The Tyrant Alpha's Rejected Mate (Five Packs #1)(35)

“You’re wrong,” he finally says, low and intent. “You’re a threat.”

I shake my head.

“You’ve got an alpha wolf enthralled. How the fuck did you do it?” His Adam’s apple bobs as he speaks. He’s so chiseled, even his neck exudes strength, the cords, the vein running the length. My mouth waters. I want to sink my teeth into it.

I’m losing my mind.

I know this is an important conversation, but my attention keeps slip-sliding away. His body is fascinating. The deep ridge where his shoulders meet his pecs. The trail of darker, crinklier hair that starts just below his belly button—

He gently tilts my chin up.

“Eyes up here.” His voice is bemused. “What’s going on, Una Hayes?”

I swallow. “You’re reaming me out.”

“Kind of feels like the opposite.”

“Well, if I were alpha, I wouldn’t let assholes like Lochlan Byrne kick people when they’re down. And you’re lucky you didn’t kill Gael—"

“I wasn’t trying to kill him. I was making a point.”

“Which was?”

He frowns. “I ask the questions.”

“How’s that workin’ out for you?”

Did I just say that? Am I cruisin’ for a bruisin’, like my Da used to say?

He reaches for my face. I flinch. He hesitates for the slightest second, and then he brushes my cheek with his fingertips, grazing my temple. Shivers follow in the wake of his touch. Then his eyes harden, and he reaches behind my head, grabbing my braid by the base.

He drags me into his chest, winding my braid around his fist, forcing my back to arch, my hips to press into his.

I can feel him again. His length. His hardness.

My scalp stings. I whimper, searching his pupils for the gold of his wolf. It’s nowhere. My own wolf has lowered her head, almost purring she’s so pleased with his display.

“Let me go,” I whisper. I could sass him when there was air between us, but now that I’m plastered to his heat, my wolf’s instincts are rising. Submit. Present.

“No.” He tugs my braid, tilting my head further back, forcing me to show my neck. It should be humiliating, but it’s not. Some primal part of me wants this. Craves it.

I swallow again and babble, desperately reaching for a handhold on reality. “Trip the girls. Pull their hair. What, are we back in school?”

“I never pulled your braid, Una Hayes. You hid up by the teacher.” He bends and nestles his nose in the crook of my neck, inhaling. Tingles zip down my spine. “Why don’t you smell like arousal?”

I don’t? Good, good. That would be too humiliating. But I feel something. New and powerful and terrifying.

But no, I don’t want to have sex with him. He’s Killian Kelly. I just got publicly humiliated. Again. And we’re out in the open. Anyone could walk past. There’s a bug zapper hanging a few feet away. I’m wearing an old lady’s sweater, and it smells like mints.

And yeah. He’s Killian Kelly. My mate who rejected me. I’m not turned on.

I try to pull my neck away from his nose, but his grip on my hair is too tight.

“I don’t like you,” I say. It’s such a stupid argument.

He nips at my shoulder. “You don’t have to. Do you think half the females in this pack like me? I’m the alpha.”

“I think it’s bigger.” My voice is breathless. Wobbly.

He stops messing with my neck and rises to his full height to gaze down at my upturned face. His forehead wrinkles. “What?”

“The number. It’s definitely more than half.”

Why am I baiting him? Is this how moon madness starts? With bad jokes and me getting my head ripped off by the braid, buck naked except for a borrowed cardigan?

He doesn’t laugh, but he doesn’t snap my neck like a twig, either. He kind of cocks his head. “Why don’t you like me?”

“Well—” I don’t know where to start, but I do know that saying pretty much anything honest would be a huge freakin’ mistake. “I mean, for one, you’re pulling my hair. It hurts.”

He stares at me for a long second, and then he smooths my braid so it hangs over my left shoulder. He tugs off the elastic, and with one hand, he undoes the sections, careful not to yank.

He combs his fingers through the loose strands. Slowly. Gently. His fingertips glance down the slope of my breast. It’s too light and fleeting to be full-on copping a feel, but I don’t think it’s accidental, either. Goosebumps break out down my arms and bare legs. No one touches me like this. Ever.

Nobody ever really touches me.

“I could make you hot,” he says. “Your wolf’s panting for it.”

She is—at this point, she’s presenting—and it’s beyond awkward. I’m not paying her any attention. If I did, my face would spontaneously combust.

“We’ve agreed to disagree on this one,” I mumble.

“There’s no division between the man and the wolf. That’s a heresy.” Killian says it like he learned the words by rote. I bet he did. It’s what the elders preach. The man and the wolf are two sides of the same coin.

Abertha teaches us differently. She says everyone’s connection to their wolf is unique, a creation of their own making. When people are fucked up, it’s because of an imbalance in the relationship. She says that’s what’s wrong with a lot of folks in this pack. Their heads are up their wolf’s ass.