Page 43 of The Enforcer's Rejected Mate
It isn’t that it’s like the moon run all over again, but that it feels like my time in Frostclaw is slowly catching up with me. All the miles I’ve put between us are eaten up in the blink of an eye until it’s arrived here, bearing down on me until I can hardly hold my head up. I’m never going to be good enough.
I look away from Lucian and back to Thorne. He looks like he wants to be anywhere but here. I get it. I’d rather be back in Oak Fast with Jenny and Clara, or sitting with Gus at a diner while we eat hamburgers. Luna. I’d kill to be back with Maud.
“I don’t need the meal,” I say, my voice cracks but I force myself to keep speaking. “I can hunt. I-if you get me an audience with the Alpha, I’ll plead my case and I swear I won’t be a drain on the pack. I’ll contribute my fair share.”
A dark look passes over Thorne's face. He jerks back like I’ve slapped him and I don’t understand it. Is he ashamed of me? Embarrassed that the others ran up on us in the meadow? I willhim to speak but he stays silent. I open my mouth to ask what’s wrong but before I can, he speaks.
“If you think Bloodstone is such a poor pack that we would have you hunt your own meals then you know nothing of who we are.”
I want to tell him that’s the whole point. That I don’t know anything but I desperately want to. I look around the space. The Defenders and the humans fade away the second I see the great tree I once believed held the skies from falling.
There’s secrets here, memories that I’ve lost that I can win back and I’m not going to let this moment break me. I was the punching bag of Frostclaw my entire life, I can take this.
“I didn’t mean to offend you.” I look around at the others. “If I did, I’m sorry.” I’ve said sorry a thousand times before for things I was never in the wrong for. This sorry means nothing, just like all the other times. Just like all those other times I turn off my emotions and put my pride aside.
“I might not know Bloodstone customs but I want to learn. I can learn. And I’ve come here to be useful in any way I can.” I meet Thorne’s eyes. The shifter looks angry but that isn’t different from any other time I’ve looked at him. He didn’t look angry in the meadow my body whispers to me. I clear my throat and will my libido into another dimension to keep my cool.
“All I ask is an audience with the Alpha to plead my case.”
No one speaks, not even the hunters who up until this point have been looking sick or collapsing on the ground with quiet moans. The moans are gone now. One of them watches me from the ground with wide eyes. Thorne shifts and everyone looks his way. Lucian may be the leader of the Defenders but it’s clear Thorne outranks him.
What role does he have in Bloodstone Pack that everyone defers to him?
I hold my breath while we watch Thorne decide what to do next. I expect him to say something when he looks at me but he doesn’t. Just rubs the bridge of his nose with a weary sigh before he turns and starts towards the path leading us towards Red River. Just like before he doesn’t walk, he sets off at a run. The rest of us fall in line behind the big shifter and that is how I enter Red River.
Chapter
Eighteen
THORNE
Contribute her fair share.
I never thought hearing something would make me this pissed off but here I am. Pissed and jogging into Bloodstone with the Defenders and the Omega at my back. There’s only one explanation for it really.
She’s a witch.
That’s the only thing that makes good sense.
Why else would I have lost my head over her like this? All of my control snapped in the meadow and hearing her say all she needed is a bed, not even thinking we would feed her? My wolf snaps his teeth at that. We provide for her. Us. An omega that’s fed and happy, healthy and protected which fuck.
This is witchcraft. I’ve been fucking hexed.
I look over at the omega. She’s keeping pace but she's hurting now. The speed and endurance she showed earlier are gone. She deflated like an old balloon the second we came into sight of Thorne’s Embrace and Bloodstone Keep. I look up at the great tree. My namesake. My parents are firm believers in tradition, that the old ways are the right ways, meant to be honored by each generation to keep the pack strong.
I don’t know how much I believe in that.
Belief or not, I was named for the great tree that stands guard over the whole of Red River. It’s the first sight that anyone who comes to our pack sees when they make the trip to town. It doesn’t matter if they come from the forest or make the trek from the northern trailhead. Most humans opt for the trailhead. Red River is only a ten minute walk from the parking lot but there’s no awe in that journey.
No, the forest entrance is the only way to fully appreciate Thorne’s Embrace and the first glimpse of the Keep. I feel a glow of pleasure knowing the omega saw it the way it was intended and that she was with me.
She beat me, too.
The pride I feel grows, swells up until I can feel it where we were shot. The pulse there makes me remember the pack lore that will soon sink its claws into the new omega. She’ll know soon enough what the lightning means to us.
Two halves blessed as one.
I sidestep the words I know I’ll hear soon and double back to the fact that a witch hexed me. A witch that doesn’t think I’ll provide for her. There won’t be a day that she doesn’t have fresh meat waiting for her, a home just the way she sees fit and all her days to spend as her own. I will provide. The thoughts dig their dangerous hooks into me and pull me under and I let it happen, ignoring the fact that my thoughts are illogical. Pure fantasy and Alpha instincts that won’t shut the fuck up and let me think.
