The Tyrant Alpha's Rejected Mate (Five Packs #1)(63)

TV is allowed, but shifter ears are hyper-sensitive. We keep the media at the lodge, and most families don’t have it in their homes.

The females have gotten away with a lot up here on the outskirts.

And none of them have been winning any fights. The money came from somewhere. Yeah. Dealing with humans. For ten damn years.

Holy fuck. My heart thuds with delayed panic.

Shifters are exotic; shifter females even more so. Shit happens. A North Border male was killed, his female taken and never recovered. A Moon Lake scavenger was lured off by a sweet-talking human, hooked on their drugs and turned out. When the pack finally found her, she was broken. Her wolf gone.

And those are the human dangers. Last Pack is always looking to poach females. They’ll steal young, too, to lure away their dams. They don’t care if the females aren’t their mates, or if they’re someone else’s. They’re animals.

It could have happened to our females. On my watch. Because of my lack of attention.

This is on me. I deserve the punishment.

Maybe that’s how I present it to the elders. Ultimately, the females’ transgressions are my responsibility, so I should bear the consequences. Lochlan’s gang will get off big time, watching me take a beating in the commons, but it’d be a pleasure to go a round with each of them straight afterwards and whup their upstart asses. So they remember just who and what they’re dealing with.

I guess the girls are getting accustomed to me in their space because slowly, their huddle disperses. Kennedy goes to lean in the kitchen doorway. Annie and Mari perch nervously on the edge of the sofa.

The cabin is nice. There are paintings on the wall. I don’t recognize the artist, but the scenes are from Quarry Pack territory. The old dens. The river. The foothills. There are pretty curtains and embroidered pillows. It smells amazing—like Una’s warmth is baked into the hardwood floors.

I lower myself into a recliner. It creaks, but it’s comfortable. I resist popping the footrest. The way Kennedy’s glaring at me, I’m pretty sure I’ve made myself at home in her chair.

In fact, all the females are giving me the stink eye.

“There something you want to say to me?”

Three sets of eyes go bigger and wider.

“Now’s the time. Later might be too late.” I go ahead and pull the lever on the footrest. Now I’m fully reclined. There’s no way I can look less intimidating.

Mari draws in a deep breath. Her eyes are shining. If she cries, I’m waiting out on the porch.

“Don’t hurt Una,” she says.

“I-it w-wasn’t h-her f-f-fault.” Annie fights to get the words out. Her long face is a pasty green. “S-she did it for u-us.”

“What do you mean?” I ask Kennedy. She’s the least traumatized by my presence. She keeps her mouth shut, though, her expression mulish as hell.

It’s little Mari who answers. “She did it so that we would have nice things. Something to look forward to, you know? And we helped. So if you punish her, you have to punish us.”

A tear dribbles down her cheek. If Darragh Ryan knew I was here, making his mate cry, he’d kill me. Good thing he’s still hiding from her up in the hills.

All three females look so defensive. So small and fierce and scared.

This isn’t what I want.

My father was the one who wanted females to reek of fear. He got off on it. I never developed a taste for it. Smelled like defeat to me. Like a weak pack and weak males who confuse respect with mere compliance.

Submission—now, that’s another thing. I wouldn’t mind filling my nose with that. Later. When I have Una alone back in our den.

Now, though, I have to soothe these three before Una comes back and hates me even more for terrorizing her friends. And to be honest, their distress isn’t sitting well with me or my wolf either.

“Was she the only one who left the territory?” I ask.

Not one of them will meet my eye. I sigh. They’re not making this easy.

“What is it you need that the pack doesn’t provide?”

Anyone can take what he needs from the commissary. It’s been that way since I took over. Cheryl might give you the stink eye and come bitch to me about it when folks get greedy, but there are no limits. No old carved up bench out back where females pay for extras with what’s between their legs.

All three are blushing like a bushel of tomatoes, staring holes in the floor.

“Like, is it female shit you need or something?”

Mari squirms and looks at Kennedy. Kennedy’s face is contorted in horror.

The air’s so thick, it’s getting hard to breathe, but I’m afraid if I stand, the stench will get worse. Fate, I hate the stench of fear. And what have I done to them to earn it?

I’m lounging here, very reasonable, feet in the air like an idiot. Never laid a hand on one of them. Or raised my voice. Much.

I shimmy down, make myself as low and small as I possibly can. “Come on. Help me understand. I’m not the enemy.”

Kennedy huffs and stomps over to a closet, throwing open the door. Annie gasps and tucks herself behind Mari.

“See?” Kennedy cocks her hip, points a toe to the side, and glares mutinously. On the shelves behind her, there are a shit ton of cords, not a single one properly coiled. She huffs again, grabs a box, and turns to face me, glowering and unrepentant.