Page 10 of The Weakest Wolf

My jaw tightens, and I refocus my attention on what really matters. Keeping my mouth shut until I can end Leo and Bowen.

As I sit up, his gaze dips down. Since I’m wearing a thin cotton t-shirt, it’s impossible to hide the moment my nipples harden. I spend the next several seconds cursing my traitorous body for betraying me.

His expression doesn’t change, but I feel the intensity of his focus sharpen as if he knows exactly what effect he’s having on me. “Your head might think that, but your body knows otherwise.”

And there it is— a symptom of that alpha flaw rearing its ugly head. An ego the size of fucking Texas.

Narrowing my eyes, I grip my top sheet and yank it up. “Was there a reason you invaded my personal space, or were you just here to remind me that you’re alpha?”

He lifts his gaze back to my face. “Did you have something else in mind?”

As I stare at him, I’m suddenly hyper-aware that I’m in bed wearing nothing but a threadbare t-shirt. I’m not even wearing panties. And he’s there. Galen Hunt, eyeing me as if he’s considering joining me.

I tell myself that the reason I move to get up is that I feel vulnerable sitting in bed while Galen is standing. That it has nothing to do with how breathless and warm I’m getting. “Yes, I did. You leaving.”

On my feet, I turn.

And find myself face to face with Galen. It’s a miracle I don’t jump, and I barely— just barely—manage to stuff my scream down my throat before it can emerge.

Amusement flares in his eyes. If he were any other guy, I’d call them beautiful, but because he’s nothing but a threat to me, his emerald eyes are just plain ordinary. At least that’s what I tell myself. “Did I startle you?” he rumbles.

I take a step aside. “No, you didn’t. Now if you’ll—”

Faster than I can stop him, one hand closes tight around my hip, halting me, and the other goes to the thin chain around my neck. “Pretty. Someone special give it to you?”

Panic spikes in my belly. He’s holding the only thing I have left of my parents. The only thing I have in the world that means anything to me.

Old pictures of a small family wouldn’t mean anything to Galen, but they mean everything to me. In a pack like this, sentimentality is a weakness. It’s why I’ve put as much care into hiding the necklace as I have my submissive wolf.

I’m always careful to tuck the thin silver necklace with the small heart-shaped pendant under my clothes, but this time I haven’t been.

Carelessness will kill you, Sierra. Don’t let it happen again.

If any of the pack saw how much I cherished the necklace enough that I remove it to clean it each week, or they glimpsed the pictures inside, they’d view it as a weakness, and weakness in this place is something to be punished. “It’s just something I picked up in a thrift shop.” I make my eyes wide and empty. “I like that it’s a heart.”

He raises his eyebrow. “You know alphas can tell when a member of their pack is lying to them.”

“Can they?” I blink up at him.

For several seconds he does nothing but study me, as if waiting for me to break down and admit the truth. I wait for him to realize the last thing I’m ever going to do is break down or back down.

“Submissives don’t lie to their alpha,” he rumbles.

I widen my eyes as if he’s just said the most shocking thing I’ve ever heard in my life. “Theydon’t?”

“They also,” he continues as if he didn’t hear me, “follow orders. You don’t seem to be very good at that, do you Sierra Stone?”

“Maybe,” I bite out, “you just don’t know how to give the right orders.”

Heat flashes in his eyes and I have a second to wonder what thought my words just triggered in his head. “So youdofollow orders, then?”

“Only the ones I want to.”

He doesn’t speak as he puzzles over me. No submissive would or should be this combative. It’s just not in our nature. I know that better than anyone because it took a long time to stamp out my need to follow orders.

Years.

When I was fourteen, if someone told me to pick something off the floor, it’d be in my hand before I’d even realized I’d moved. I wanted toplease. Everyone. Constantly.

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