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AREN

I stand in the parking lot outside Kat’s building complex, staring up at her apartment, wishing I knew what she was doing right this moment.

Slipping out of her sexy black dress?

Putting her hair down?

Soaking in the bath?

I answer my ringing phone as my pants get tight. “Finan.”

“You have to come back. Tagge is here. With his sister .”

The emphasis he puts on the last two words has me wishing someone else could be Alpha.

I glare into the night sky. “What the fuck are they doing there?”

“Presumably so you can be mates.”

I squeeze my eyes shut. Shifters don’t get headaches, but my head just started pounding. Just this once, I wish I didn’t have to deal with a mess of my own making.

Finan warned me that snarling at Tagge would lead to consequences. He’s not the type to be smug or rub something in my face that I should have seen coming. Thank fuck.

“Can’t you take care of it?”

He sighs. “I am not interested in being mates with his sister, Aren. There’s a lot I will do for you, but that is one bridge I won’t cross.”

“Does she look diseased?” I ask, curious despite myself.

Tagge, the Wolf Lord of Starling’s Peak, Washington State, wouldn’t have been trying to get rid of his sister if there wasn’t something seriously wrong with her. He’s been attempting it for three months, which makes me think it’s serious.

Try as I might, I can’t envision what it could be.

“No. She looks fine. Seems fine. A bit quiet.”

I wave my hand in the air. “Then what’s the problem? You need a mate. I have a mate. She’s quiet, exactly your type. And it sounds as if you like her.”

I don’t actually know what his type is given he’s not one for dating. But he’s always been quiet, speaking with Dania, Leo’s mom, more than any other woman in the pack.

Another sigh drifts down the line. This one louder, as if he’s worried I might have missed the first one. “I said she seemed fine , not that I intend to tie myself to her forever. You need to come back. Tagge is being difficult.”

I consider climbing Kat’s building with a bunch of flowers that can serve as my apology, so I won’t have to say it. It’s twenty floors. With balconies, a climb like that would barely test my abilities. Would she appreciate the effort I’m going to, or will she shove me off her balcony?

I recall the growl in her voice and the wolf in her beautiful, pale blue eyes. At the time, I’d been turned on by her anger. Now I consider her response with clinical detachment.

For one brief moment, as she was ordering me to leave, I could’ve sworn I caught a hint of her arousal. But that was right before she threatened to throw me out of her apartment window.

Now I’m not sure.

Women like flowers, and Kat didn’t have any in her apartment, so she’d appreciate the… roses? Lilacs? Whatever other flowers I can buy at a grocery store at nine p.m.

I can’t leave things with Kat like this. I was wearing down her defenses, getting her to open up.

My wolf snorts his amusement.

I growl at him to shut up. I understand people. He understands animals. We have our strengths and reading women is not one of his.

“You can handle Tagge,” I say to Finan. “Try that diplomacy on him that you’re always trying with me. It’ll work.”

It won’t work.

Tagge is a Wolf Lord. I might not appreciate the guy’s persistence in trying to shove me into bed with his sister, but we’re both Alphas who lay down the law.

Diplomacy has its place. It is not the dominant alpha’s way.

But it’ll buy me one day to get Kat to see reason. That we’re mates. We belong together, and I’ll make things up to her in ways that don’t involve me begging.

I just need time. That’s all.

“I stopped him from sitting in your chair,” he warns.

Growling, I stop eyeing the window with the lights on.

Tagge sitting in my chair isn’t the problem. It’s the intention behind the act. An intent to claim something that is not his.

My position is in jeopardy.

If I don’t get back to Burning Wood, Tagge might try to take something even more important that belongs to me than my chair.

Like my pack.

“I’ll be back later tonight.”

“With Kat?”

I study the window again. Maybe it’s just in my head, but I swear the curtains have moved. “She’s more stubborn than I’d thought she’d be.”

I’m used to getting what I want, usually, with minimal effort. Especially when it comes to women. I’ve never had to work hard to convince a woman to trust, like, or sleep with me.

Until now.

“Have you tried apologizing?”

No, because that’s the last resort. The humbling path I’m desperate not to take.

“I’m doing things my way,” I tell my beta confidently.

“Have you considered that might be why she’s being stubborn?” Finan offers dryly.

Scowling, I hang up.

He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

Kat is my mate, and no one knows her the way I do. The universe would not have matched us if we weren’t made for each other.

I’ll figure out this thing with Kat without having to apologize and without the begging she seems to require from me.

I don’t beg.

Not for anyone.

She’s attracted to me. And we’re mates. That is a bond she can’t ignore even if she wanted to. Now that she’s out of the silver cage, the invisible threads tying us together will strengthen. Distance won’t matter because we’ve found each other. We belong together. The universe has willed it so and there’s no going against what the universe wants. She will come crawling to me once she’s had time to reflect on everything I’m offering her.

Again my wolf chuffs in amusement.

“As if you know the first thing about women,” I mutter as I head to my car when I spot a woman—not Kat—peering down at me from their window, a phone pressed to their ear.

The last thing I need is to get arrested for being a peeping tom. Finan would die laughing.

Or maybe not. He’d sigh sadly, like I’d let him down as he got me booked out or whatever it is the regular humans do. All I know about being arrested is from movies and TV shows, and who knows how accurate they are? Probably not very.

Human law enforcement wasn’t a subject covered in shifter school, and my responsibility as pack leader meant that attending a human college wasn’t an option. The pack needed me.

But if I got myself arrested, Kat would die laughing and say it was poetic justice. A pang of guilt, an unfamiliar emotion, surprises me, and I rub the heel of my hand over my heart to get rid of the uncomfortable sensation. After locking her in a silver cage for nearly a week, maybe she’d be right to think I deserved for someone to lock me up and throw away the key.

My wolf growls, uncomfortable with my thoughts

No shifter handles being caged well. Our beast will always crave freedom, making being trapped a form of torture none of us can handle for long. He was never happy about what I did to Kat, though he understood I did it to protect the pack.

Pack has always come first.

Now I have a mate and there will be times that Kat will need me too.

In my mind, an image of two wolves takes shape—a large brown-blond with gold eyes. Me. And another, small, sleek, and beautiful with dark brown fur and ice-blue eyes. Kat.

Side by side, hunting together. Fighting for the pack and protecting together .

Maybe my wolf understands women more than I give him credit for.