Page 65 of Rejected Exile

Finn twists, ripples, and somehow manages to get out from under Kieran enough to punch him in the side. Anoofleaves Kieran's lips. I shift my weight uneasily from side to side, uncertain what to do next.

"Fuck you, dude! You don't get a say!"

"I think that I do!"

"We weren'thurtinganyone. How did you even get in here?"

"You left the door open, because you don'tthink."

Finn flips Kieran around and pins him to the ground with his legs. His eyes are glowing now too, and his lips are peeled back from his teeth, a snarl in his throat. The hands he uses to hold Kieran down are tipped with pointed claws.

"Finn. Kieran." There's a warning note in Lance's voice as he steps forward, his bulk filling the hallway. "Cut it out, now."

Head jerking up, Finn narrows his eyes at Lance. "You saw what I saw. He was going to mate with her."

"Yes, and—"

"What's the fucking problem with that?" Kieran demands, twisting around and kicking at Finn without effect. "I swear to god, you're so controlling!"

Roarke's quiet voice cuts through the air like a knife. "There were mate bonds glowing between you two. Silver threads that pulled and tied together. If you'd mated with her, Kieran, you wouldn't have just been having sex."

Kieran suddenly goes limp, all the fight leaving him at once. His face pales. I stare at him, confusion, embarrassment, and frustration are whirling around inside me.

"You can't be serious." I stare at the guys, angry and confused. "Kieranrejectedme. There were no mate bonds between us, and we were never fully declared as each other's intended. I didn't even have any mating threadsat allwhen I stepped into the stone circle. How is it even possible?"

"I don't know," Roarke confesses. "But I do know that if you two have sex, it would doom you. Anyone can smell the wolf inside of you—and the second the full moon rises, you'll be called to shift. That's when the curse will kill you."

I swallow, glancing around at each of them. "It sounds like you all understand the curse far more thoroughly than I thought you did."

"It's just a theory," Lance confesses. "But every mated female wolf dies, and we're starting to think it's not the pack bonds, or the land itself that kills them. It's the mate bonds."

"How would you know that? How can you be sure?"

Lance looks down and away, his fists clenching, then back up at me. "Last summer a pair of bonded female wolves asked to have permission to sever their connection to the pack and the land. It was granted, and they went off on their own to be a bonded pair in the wild, as their own pack. We were sure they'd escaped the curse by doing so."

"They didn't make it," Roarke says, voice raw. "They were found this morning, dead and half-decayed hundreds of miles east of here. Both hemorrhaged to death, probably a few weeks ago, around the time of the full moon."

Finn grabs onto Kieran's chin and jerks it up, forcing him to look into his eyes. "So you see, fuckface? You were about to kill Delilah because you're ledcompletelyby selfish impulses. Just like you kill the land by attracting vamps because you're too weak and cowardly to face the rot inside you."

"Hey!" Roarke's voice rises in anger as he prowls towards Finn, his fists clenched. "Watch it."

"You watch it. I'm tired of watching this useless asshole ruin things." Finn rises to his feet, his face hard. "Just because you think he's redeemable doesn't mean the rest of us have to agree."

I sigh, raking a hand through my hair and trying to put everything into place. Shame and embarrassment gnaw at me—I can't believe the guys saw me like that, and withKieran—but as the hormones flow through me and I feel the wolf within, I admit she's one horny wild animal. I'm not sure I wouldn't have fuckedanybodywho came within smell distance of me just because she wants to get some.

Finn is still angry. "If you ask me,heshould be the one who's exiled. Maybe if he got some sense knocked into him—"

"We'll talk about Kieran's place in the pack later," Lance says smoothly, interrupting what was working up to a very fevered rant. "For now, there's just one thing I want to know."

He turns towards me, and I feel the full weight of his honey brown eyes on my face. "How in the world do you have a wolf inside you now, Delilah?"

"About that." My fingers go up to my neck, and then I feel a draft of cool air about my legs. "Let me get dressed, and I'll tell you all about it."

Twenty-One

Roarke

She smells...different.

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