Page 74 of The Wild Wolf's Rejected Mate

Yes. I suppose I am. I never again want to see the trapped, terrified expression that she wore when she realized she was in heat.

I should have stolen her. It couldn’t have been worse than what happened by the river. At least, she would have had her heat in a real nest in a den.

When do I get to stop feeling like shit about what should have been the best thing that ever happened to me?

I slow my steps so Alroy and Khalil pull farther ahead. When there’s a decent distance between us and Alroy turns his attention to muttering to himself about the unfairness of life, I ask Max, “Do you remember when you mated Elspeth?”

He snorts. “My legs are slow, not my brain.”

“She didn’t want to come with you, right?”

He slides a glance over to me, his warm, brown eyes glittering. “What are you asking, Alpha? You know she didn’t.”

“I’m not the alpha,” I reply without thinking as I try to figure out what it is exactly that I want to know. Has she really forgiven him? How long did it take?

Max blows out his cheeks and stops to catch his breath. Alroy and Khalil keep going.

“You know, I’m an old wolf, and in all my life, I have never met a male who thinks the way you do,” he says. “You’re the strongest male in the pack. It’s not even close. Who would be next after you? Khalil?”

I nod. Khalil can fight. Alroy has the potential to be at least as good, but he’s so fixated on his gripes and grudges that he doesn’t have the confidence to dominate in a real fight.

“And Khalil isn’t even a challenge, is he?”

“He might be, if he were disciplined.”

“But he’s not. Not like you. That’s my point.” Max skewers me with his sharp gaze. “You lead this pack, and you say you aren’t the alpha. You have a mate, and you’re acting like you don’t. The sky is blue no matter what you call it, pup.” He sighs loud and long. “What are we doing out here, Justus?”

I hold his gaze. I might be afraid of my mate, but I won’t bend my neck to any male on earth, no matter how good a point they make. “Hunting elk,” I say.

“Hiding from a female.” He snorts. “And why? Do you even know?”

“I don’t want to let her go,” I say almost under my breath. Not because I’m ashamed, not in front of Max. He’s the one who dragged my wolf out of the crevice I burrowed into at the back of my dam’s den after my parents died. I was halfway feral by then, living in my own shit, eating bugs and slowly starving to death.

He’d held me by the scruff of the neck and scrubbed me clean in the river while I fought and bit, and then he fed me and threw me in a pile with the other pups who’d lost everyone. He kept watch over us every night until Elspeth finally let him sleep in her den, and even then, he’d come to comfort us if a pup cried out from a nightmare. IfIcried out.

I’m not ashamed to tell Max that I don’t want to let Annie go, but I want it so bad that it feels dangerous to say out loud. The things you want the most—the things you can’t live without—that’s what Fate takes.

“So don’t let her go,” Max says. He drinks from his canteen and offers it to me. I take a sip and pass it back.

“It’s not that easy.”

“It could be. You should have heard Elspeth holler.” He grins, remembering. “Knowing the female she is today, you’d never guess the pair of lungs she had on her. They must have heard her in Moon Lake.”

In sync, we cap the canteen and continue hiking. Up ahead, Alroy has caught up to Khalil, and they’re taking a water break, too.

“I don’t want a mate who despises me,” I say, aware that Max could take offense if he chose, and also that I’m lying. The years have worn my pride away. I could live with Annie’s hate if it meant when I woke up in the night, she’d be there where I could see her.

Max says, “Pfft. She’ll get over it eventually. Just tell her how things are going to be. Be firm and consistent. She’ll come around. It’s the natural order.”

I snort. “You told Elspeth how things were going to be?” There is no way. That female rules him.

Once, she left her favorite comb at our summer camp one year, and she didn’t realize it until we’d reached high valley. His wolf ran all the way back for it himself in a snowstorm, and then when she idly remarked that his fangs had scratched the wood when he carried it in his mouth, he carved her a new one, but not until he traveled all the way to red clay camp for more of the teak that he’d made the first comb from.

“Not in so many words,” Max mutters. “But she knew.”

I hide my smile as we reach Alroy and Khalil. We’re getting close enough to the lake that if there’s elk, we should start seeing signs of them. So far, I scent nothing on the wind but possum, raccoon, and the like.

“I’m not as brave as you,” I say to Max.

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