Kane nodded, shocking the hell out of me when he broke the line of sight first and pinned Gael with a look. “You heard my mate. See her off the premises and ensure her access is revoked at the gate. Permanently.”

“Yes, Alpha,” Gael said, doing the formal bow once more, this time to Kane and Brielle.

I turned away as he extended a hand to the fallen she-wolf.

“Get me out of here, please,” I whispered brokenly to Shay, closing my eyes.

I couldn’t watch him touch her again,leavewith her, I just couldn’t. My control was paper thin, and my wolf was demanding that I let her out, let her tear the other female’s throat out, fight for our mate.

But my human side knew what the wolf wouldn’t accept.

If he’d hidden her, she must mean something to him.

Not enough for him to not screw around, but enough that he didn’t want to mess it up. No, if he wanted someone else, killing her wouldn’t make him choose us.

No one is ever going to choose us.

THIRTY-NINE

Gael

“Are you kidding me right now, Gael? I’m your fiancée, and you’re more worried about what some trashy piece of ass—from bum-fucknowhere,by the way, I asked around—thinks instead of taking a damn minute to speak to me? Just wait until my father hears about this. He’s going to tear you a new asshole.”

Celeste had dropped the sweet, enraptured bride-to-be act the second we were out of the castle, her true venom coming out as I dragged her down the driveway toward the guardhouse.

I closed my eyes as the fury tried to get the best of me, fists balling up at my side, and spun toward her.

“You don’t get to say a word about her, do you hear me?” I threatened, unable to stop my eyes from glowing as I spoke. She lifted both hands innocently, as if she hadn’t been cussing me up and down for several minutes straight.

“Right, I forgot. I’m supposed to wait patiently while my fiancé runs around and fucks every random mutt in the western hemisphere with a nice pair of tits. Sorry, I forgot. Prince Gael gets to do whatever he wants, while I’m stuck in myfather’s house, waiting for him like the good, little, chaste wife he deserves.”

Chaste? Hah. She’d been fucking her father’s gardeners before I’d even formallymether at my eighteenth birthday party. I knew because I’d walked in on her more than once. And even then, Celeste had made it very clear that I was too scrawny for her tastes, and she was no more pleased with the match than I was. I could still remember the first time it happened.

She was in the pool house, glittering skirts pushed up and bent over the back of a couch while some guy railed her.This is how a real man fucks, Gael. Watch awhile. You might learn something.

Pretty sure the emotional scars ofthatwere never going to leave me, but I had done my best to forget she existed. Hell, I’d gone about as far away as I could on the globe to escape her.

But our damn fathers had agentlemen’s agreement, which meant I’d been trapped before I drew my first breath. The first son and the first daughter of the family lines were betrothed at birth as part of a treaty set up centuries before I existed.

The only escape? A fated mate bond, complete with mate marks, before age fifty. Until then, I was free to go out and look for my mate.

Otherwise, I was doomed to wed this shrew, and she took every chance she could to rub it in my face. We’d never even kissed. I refused to count the time she’d cornered me in a hallway right before we left for Alaska. She’d shoved her tongue down my throat while trying to grope me as I fended her off—because apparently, another ten years and seventy pounds of hard-earned musclewasup to her standards, the bitch.

This was never supposed to happen. I’d met Leigh, and we were mates. Soon enough the marks would come in, Kane would have blessed our bonding, and I’d mail the evidence tomy old man with a smile, the potential union to Celeste severed forever.

I was never going to force Leigh to meet her, let alone deal with her barbed tongue. Especially not while she was pregnant.

The reminder of the stress this was causing her and our little girl had me grinding my teeth again. I didn’t have time for this. I had to get Celeste off the property as quickly as possible and get back to Leigh, so I could explain this whole fucking mess and beg her to forgive me.

Celeste wasn’t worth arguing with. She could twist the truth like it was an Olympic sport and she a gold medalist.

I turned away from her, blocking out her continued insults until we reached the guardhouse. I didn’t let go of her hand, because if I did, she’d bolt back toward the castle.

Anything to steal every scrap of happiness I have.

“Andrei!” I barked, my wolf riding me hard as I slammed through the door.

“Gael. What’s wrong?” Andrei was on his feet in an instant, his brow furrowed with concern.