maybe it’ll be another three years before I see you.”

I could run. I didn’t know much about the clan politics or the local packs. They were all independent of each other. The king exiled Shadowed Moon Mountains a long time ago. There was no higher authority than the alphas, but they controlled nothing out of their own territories. I could blend in with the pack-less rogues. I knew these mountains like the back of my hand.

It wasn’t the first time I’d considered running and picking my life up as a rogue. I might not make it more than a few years before another wolf ended my life, but it would be a few years of freedom. That was all I wanted.

“If you run, Anna, I will find you, and I will make sure that where I put you next will make this place look like a castle.”

Jax and Jenson stopped and headed for the door. Helplessly, I watched them go.

“You don’t understand. You don’t know the things Danny will do to me,” I called after them.

My mate didn’t even look over his shoulder. “I do.”

3

Anna

“You have to learn to trust me at some point.”

The whisper in my ear heated my skin, and I tried not to wiggle against the body pressed to mine. I didn’t understand what he wanted.

“You. I want you.”

And he could always read my thoughts. Damn irritating.

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