Page 26 of The Wolf King's Mate

He was one of the guys from the hallway, who had been waiting outside the bedroom door when I left.

My gaze jerked to the next guy Enzo had already grabbed by the throat, with his clean hand. The fingers at his side were already dripping blood.

It only took me a moment to place him as another guy from the hall.

All of the blood was gone from my face as the king repeated it with the third man, and the fourth. The amount of blood that dripped down their throats and coated his hands told me the cuts were far from shallow, and I hoped he hadn’t done any permanent damage.

When he came back over to me and put a bloody hand to my back, then walked me out in front of him, I didn’t dare hesitate or protest.

How had I forgotten who and what he was?

Enzo wasn’t just the Alpha.

He was the Wolf King.

He was the nightmare human females told stories about to get their pups to obey. Everyone feared him.

And he’d claimed me as his mate. His possession. Something no one was allowed to look at, smell, or touch. His fuckingprincess.

My wolf preened at the idea, despite her own show of dominance earlier. Shewantedto belong to him.

I just wanted to be free.

When we reached his room, I knew I should give him space and try to gauge how best to avoid pissing him off. My wolf had thrown away my plan to play along.

If I wanted to avoid making him mad in the future, Enzo and I had to exchange at least a few words.

So, I followed him to the kitchen as he stalked over to the sink. I remained silent as he used the base of his palm to turn the water on. There was a large bottle of soap next to the faucet, and he pumped some into his hands. It had no scent, and slowly erased the smell of blood from the air.

I waited while he scrubbed.

Hopefully if I spoke after his hands were clean, he wouldn’t want to get them dirty again with my blood.

After a few minutes, he finally shut the water off and grabbed the towel from the countertop, drying them.

“I can wear your clothes, if you want,” I said. “But what I told your wolf was the truth. Mine doesn’t like to be controlled. Now that she knows she’s not in danger for existing, she’s going to assert herself. If I don’t have my own clothes, she’s going to keep putting me in uncomfortable positions to piss you off.”

“I’ll deal with it.” He dropped the towel on the counter again and stepped past me.

“I’m going into heat next week,” I added, following him out of the kitchen. “I track the date on my phone. I’ll need it back so I know when to expect it. So you know, too.”

He grunted.

Definitely wasn’t going to give me my phone.

His mom was like me… but she had died when he was a kid. He likely had no idea what heat entailed.

“Do you know what will happen when heat hits?” I asked him.

Enzo ignored me.

I’d take that as a no.

I followed him to the bed, where he plopped down on the mattress and grabbed a remote off the nightstand, turning on the large TV across from the bed. There was a book next to where the remote had been, so I knew he liked to read, but I didn’t bring that up.

The blanket I’d been given earlier was still wrapped around me, and I remained standing a few feet away from the bed. Though the blanket smelled lightly of Hunter, the scent was faint enough that it didn’t seem to be bothering the Alpha.

If he was going to ignore me, I was just going to have to keep talking. “My body gets hot and sweaty. My scent gets much stronger, and pulls in unmated wolves like a magnet. Since human women can’t actually seal a bond with male werewolves, that includes men who have been paired loyally with humans fordecades. The only one it doesn’t pull in is my brother. He guards me.”

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