Page 32 of The Wild Wolf's Rejected Mate

He shifts back to man as he slides to the forest floor.

“Stay down,” I tell him, but his eyes are on fire. For all his nonchalance, he’s angry that he had to walk away without a female.

I understand the feeling.

He leaps back to his feet and sprints at me. I wait until he’s close, and I shift, clamping down on his calf with the full force of my jaw. I dash forward, dragging him so he lands flat on his back. He shifts to wolf, curling and writhing, trying to get a piece of me, but I hold him tight and shift again, knocking him across the dirt with the force of my bigger human body exploding into his wolf.

He comes at me over and over, in fur and skin, and I carve him up like a bird at the full moon table. After his calf, I rip into his shoulder, and then a knee, and a hip. It takes him longer and longer to drag himself upright.

He’s fighting to stop hurting. It doesn’t work. I learned that the first few years after I walked away from Annie.

Finally, after a lucky hit directly to his human sternum that steals his breath, he falls onto his ass and stays there. When he’s finally able to speak, he huffs, “We didn’t know that the Byrnes planned to take Kelly out.”

I grunt, spit blood from my mouth, and then crouch next to Elis to continue checking him out. “You should have bailed the minute you figured it out.”

“It was too late. We already scented Kelly on the wind. Would you have had us run like cowards?”

I pluck a stick from the nearby undergrowth and hurl it at his head. He ducks, and it misses, nailing Tiny Jac’s wolf in the side of his head. He yelps and skitters away.

“I wouldn’t have had you do anything becauseI am not your alpha!” I shout, scooping up Elis since he’s already startled and peeking at his belly. It’s a mess. “But if I had been fool enough to join forces with a bunch of delusional lost packers trying to overthrow their battle-chosen alpha, then yes, I would have run when I realized I’d kidnapped his mate. Give me your pants!” I snap at Alroy. He’s the only one of us who took the time to snag his clothes when we did, in fact, run.

Alroy immediately fumbles with his waistband. I quickly look down. Guts peek through the gash in Elis’s underside. It still beats seeing Alroy’s dick.

His pants land in a heap beside me. I amp up my rumble and murmur to the young wolf huddled and shaking in the dirt. “It’ll be over quick, brother. A few moments to get your stuffing back in, and you’ll be right as rain.”

His sad whine tears at my heart.

“On three,” I say. “One. Two.” I roll him onto his back, pin him in place with one arm, and frantically pack his wound with moss before any more intestine pops out. He manages a few weak kicks and swipes before he passes out from the blood loss.I finish binding his stomach and then glare at the others. “Who else is hurt?”

They scuff their paws in the dirt, hang their muzzles, and keep their traps shut.

I raise my voice. “Who else? We’re not leaving a trail for Kelly to follow. We’re already going to have to move the pack. Did you even think of that? Kelly will come after us.” I’m bellowing now. “Did you consider the elders and the pups? Do you think our females are going to be happy to leave their dens because you took it upon yourselves to kick a gods-damned hornet’s nest? For nothing?”

I give my anger free rein. The rage is well-worn, as familiar now as breathing, but I still remember a time when I didn’t feel it burning in my guts every waking minute. She gave it to me. My mate.

I had hope before. I knew the odds were against me finding a mate. The wasting sickness took so many of us, so many females. But if Max could find his mate picking flowers in a field beside the North Border wall, then maybe mine was out there, too.

And then I found her, and she cowered from me like I was a fate worse than death, and I would have done anything at all to ease her fear. To please her.

And then she invited me into her nest, and I thought everything was going to change, and I wouldn’t be the male that everyone came to with trouble, who always slept alone. I was Annie’s mate.

And she ruined it. Made it foul. I can’t bear to remember, but at night in the dark when I stroke my cock, I always think about that pile of leaves beside the river, and then when I’m at my weakest and about to come, the shame kicks me in the gut, again and again, and I spurt my seed onto my belly, disgusted with myself and hating her.

She has no shame. No regret. At the Quarry Pack dens, she clung to the other females, refusing to look at me, like I was the enemy, like I don’t feel our bond in my chest every minute of every day, a constant aching empty reminder that there is no hope left for me. I am as alone as these sorry, mangy males slumped in a circle around me.

“Alpha?” Alroy’s quavery voice brings me back to the moment.

My pack brothers are all hanging their heads, tails tucked. The stink of their shame drifts like the stench of scum on a warm pond.

I sigh, loud and long, and bend over to pick up Elis’s limp carcass.

“Khalil, take Tiny Jac and Calvus up to the north camp and clear out those dens. Don’t just check for bear. Look for snakes and lizards and such. The females don’t care to share their nests with critters. Alroy, you take the others and tell everyone what you’ve done. Tell them to be packed by the time I return. Max, can you walk?”

He grumbles.

“Well, go on then. Go,” I bark at my packmates. I cradle Elis to my chest like a baby to add pressure to the wound.

I’m last to leave the clearing, but I don’t linger, and I don’t look back toward Quarry Pack.

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