Filed To Story: Alpha's Regret: His Wrongful Rejection
But they said whatever they wanted to Flora because I kept my distance, protecting the female I thought was my future mate. I can hardly swallow, my throat is clenched so tight. The logic is a knife, pressing into my gut in slow motion.
I never gave a shit if people ran their mouths about me. Why do I care what weaker wolves yap about? And it’s not like they’d have the balls to do it where I can hear.
But Flora cares. Flora cares so much that she’s dragging us into another pack’s territory on the word of a witch I’ve never seen in human form. Flora says she’d die before she’d let our pup grow up the way she did.
All this happened right in front of me, and I didn’t see it. No, that’s not true either. I saw it. I saw Flora keeping to herself, and the females ignoring her, or laughing at her, and I thought it was petty shit. Pack life. I thought at the end of the day, better for Flora that she gets left alone.
Better for me that no one was getting close to the female I couldn’t quit and couldn’t claim.
I’ve fallen off a roof before. I stepped wrong, my ankle turned, and I rolled off like Jack and Jill. One second, I was about to nail down a shingle, thinking about nothing, and the next, I was flailing in midair.
This feels like that, the sudden knowledge of how badly I’ve fucked up, the pristine clarity about what I should have done, painfully obvious only as I’m hurtling toward the ground.
I’m an asshole.
I reach out and grab Flora’s arm. I need to say something, but I’ve got no words, so I end up holding onto her like I’m stopping her from running. She frowns, confused. I scrape the very bottom of my brain, open my mouth, and as Flora stares at me as I gape like a fish, there’s a rustling from the shrubs ahead.
I swing Flora behind me. My canines plunge through my gums, and I taste blood.
A female bursts from the greenery, her short black hair sticking up all over like a porcupine. There are leaves in it. She careens to a halt. A male follows, zipping his camo pants. He sees me, snarls, and throws the female behind him.
“Flora?” The female peeks from behind the male. She’s got a lot of metal in her face, hoops and shit.
“Nia?” I hear Flora inch out from behind me. I sidestep to block her.
My wolf rattles my chest as I stare down the male. He doesn’t back down, but in his eyes, I see his wolf struggle not to bend the neck. I don’t pull alpha often, but my wolf will bring the big guns to a knife fight every time. The surprise is wearing off, and I’m beginning to recognize the couple, too. They were at Moon Lake Academy with us, but they were a grade or two behind.
“Flora from General Numeracy?” The one with the metal, Nia, shoves her way out from behind the male.
“Hi,” Flora says shyly. Nia elbows past me and drags Flora forward. Her male growls, his already wolfish features sharpening. Dude’s face is almost all shaggy beard, and there’s fur tufting from his shirt sleeves like his pit hair’s gone Rip Van Winkle.
My claws are out, but other than that, I’m in full control of myself. Unlike some.
“What are you doing here?” Nia links arms with Flora and strolls off with her. It’s like she’s trying to put distance between herself and the furball she was just wandering in the woods with. Can’t blame her. He smells like dog.
I follow them. The male falls in beside me. Our wolves snarl at each other like grizzled old males fighting over a bone, neither invested enough to draw first blood.
“I’m going to Old Den,” Flora’s saying. “Do you live there now?”
“Yeah. What brings you here?”
I growl at Flora, trying to stop her from saying too much. We need to scope out the scene first. Just because we know these guys doesn’t mean they’re friends.
“I’m looking for a new pack. Abertha sent me here.”
I grit my teeth, and my canines scrape my chin. The male’s nostrils twitch, and he smirks.
“How is the old witch?” Nia asks. “Haven’t seen her around these parts lately.”
“I think she’s good.”
“Hard to say with that one.”
Flora murmurs in agreement. She seems intrigued by the brash female. She keeps sneaking glances at the hardware on her face and the nipple rings obvious through her skintight, midriff-baring shirt.
“Eyes up, asshole,” the male beside me snarls.
“Fuck you,” I spit back.
“Boys!” Nia snaps over her shoulder. “We’re having a conversation here. If you want to go compare dicks, that’s fine. Don’t let us stop you.” She turns to Flora. “Do you mind if your mate gets lost?”
“He’s not my mate,” Flora says. No hesitation. It’s a boot to the gut. “Well, he is, but not really.”
Nia’s painted eyes widen. “Interesting.” She casts another look over her shoulder. “He doesn’t look too happy that you said that.”
Flora’s cheeks pinken. “He can do what he wants. And I’m doing what I want.”
“Exactly,” Nia crows, holding up a palm like humans do. Flora presses hers to it, a small smile curving the corners of her mouth. “Hear that, Pritchard? I’m not ‘messed up in the head,’ I’m not an ‘unnatural female.'” She makes air quotes with her middle fingers. “I’m the vanguard of a new movement. Fuck destiny. ‘I am the master of my fate! I am the captain of my soul!'”
“What is she talking about?” I ask Pritchard. The swagger he came out of the bushes with has all but disappeared, replaced by a long-suffering tension.
He shakes his head. “I don’t know half the time, man.”
Nia rolls her eyes. “It’s from ‘Invictus?’ By William Ernest Henley? Everyone knows that one.”
Pritchard looks at me and tilts his head. I shrug. I’ve never heard of him either.
“He from North Border?” Since I don’t fight on the circuit, I don’t know all of those males by name.
Nia sniffs and pulls Flora closer to her side. “So are you trying to escape from this guy? If you want, I can have Pritchard beat his ass and send him on his way.” She casts me a mean glare from the side of her eye, not even bothering to lower her voice. She’s got an admirable, though misguided, faith in her mate.
Beside me, Pritchard stiffens. His wolf grows quiet. They both know he’s outmatched. Males do tend to recognize the alpha blood sooner than females.
“No,” Flora answers with certainty, but before I can feel good about it, she goes on. “He can do what he wants. That’s his decision. Can you take me to Old Den, though? I have human money, and I’m a hard worker. I don’t need much space.”
Pritchard gives me a look of such scorn, I’d punch it off his face if Flora’s words hadn’t skinned me to the bone. No self-respecting male’s mate should ever find herself begging for shelter, offering up her own money. It’s unconscionable.
“She’s got this crazy idea she wants to trade packs,” I grumble at Pritchard. “She’s just mad. And she might be with pup. She’s my mate. I’m not going anywhere, and I’ll do whatever needs doing.”
I catch his eye. He must read my intentions in them because his expression changes. He slows his step. I drop back to walk beside him.
“She’s rejected you?” he asks.
My gut twists. “After a fashion. Yeah. I guess so.”
He whistles. “Females,” he says, shaking his head.
I nod in silent commiseration. We walk a while, listening to Nia and Flora chatting a mile a minute up ahead. Flora’s shoulders are relaxing, and her voice is losing the defensiveness, melting back to the sweet, breathy chirping I’m used to.
“What’s it gonna take to bunk with y’all for a few nights?”
Pritchard eyes me up. “I remember you from Moon Lake. You ran the woodshop.”
I grunt. A human, Mr. Burnham, was technically the instructor, but he didn’t have the ability to dominate thirty young males around a bunch of power tools and sharp blades. I stepped in and kept order. Unlike the rest of the idiots, if I was forced to spend my time in a classroom, I was gonna learn something useful, and I couldn’t do that if some douchebag was staple gunning some poor asshole’s nuts to his taint.
“What can you do besides carpentry?”
“Electrical. HVAC. Masonry. Welding. Plumbing.” Pritchard’s eyes light up.
“Plumbing?”
Shit. Should’ve left that off.
I grunt. He gets that expression. That “just take a look, let me know what you think” expression that ends up costing me two weeks’ unpaid labor and a few hundred bucks in parts.
Shit.
He claps me on the back. He packs a wallop. “I’ll have to talk to my alpha, but I think we can make room for y’all for a spell.”
“Your alpha’s that kid Cadoc Collins?”
“More or less.”
“What’s that mean?” I’m not letting Flora anywhere near a pack during the middle of an alpha challenge. No way in hell.