Page 34 of The Sacred Wolf

“Going down?” Kenzo asked innocently, sticking one foot over the threshold to keep the doors open.

“No! I mean, yes. Yes.” I smoothed stray tendrils of hair behind my ears and stepped bolding into the tiny cabin with the hulking males. “We’re going down.”

Evan bounded in after me, humming an old pop song and occasionally repeating that phrase as its only lyrics. Kenzo withdrew his foot, sealing us all inside together. Sebastian’s jaw clenched so hard I thought his teeth would pop out, and all of yesterday’s warm and fuzzy feelings were way ahead of him. How could I ever consider mating with someone who treated my best friend with such willful ignorance? I glowered at him, refusing to be drawn in by the black T-shirt clinging to his torso like a second shiftskin stretched over the first.

“Where are you going?” I asked, unable to hide my aggression.

Sebastian’s cheeks sucked inward, displeased with my tone.

“We got a report from Tony.” Kenzo replied. “He said there are signs that Damien might have gone to Staten Island to stir up their pack. We want to get there before he causes any more harm.”

“What?” I looked back and forth between them, but Sebastian’s face gave nothing away but anger. “Why didn’t you say so? I’ll come with you.”

“That won’t be necessary.” Sebastian’s voice was tight. He wouldn’t meet my eyes, and a muscle in his jaw pulsed.

I laughed in disbelief, shaking my head. “Are we really doing this again? I thought you agreed not to keep me out of the loop anymore?”

“I didn’t. You’re in the loop. We told you what’s happening.” He gave a dismissive shrug. “We just don’t need you to come with us. You obviously have plans. That you didn’t run by anyone…”

My hackles rose, and my wolf reared beneath my skin, threatening to destroy Ruby’s fashion choices too. “You know, I announced myself as an Alpha Heir yesterday, right?”

“Not of this borough.”

Evan’s eyes tennis-balled between us while Kenzo pretended to whistle and stared at the ceiling. I took a step toward Sebastian, hoping the moisture in my eyes looked like molten fury and not aching sorrow because he was never going to be what I wanted him to be. He was an Alpha born and bred, and I was starting to think I didn’t want any part of this system at all.

“I’m taking Evan to my theater,” I said boldly, almost daring him to stop me. Actually maybe kind of hoping he would stop me because what we were about to do was truly the most terrifying thing I’d ever done in my life. “We’re meeting Jayla.”

“Why would you do that?” Sebastian’s voice rose to a previously unheard pitch. “Without even asking me? It’s not safe, and you know it—”

“But it was safe for me to walk right up 5th Avenue with you?” I sneered. “Here we go again with the double standards.”

“I was there to protect you,” he sputtered.

“Like you did on the subway that night?”

Sebastian’s featured turned to ice. I hadn’t realized until that that we’d advanced on each other in the tiny space until our heaving chests were almost touching, our foreheads inches apart. It was just like in my dream, only we hated each other. But at least I had a reason.

“I don’t need your permission for anything,” I said. “You don’t own me.”

“You’re right,” Sebastian said. “I have no claim on you or your time because I relinquished it. You are a free wolf.”

“My freedom was never yours to grant.” I turned toward the button panel and jabbed the next floor we’d be coming to. I needed out. I would take the stairs. Anything to get away from him now.

The doors opened on an unfamiliar floor, and I grabbed Evan’s hand, dragging him over the threshold. Option C—running away to L.A.—was looking better and better.

“You two have fun on your date,” Sebastian huffed.

I whirled like a tornado, and caught Kenzo face-palming as the doors slammed shut. At least one of them wasn’t an idiot. Maybe there was hope for Manhattan yet if he became Alpha, but I no longer wanted any part of it. Evan’s hand clasped my shoulder, and I laid mine over it, a silent promise to get him out of this toxic sludge environment. At the end of the day, he was the only thing that really mattered. He was the only thing I could ever call mine.

Chapter Seventeen

A hooded figure slouched against the gold-trimmed doors of the embarrassingly named Elysium when our car pulled up. In my absence, street debris had piled up along the building’s lower edges under the dark marquis, and the sun had already begun to fade the collection of Grace Kelly posted flanking either side of the entrance. Acid filled my mouth, remembering my one and only date with Sebastian. Unless we counted yesterday, which I was no longer doing because that guy had obviously been a fluke.

“Jayla!” Evan yelped, fumbling with the door handle, but the drive had yet to unlock it. I met his gaze in the rearview mirror and nodded that it was safe to do so, and a moment later, the black sedan echoed with the thump of flipped locks. Evan piled out so fast that he hit his hands and knees on the dirty sidewalk, and I worried he was going to get so excited he pulled a shift. Not uncommon with pups.

He recovered and scrambled over to her statue-still form. Fear gripped me momentarily, wondering if someone had intercepted his messages and lured us into a trap, but then her dark hands pulled back her hood, and it was her. It was Jayla. She was really here. She had really survived.

One hand and then another clasped her rapidly wrinkling mouth, and when Evan swept her off her feet and into a clunky twirl, she emitted a sound like a wounded animal. He dropped her gently and took her face in his hands, his word drooping to a murmur as she stared up at him in shimmering awe. After a moment, she grabbed his face, and twisted it to the side, her expert-in-training hands moving deftly over his scalp. She pulled back, shaking her head, and he said something that made her eyes dart toward the car, alarmed.

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