Page 52 of The Weakest Wolf

“Galen?”

Without warning, he rips himself away from me.

When I turn, he’s stalking toward the bathroom, his back stiff. “Get out,” he snarls.

The bathroom door slams hard behind him. I don’t hesitate. I grab his shirt from the floor, slip it over my head, and rush from the room.

12

GALEN

The only thing the icy shower does is cool my raging hard-on. It doesn’t do a damn thing to control my fierce need to bite Sierra Stone.

Even now I want to claim her.

Sierra Stone is not mine. She’s just as rotten as the rest of this pack.

Does that kill the need? For a second it does.

Just long enough for the image of her bruised and battered face to fill my mind.

They don’t treat her as if she was one of them. Maybe she’s not. Maybe—

I shake my head.No. Sierra Stone cannot be trusted. For all I know, she set this all up so I would go easy on her. Maybe to play on my sympathy, or so she could get what the rest of the women want: to be Luna.

When it feels too much like I’m hiding in the shower, I turn the faucet off and step out. As I grab a towel and wander back into the bedroom, I already know I’ll find it empty.

Sierra is gone, and she did not leave empty-handed.

I’m not pissed at her for taking my shirt. I’d have given it to her if I could tell she didn’t want what I was offering. This way she could lay all the blame on my shoulders for enjoying a kiss she would never admit she wanted—while still enjoying it—just as I knew she would.

Kiss or no kiss, nothing has changed between us.

“She needs to tell me where Eden is,” I mutter, as I stalk over to the dresser in search of fresh clothes.

Sierra will be wearing my shirt now, which is covered in my scent. My shirt, my—

“No.” I snarl. “Not mine.”

I turn my attention inward.

What was Melody, then? I ask my wolf. What was she that you are so eager to replace her?

My wolf stops snarling, but his presence doesn’t fade. An image flashes in my mind. It’s brief, but it’s enough.

Earth. An ending. Death.

Maybe it’s easy for my wolf to forget a mate, forget a feeling, but I still remember Melody, even if the wolf side of me doesn’t.

Another image forms. This one packs a bigger punch because it’s a memory. One I haven’t let myself think about for a long time. Years.

Some things hurt too much to remember, and this is one of them.

Melody’s laughter bounces off the trees around us as tears stream down her pink cheeks. Fifteen years later, I still remember my terrible joke about a squirrel losing its acorn that made absolutely no sense. But it set her off like nothing else I’d ever said.

She laughed so hard she cried. Even then, she didn’t stop.

A little of my animosity toward my wolf fades. He remembers her. That’s what he wants me to know. But his grief is long over now. For him, life is too short to live with yesterday’s pain and hurt.

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