Page 51 of The Wolf's Pregnant Rejected Mate

Elin shook her head. “I never had it on me. Couldn’t have kept it when I shifted to wolf form, anyway.”

Tess shook her head. “Thank you for standing up for me. I wish I’d been able to tell you not to, though. He was already so angry, it was better to just play the part and agree with him until he left.”

Elin wrapped her arms around herself. “He hit you.”

“Yeah. He did.”

“My father never hit me. I didn’t know what to do. I just… I just was afraid he’d hit you again,” Elin mumbled, looking at the carpet. “I just wanted to stop it. I’m sorry that I made things worse.”

Tess reached for her hand. “You didn’t make it worse. He did. And I guess it was a good thing you intervened when you did. At least now, he’s been arrested. Which means he can’t keep harassing me. It also shows how much Hayden’s team will intervene. He won’t do this again,” she said. That much she was certain of. “My father is abusive and a bully, but at his core, he’s a coward. He only goes after people he thinks can’t fight back.”

“I’m jealous of how brave you are,” Elin sighed.

Tess smiled weakly in response. She didn’t feel brave. She felt small. More than anything, she wished Ryder was here right now. She wished she could wrap her arms around him and borrow from his strength to make herself feel braver than she was.

And all at once, a spiky, awful ball emerged in her chest. A feeling of regret, the certainty she had made a terrible mistake. The day she told him she was pregnant, she shouldn’t have rejected him and run away. She should have stopped him. Should have told him that she didn’t want him to take her as his mate just because she was pregnant.

But she should have stayed, talked to him, and been frank and open with him rather than hiding her true feelings.

And now he was out there, at the mercy of demons. She didn’t know if Hayden’s plan would work. If Ryder could come back. Or if he was already dead.

Would she ever be able to tell him? To hold him again? Or was it too late?

Chapter 28 - Ryder

The blindfold was ripped roughly off Ryder’s head. The ropes fell away from his body, and he was shoved forward. His paws prickled as the blood rushed into them. The light was surprisingly bright, and he blinked several times as his eyes adjusted. He was in a cave of some sort, with a handful of electric lights hung up on the walls.

The demons had put him in a cage. It was barely long enough for him to stand in his wolf form, but it was tall enough that he could stand in human form. He shifted to stand, peering around himself to get a better idea of what the layout was.

A wooden floor had been built over the cave floor. The walls were smooth, with cubbies carved into the rock every so often. LED lanterns sat in these cubbies, casting out light. The air was chill. A disgusting mix of brimstone, blood, and rot assaulted his nostrils. The source of the rot came quickly; a beast-demon nest lay cradled in the back of the cave. What appeared to be electric blankets lay over them, with long wires leading below the floorboards.

If Ryder strained, he could hear the hum of a generator. The demons were better set up than any of them had anticipated. A handful of the aura demons lingered nearby in their hosts.

“I was expecting more of a welcoming party,” Ryder drawled. “Considering that Sebastian talked such a big game the last time I saw him.”

Jace chuckled from where he stood next to the cage. He pushed a bundle of clothes through the bars. “Ah, yes. Sebastian. It was quite impressive, don’t you think? Unfortunately, the experiment didn’t quite… stick. But there’s still use for him.”

He gestured toward the pile of rotting corpses making up the beast-demon nest. If it weren’t for the color of the fur, Ryder wouldn’t have recognized the mess as the wolf that had once been Sebastian.

Ryder shook out the clothes and pulled on a pair of jeans. “I’m supposed to act shocked and horrified for the man whose life got cut short. But he was always a bastard.”

He shrugged as he tugged on the shirt. The jeans were covered in sequences and glitter, while the pink shirt featured a cartoon strawberry blowing a kiss. Clearly, Jace was trying to humiliate him by putting him in feminine clothes. Ryder rolled his eyes. How pathetic.

“So where did this host of yours come from?” he asked, waving a hand at Jace. “If you’re not half-demon.”

“I don’t know. The body was dead when I found it, so I just… moved in. Lost all its memories, though.” Jace inspected his hands. “It’s a fine form though, don’t you think?”

“If you’re into that sort of thing,” Ryder answered dryly. He leaned against the cage door nonchalantly. “So. You clearly aren’t after killing me. What do you want?”

Jace grinned. “That’s what I like about you wolf shifters. You’re always so blunt and to the point. And Bluebell Valley is so easy to manipulate to do what I want. Just look at how you’re all quivering inside your town. Your Alpha sending his teammates after us. Trying to catch us, as though there won’t be more to take the place of every demon that you do get rid of.”

He tapped the Demon Seed still hanging around his neck.

Ryder opened his mouth, but Jace cut him off. “You’re not here to ask questions, Ryder. You’re here to answer them.”

“You haven’t asked any questions.”

“How much salt do you have left in town?” Jace’s tone was casual, as though they were discussing the weather.

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