Page 13 of The Weakest Wolf

I’m also not going to survive long once Bowen hears about this. The only thing worse than him not being in charge is for someone else to leapfrog him in pack hierarchy the way this promotion will. It won’t matter that I’ll be little more than Galen’s cleaner and cook, I’ll be stepping into a position he views as his.

At least he doesn’t have me cleaning the toilet with my tongue. If Bowen were in charge, I know how I’d be spending my days.

The sooner I deal with Leo, the sooner I can focus my full attention on ending Bowen before the pack’s attacks turn too nasty.

Galen’s gaze dips to my breasts and stays there just long enough to make my breath ragged. “Yes, you are,” he murmurs. “And that’s relevant to this discussion because?”

“Women don’t serve as betas.”

Neither do submissives. They just serve.

“Because a woman’s place is on her back or in the kitchen?” His expression is impossible to read.

I shrug. “I guess so, same as anywhere.”

His gaze sharpens. “And what makes you think that’s the case elsewhere? Did someone tell you?”

Eden. He means Eden.

Careful.

“Just a guess,” I say. “Why? Did you have somewhere particular in mind?”

Seconds tick by and he doesn’t say a word. Finally, he takes another step back. When my nose isn’t as full of the scent of him, I let out a quiet sigh of relief.

“You won’t win this game, Sierra Stone. If you’re not careful, you won’t even survive it.”

I widen my eyes. “A game? What game?” Playing stupid has saved me more times than I can count. “Can you explain it again, please? I promise I’ll listen harder this time.”

Despite my bimbo routine, Galen’s eyes narrow. He’s not buying it. Why isn’t he buying it?

I break out the wide, empty smile that convinces everyone the only thing in my head is tumbleweed blowing through it.

After giving me a doubtful stare, he moves toward the door. “I want breakfast in the farmhouse in thirty minutes.” His eyes give my sparse but clean one-room cabin a quick once over before they return to me. “Food for ten. I’ll be letting the pack know who my new beta is.”

It’s a struggle to hold on to my vapid smile, but I manage it. Barely. “Okay.”

“Unless—" His eyes search my face “—there was something you wanted to tell me? If that was the case, I could find someone else to be beta.”

And take all that nice pack attention off you, is what he means. Because there’s going to be a lot of it.

The new alpha picking a submissive to be his beta is not going to go down well. Maybe it wouldn’t be as big of a deal in a less predatory pack, but I doubt it. He’s just painted a bigger target on my back, and he knows it.

My mind flashes to Eden’s haunted face after Jared let her out of the closet he’d locked her in for days. That was just one of a long line of punishments for running back to her family. We shifters don’t do well in enclosed spaces, at least not for long, and Jared knew that.

She’s suffered enough—more than enough.

“Well.” I smile brightly and head for a bathroom so tiny it makes me claustrophobic just thinking about it. “I’d better get ready if you want breakfast in thirty minutes. Ten people you said?”

He doesn’t respond. After another long stare, he turns and stalks from the room, pulling the door firmly shut behind him.

With him gone, the sheer terror of all the things the pack could and will probably do to me hits me like a wave, nearly overwhelming me.

I tremble so badly that I back up and sink onto the edge of my bed. Instead of focusing on my shaking hands, I focus my attention outward, on my cabin, as I try to imagine what Galen thought of it.

Unlike some of the others, I clean my cabin and I look after what little I have, so I’m not ashamed of it. But at twenty-four, I thought my life would be more than existing in a one-room cabin surrounded by a pack I hate.

But it won’t be forever.

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