Page 4 of Rejected Sold Mate (Crystal Creek Wolves #4)

Shame was nothing new to me, so leaving Jayce’s cabin after he’d stormed out shouldn’t have been a problem, but I felt so horrible that I had trouble seeing through my tears to start my car.

I was so humiliated. Couldn’t he have just left and spared me the speech of how worthless I was to him? I wouldn’t have blamed Jayce for wanting nothing to do with me, but he didn’t have to be cruel on top of everything else.

I managed to get myself under control enough to drive home, and once I was there, I showered and immediately went to bed, pulling the covers over my head and desperately trying to put what just happened out of my mind.

It was impossible, though. It was like Jayce had gotten his claws into me somehow, and I couldn’t shake him, no matter how hard I tried.

I managed to get a few hours of sleep before the sun became too bright through the curtains, and I’d been looking forward to feeling better after some rest. Unfortunately, when I woke up, I still felt off.

The feeling was hard to describe. It was like I was homesick, but not for a place. A painful feeling of nostalgia, so intense that if I let it wash over me, I was on the verge of tears.

Boxing unwanted emotions up and putting them in the back of my mind was nothing new for me, and it worked pretty well for the homesickness, but it never went away or faded completely.

I was aching for something that I couldn’t name, and it made it hard for me to eat, to paint—heck, it made it hard just to exist. Every time my mind was quiet, it took me over again.

At first, I was able to tell myself it was simply because of how hurtful Jayce had been, and how his words had managed to dig at basically every vulnerability that I had.

He’d even managed to push buttons he wasn’t even aware I had, and once he was done with me, I felt raw and used.

Unlovable, even though there was no love in what we’d done, just passion.

We didn’t even know each other, but he’d managed to wound me in ways that all the wolves in my own pack that had been needling at me hadn’t managed to do. That had to be the reason I felt so strange even days later, right?

It was harder to convince myself after three days, when the memory of the things he said still burned, but in an expected way.

The feeling of homesickness, of missed connection, had only gotten worse.

I was beginning to become afraid that it wasn’t just because I’d had incredible sex with a man who immediately rejected me.

I was starting to think something was really, really wrong.

It was so bad by the third day that I couldn’t even paint. There was a commission due the following week, and I didn’t have time for the out-of-place hurt to distract me as much as it was. I’d thrown down my paintbrush and lowered my head into my hands, fighting back tears.

I just wanted it to stop hurting and go away. Why was this happening to me?

All of a sudden, the urge to run away hit me.

It was always there, simmering under the surface, but what Jayce had done to me made it come back like an unwelcome old friend.

I’d been running since I was a kid, trying to make it on my own, but always being dragged back to the pack either by my inability to live the life of a rogue or because my parents forced me back.

Even once I joined the Shadowbay pack, there’d been a few times I tried to run, exhausted from pack politics and all the male wolves who thought I owed them my affections just because I was a low-ranking Omega.

I’d had a hope that the new pack would be different, and while there wasn’t the same undercurrent of sickness that had been in my original pack, wolves never changed.

Men never changed. The obsession with dominance and my status as an outcast never changed.

I’d fled the Shadowbay pack twice. The first time Alpha Scott tracked me down and brought me back, angry that he’d gone through the trouble of accepting me into his ranks just for me to flee.

The second time I’d come back myself, his words ringing in my ears and the pack bonds tugging at me, multiplying my guilt and the fear I had of being alone.

Now that itch was back, and it was all because of Jayce.

If I really wanted to, I had just enough money saved to make a real go of living on my own, away from any pack.

Rogue wolves weren’t common, and rogue she-wolves even less so, but I’d been through so much, surely that wouldn’t be the thing to break me.

Yet, when I tried, the pack bonds made me miserable . There was something genetic about Omegas that made us need the safety of a pack to the point we’d feel physically weak when separated from them for too long, but it just didn’t make any sense for me. No pack had made me feel safe.

Well…that wasn’t entirely true anymore. Kiera, Nayeli, and Gwen had made me feel a sense of belonging I hadn’t ever felt with other wolves before, and they accepted me with open arms. Spending time with them made me reconsider how much I’d wanted to run away in the past.

I never felt like they included me because they felt sorry for me. They were my first real friends in so long, and for a while, I’d started to think I’d finally found a permanent home. The world just felt lighter when I was with them.

So instead of packing a bag and running away, I called my friends instead.

We made plans to hang out the following day, getting coffee and checking out the new deliveries at the local bookstore.

Nayeli was super pregnant, but she was trying to stay active as long as she could so her recovery after birth would be easier, and while it grated on her mate, Alpha Scott, to have her out and about in her condition, he let her have freedom.

That was something rare with Alphas, but I’d been seeing more and more of it in the local packs.

Women and Omegas found respect here that they couldn’t find anywhere else.

It was another reason I tried to settle my burning desire to flee.

I might never find a better pack than Shadowbay, even if a lot of the members would rather have me gone.

I woke up the morning of my friend's hangout with the nostalgic, lingering pain still in my chest, but I was able to set it aside long enough to get ready and head downtown. The three Lunas were waiting at Howler’s Coffee when I arrived, and I waved happily when I spotted them at a round table in the center.

There was Kiera, Luna of the Saltfang pack and mate to Alpha Samson, Nayeli, Luna of my pack, the Shadowbay pack, and mate to Alpha Scott, and Gwen, Luna of the Brokenclaw pack and mate to Alpha Joe.

As usual, I was swept up in a wave of self-consciousness, looking at the three radiant, powerful women.

All three of them leaders, all of them magic users.

They were probably three of the most influential Lunas on the East Coast, if not the entire country, and they were choosing to spend time with me, a sad, out-of-place Omega.

It figured that they’d be ridiculously kind, too. It made me feel guilty for even considering running, especially when they stood to hug me one by one, even pregnant Nayeli.

“It’s good to see you,” Kiera said, pushing a plate of assorted pastries towards me. “We were excited when you called. It’s been a few weeks since we’ve seen you, Rhie.”

“Are you still settling into the pack okay?” Nayeli asked. “No more trouble with any asshole wolves, right?”

Yes, but not with any in the pack, I thought, but instead I said, “No, I’m fine. I’ve been keeping to myself a lot.”

“You know you’re always welcome to hang out with us,” Gwen added. “Or even come work at the cafe if you want. I know you have your mysterious at-home job, but the offer is always open.”

I waved their concern away and steered the conversation towards other, easier-to-talk-about subjects.

Gwen and Kiera were always more than happy to talk about their kids, and Nayeli had plenty to say about the equal joys and horrors of pregnancy.

Soon enough, we were laughing, and while the weird feeling in my chest didn’t go away, I was able to forget about it for a little while.

After brunch, we left the cafe and headed out to look at the other shops, specifically the bookshop a few doors down.

“Have you thought about settling down yet?” Gwen joked, bumping her shoulder into mine as we walked. “I know most of the guys that have tried to talk to you so far have been assholes, but I have to believe there are some good choices between the three packs.”

I snorted. “I don’t think you guys are processing just how undesirable I am to all of these jerks.”

“You are not undesirable,” Nayeli protested, stopping the four of us on the sidewalk and turning me around to face my reflection in one of the shop windows. “Look how gorgeous you are, Rhie. Seriously.”

I inhaled slowly, and just to humor my friends, I tried to see what they saw.

Objectively, I suppose I wasn’t bad-looking.

I was short, but not much shorter than the rest of them, and my hair had always been my favorite feature about myself, pale blond and easily tamable most of the time.

My eyes were forest green flecked with gray and brown, but my almost-white eyebrows made me look a little otherworldly if I didn’t bother to fill them in.

I was fit enough, but I didn’t see anything extraordinary in my appearance.

To me, it all screamed average. Maybe if I’d been a generational beauty or something, I’d have been able to overcome my terrible status in the pack, but no one was going out of their way to try and accept a boring, controversial Omega.

Especially not any wolves I’d ever consider mating with.