Page 16 of Bound to Exiles (Rejected Wolf Pack #5)

But the thought reminded me of the last time I’d been aroused by the sight of a man — two of them, actually.

Watching Gage and Heath push each other around while Flint and I pleasured Freya had only heightened my enjoyment of the moment, not lessened it.

Seeing Heath grind his cock against Gage as he kissed him…

My dick started to rise just thinking about it, and I growled in frustration.

Zak instantly stepped back, his gaze meeting mine. His mouth turned down, probably catching the golden color my eyes had turned. But it wasn’t fear or anger that had awakened my wolf, but a different primal feeling — lust.

With the touch between us broken, my head cleared slightly. The memory of Gage and Heath together had been so vivid, it made me wonder if Zak had somehow manipulated it into resurfacing. Perhaps through the Bonded link somehow?

I always sensed the others’ emotions through the link, but never his.

I growled again, stepping closer to Zak. I wanted to throw him against a tree and find out what he was hiding. But my eyes dropped to his luscious lips, and when my nostrils flared, I caught the scent of something that made my wolf whimper: Zak’s fear.

My eyebrows drew down in confusion. I was at the mercy of his magic here, not the other way around.

Then I remembered, he wasn’t just a mage. He was also a wolf shifter, and I was an alpha. With one command, I could halt any attack he made against me. I could force him to his knees and…

My already hardening dick only got harder.

“Fuck,” I said, turning away from him to hide my boner.

“Feeling any better?” he asked hopefully.

With him behind me, I stared down at my traitorous dick in shame and fury. What was the matter with me?

The whole point of this was to test Zak.

Then I looked down at my hipbone. I leaned back, letting my eyes trail upward as far as I could, up my abs and pecs… and saw no scar. The right side looked no different from the left, aside from a lack of hair where the scar had been. Even if it never regrew, I didn’t care.

At one point in time, I’d been ashamed of those scars. Especially all those times we’d gone to the bar and Heath easily bedded women, while they regarded me with disinterest or outright wariness.

Freya hadn’t, though. She and I had bonded over our scars. She loved me in spite of them.

But now they were gone.

“Can you heal Freya’s scars?” I asked, still turned away. “If she wants you to, I mean.”

“Of course. And the other guys’ witchfire scars, too, if they want. Did you… want me to finish? I only got your lower half. I can try to heal your face and neck, too, if you’d like.”

I swallowed hard. I’d only just gotten my dick under control. Steeling myself, I faced him once more.

“Make it fast. I don’t want to lose the scent.”

Zak nodded, stepping close to me again. He was clean-shaven, and he bit his lip in concentration.

His face was so close to mine, and his scent reminded me of the sweet smoke after blowing out a candle.

I couldn’t help but notice all these details with him so close to me, but I also found all of them pleasing.

As he laid his soothing hand upon me again, I began to realize Freya’s trust in Zak made sense. Mages might be better liars than wolves, but during our entire conversation, his heart rate never increased like a liar’s would. The only time it had jumped had been when I’d growled .

“Sorry I growled earlier…” I trailed off as his hand moved along my collarbone.

“It’s okay. Neither of us knows the other very well. Of course we’re both a little skittish.”

His eyes darted up to mine and the boyish smile he gave me made me want to protect him from the witches who’d hurt him in the past.

I detected no deceit except when it came to questions about his own wolf. None of us had seen him shift yet, even though we’d met him on a full moon. And now I wondered if the witches had something to do with that. Had they… hurt his wolf?

We’d wondered why he hadn’t triggered another heat in Freya yet. It was another thing that had made me suspicious, wondering how he could truly be her mate if he didn’t kick off her heat.

Heath thought maybe it was because Zak was a hybrid, Gage thought it was because he wasn’t an alpha. But maybe it was because Freya hadn’t met his wolf yet. Maybe once their wolves met, we would know for sure if he was Freya’s mate or if this was all some elaborate trick of his magic.

Zak’s large palm cupped my neck, and I tensed.

“Just a little bit more to go,” he whispered, and his breath on my naked skin stirred something in me.

His hand caressed my face like a lover, and it was all I could do to keep my eyelids from fluttering closed. Only Freya touched me like this. That’s why he had such an effect over me — his touch reminded me of hers. That had to be it.

Other male shifters’ scents had always repelled me. In all the times that Heath took me out to bars with him, I always went to bed with women. Heath sometimes took men to his bed, and while I had no issues with it, I’d never considered it for myself.

In fact, I’d always found other men’s scents disgusting. Except… my packmates’ scents. And now, Zak’s.

“Hmm,” Zak murmured as his thumb brushed perilously close to my lips.

My body instantly tensed, going on the alert.

“Sorry, it’s nothing to worry about,” Zak reassured me. “It’s just that… even with me healing your face here, your beard on this side ma y take some time to regrow, so you’re going to be lopsided for a bit.”

He stepped back, and the cool December air made me shiver. Though his soothing touch had felt cool against my burns, his proximity had distracted me from the cold.

“How do you feel about shaving?” he smirked.

I scoffed and shifted back into my wolf form.

Zak chuckled, the sound pleasant to my ears. “I guess that’s another solution.”

“Why don’t you shift and run alongside me?” I suggested again over the Bonded link.

Zak backed away, his demeanor instantly changing. His expression shuttered, and he looked off into the woods.

“Lead the way, wolf man.”

As usual, through the Bonded link, I couldn’t get a read on his emotions. But his scent… that revealed something he couldn’t hide. Trepidation. Not outright fear, but a kind of nervousness.

I decided to drop it, but as soon as I got back to the others, I intended to mention his reluctance to shift.

Just as soon as we could talk face-to-face instead of through the Bonded link, where I couldn’t be sure Zak might not be listening in somehow, even when broadcasting to only two or three others.

“This way,” I said, taking off through the forest once more.

Zak followed behind, crashing through branches and bushes and generally announcing our presence to any wolf shifter with even one ear open. But from the scent, I could tell that whatever magic had come through had to be a couple days old at this point.

It grew stronger as I climbed a rocky ridge, and I realized it was leading up to an overlook where the enemy could have gazed down into Frost Fang packlands.

“They watched from here,” I growled as Zak began the laborious ascent behind me. He would have been faster in his wolf form.

“At least they couldn’t see the pack house from here,” he pointed out silently, saving his breath for the climb.

I growled as I caught a familiar scent alongside the magic. Dryden.

“Back in the Elder Forest pack, wolves kept disappearing in ones and twos when they approached the border to their packlands. The scent of the person we believe responsible is here.”

“What happened to the disappeared wolves?” Zak asked.

“We never found out. We came under attack — that’s how the others got their witchfire scars — and Heath ceased his investigation to rejoin us.”

“Clearly you all came out on top.”

I wasn’t about to tell Zak how. We’d kept Freya’s Odinswolf heritage a secret so far, and I wouldn’t be the one to break our silent agreement.

“Yes, but this doesn’t bode well for Frost Fang’s future. Without alphas here to protect them…”

“There are other ways to protect themselves,” Zak interrupted. “They made their choice. Now, give me a minute to try a few things and see what I see.”

I made my way a little farther up the ridge, but the trees made it difficult to see the packlands up here, and the scent trail died. No, they’d stopped at the overlook and then made their way back down a couple days ago.

“Report,” Gage’s voice broke through the Bonded connection.

I answered in kind, broadcasting to all of us so the others would know what we found.

“We followed the scent trail up a ridge and found a spot overlooking Frost Fang packlands,” I said as I watched Zak draw sigils in the air. “Along with the witches who must have been here, I also caught Dryden’s scent.”

I waited, knowing that announcement would provoke a reaction, and Heath cursed a long string of expletives.

“What’s he doing this far north?” Freya wondered. “The last time he was spotted was in Colorado, right?”

“Right,” Flint answered. “Whatever it is, he’s up to no good.”

“He’s going to take advantage of Frost Fang’s weakened state,” Heath warned.

“We can’t leave them undefended,” Flint agreed, his worry lacing his words.

We all knew it had been hard on Flint to leave his sister behind, but he’d made the right choice.

Pack always came before blood. My own family had proven that to me the day they watched the alphas exile me without even a protest on my behalf.

I hadn’t shifted yet, and they’d let me walk into the wildlands alone, without so much as a goodbye and good luck.

“They’ll just think we’re trying to prove they need alphas again,” Freya disagreed.

“We’ll warn Frost Fang,” Gage decided.

“Alphas…” Zak said through the link.

He faced me, his hands at his sides. For a split second, I caught a glint of gold in his dark eyes.

His wolf wanted to break free, to sniff out the threat.

I inhaled, taking in his scent now that his inner animal had risen, and my wolf instantly recognized him as a beta before his wolf submerged again.

“What did you find?” I asked.

“I’m not familiar with the coven that these witches come from. They cast some kind of scrying spell, but I can’t be sure what they were looking for. But… when you say Dryden, do you mean Congressman Dryden?”

“Yes, why?” Heath ground out, not yet revealing who Dryden was to him.

“Before I left the Ravenscroft Coven, I’d heard news about the Ashworth Coven down in the States.

Word through the grapevine said they had come up with a curse that could prevent wolf shifters from shifting, trapping them in one form or the other.

It could challenge alliances throughout North America. ”

“Aren’t there laws in place to prevent warfare between species?” Freya asked.

“There are,” Heath answered. “It’s how places like the Chicago Collective function.”

“They’re pretending they’re doing it for altruistic reasons,” Zak added. “And they have people in Congress, Dryden being one.”

“Fuck, I never realized how dangerous he might really be,” Heath growled.

“I can leave a nasty surprise for them if they come back to this spot, if you’d like,” Zak suggested.

“Do it,” Gage instantly answered, and I felt Heath’s malicious agreement. He held no love for his father.

“After Freya and I create the wards around our camp and rest up, I could also add wards just outside the southeast border of Frost Fang. They won’t be expecting that.

It should alert Frost Fang of any trespassers, giving their patrols a crucial few minutes before the witches take countermeasures to snuff out the rest of my wards. ”

“And how long will that take?”

“Depends how much ground we want to cover. We’d need to stick around for a day or two so I can rest up between.”

“Good.” Through the link, Gage felt pleased, yet still wary. “We’ll need to stay that long anyway so any stragglers can join us.”

“Zak and I will be back soon,” I promised Freya and the others.

“Watch his back while he sets up that trap,” Freya told me privately along the bond. “It might leave him tired.”

I circled around Zak as the mage began drawing something on the ground, his hands occasionally lighting up with orange and then yellow light. The mage clearly knew his magic. And yet now, I had proof that there was a beta wolf hiding inside of him, ready to come out.

“He’ll be fine. He’s stronger than you think,” I answered, also privately.

Zak gave no indication he’d heard. Maybe he couldn’t spy on our private conversations through the Bonded link after all.

Yet in spite of his powerful magic, my earlier growl had startled him enough to draw the scent of fear from him, and his wolf felt weak to all my senses. He wouldn’t shift, and he hadn’t provoked Freya’s heat. He was still a mystery.

As much as I wanted to trust him, packmates kept no secrets from one another. At least not in the Howling Echo.

If he wanted to belong with us, he would have to reveal all.

And so would we.