Page 29 of Unforgivable

"I'm a lot younger than you, you know. Eight years ago, when you came here, I was eleven. Pups talk."

His chest starts to tremble. "Baby's bones?" he chuckles out.

I smile against his chest as he laughs. I made Thjis laugh. Maybe this life isn't so horrible, after all.

"I'm telling that story to Sarj tomorrow," he says as I start to drift off into sleep.

"He probably already knows," I slur sleepily.

He laughs again.

---

A scratching sound at the window wakes me up from a dead sleep. I gasp in panic. The Moon is here for me, clawing at the window.

"Lyri be still," Thjis' gruff voice penetrates the fog of fear in my head. He's still in the bed with me; his frame crouched over me as he stares intently out of the window. His dark face is lit up in the moonlight. He looks for all the world like the warrior he is.

"W-who is that?" I ask. I can't hear much over the sound of my heart pounding in my ears but can make out the yelp of panic from just outside my bedroom window.

"No idea, but Rhet's got him," Thjis says with dark pleasure.

I feel bile rise. Someone was sneaking onto the ranch. One of the males from that night? Was I almost kidnapped? Maybe this is why the males sleep in my room.

I force myself to calm down. My wolf is whining softly in my head, afraid. Her reaction tells me it's not my family coming to see me in the wee hours of the morning.

The door swings open, the male framed in a dark silhouette cast by the hall light behind him. It's too small to be Rhet.

"Ez, what's going on?"

Ezra steps into the room, a faint look of surprise at seeing Thjis curled around me in the bed. "It's a young female. She says she's Lyri's friend. Mari?"

My nose wrinkles right away. Mari is soooo not my friend.

Ezra chuckles out loud when he sees my face. "Yeah, I thought she might be lying. She made this face when she said she'd known you since you were pups."

She's not lying about that. Mari was one of my closest friends growing up. Then, we both shifted, and she ended up being Drew, the future beta's mate, and I ended up rejected by Drew's best friend. Not that Mari knows that. She only knows that I can't stand her new bestie, Cloe. She chose her future luna over me.

I don't trust Mari, but I'm also not a coward, especially to a bitch who doesn't recognize who I am. I am the alpha bitch of this pack, not Mari, and definitely not her.

"Will you take me to see her?" I ask Thjis.

His eyebrows quirk up. I nod, letting him see my determination. I need to do this. Maybe I could forgive Mari for throwing away our friendship for her mate's best friend's lover, but I refuse to forgive Mari for being in the group of wolves who tried to bully me endlessly.

After all, Cloe hates me too, doesn't she? Too bad everyone was too blind to see why we have so much animosity between us. I don't know if Cloe knows who I really am to Daan, but she knows who she isn't. She must be paranoid, never knowing if the male she's put her everything into will one day decide to leave her because he's not hers. No matter what he wants, she wants, or hell, what I want, he was never truly hers.

And they call me the conniving whore.

"You're vibrating with anger, baby," Thjis murmurs.

I take a moment to just stare at his eyes. They're soft on me. I'm not used to seeing these eyes so sweetly looking at me. I'm used to vibrant green staring at me in pleasure, but not these black eyes. I shouldn't be surprised, though. Thjis is a healer. A grumpy, aggravating, misogynistic, male of a healer, but that caring, protective quality is in him, part of his essence. If his story had been written differently, I think he would have become an amazing doctor for his pack.

"Ah, what should I tell Rhet?" Ezra says stiffly.

"I'm going to speak with her," I say firmly.

Thjis blows out an irritated breath. Ezra looks between us, uneasy.

"Do I have to walk myself out?"

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