Page 94 of The Wolves of Forest Grove

Ifound Charity and Seth among our regular group when we entered the camp.

Ryland was nowhere to be seen yet, and I was grateful to have at least a few minutes before I’d need to face him.

I got the feeling a simple apology wasn’t going to fix anything between us.

And truth be told, I wasn’t sorry. Not at all, and I was willing to bet he’d be able to sense that if I tried to lie.

Clay stationed himself like a soldier at my side and didn’t budge an inch while Jared went to speak with his uncle again before the ceremony could begin.

Vivian and Layla, to their credit, didn’t seem very nervous.

They’d made their choice, and we’d explained to them exactly what would happen tonight, and after, once they became pack.

I envied them their ability to remain chill in the face of it all.

Maybe they were just stronger than I was, or maybe it was that they had each other.

Whatever the reason, I couldn’t be more relieved that they weren’t spiraling the way I had at the start.

The way I’d been spiraling these past couple of weeks leading up to the full moon. ..

There was no excuse for that anymore, though. I couldn’t fall apart. Not now that they were submitting themselves to Ryland’s rule in order to join the Forest Grove Pack. They were joining in part because they wanted to make sure I was safe.

They didn’t understand that it wasn’t me I was worried about. I wouldn’t voice it, not in front of Jared at least, but I knew deep down that Ryland wouldn’t hesitate to use them against me if that’s what he thought it would take to get me under control. To keep me beneath his thumb.

I couldn’t give him any reason to use them against me. It was now my job to keep them safe, and if that meant groveling at the feet of Ryland, then that’s what I would do. For now.

My wolf would only bend that knee if she knew it wouldn’t be forever.

I promised her it wouldn’t. We’d find a way to leave or maybe we’d just outlive the bastard.

Or maybe Clay was right and after Ryland got his fill of rubbing my nose in the dirt, he would get bored and leave me to my own devices. Leave my friends to theirs.

There would be a way for all of us to be free again, and I was going to make it my own personal mission to find it. If that meant playing the docile pup with her tail between her legs for a while, then I could do that.

Or at least, I thought I could do that.

“Where are you right now?” Charity asked, nudging my arm.

“Hmm?” I said, blinking out of the tangled mess of my thoughts and back to the present. “Oh. Just thinking.”

“About?”

I shrugged. “Nothing,” I said, brushing off her worry and tactfully changing the subject. “How’s the search going? I heard Ry had you guys out pretty much all weekend. Is that my fault?”

Charity pursed her lips. “Probably, but the truth is none of us wanted to be here anyway. Ry was in a foul mood all weekend. It was the best punishment he could’ve given.”

I snorted, giving my head a shake. “Fair enough.

Find anything?”

“No. Nothing at all. It’s the weirdest thing. It makes no sense that all of them deserted at different times and not a single one of them left even the ghost of a trail. They can’t all be that good at covering their tracks.

“Because they aren’t the ones doing it,” Seth injected, leaning in with a glint in his eyes. “I think Ry is right. It’s the eastern pack. It has to be. There’s no way they are vanishing into thin air all by themselves.”

I was sure the doubt would be clear enough on my face that I didn’t need to make a comment, but Seth went on anyway. “I think we need to take the fight to them. Clean house.”

“You’re drunk,” Charity told him with a little sneer, shoving him back. “Hasn’t there been enough bloodshed lately?’

Seth gave a one shoulder shrug and resumed sipping whatever awful smelling liquid was in his red Solo cup. “If Ry’s right, then they’ve already declared war.”

“I don’t think—” I began to disagree when Jared returned, his face ashen and strides purposeful.

“Ryland wants to see you in his office before we start the ceremony.”

Layla and Viv had been talking quietly with Destiny, Trey, and Todd across the loose circle of bodies, but fell silent at his words.

“What about?” Vivian demanded before I could speak the words myself.

Jared’s gaze flitted to me briefly before training on Vivian. “Don’t worry,” he told her, and the conviction in his tone settled the flutter beneath my ribcage. “It’ll only take a second.”

Then finally, he turned to me and something dark in his gaze made my belly flip. “He’s going to apologize,” Jared told me, as though if he spoke the words forcibly enough, he could make them true. “He realizes that you were not in control, and he shouldn’t have punished you the way he did.”

Charity’s mouth dropped open. Clay was staring at Jared like he may have lost his mind.

“What the fuck did you do?” Clay demanded.

“What I had to,” Jared snapped back at Clay and then turned back to me. “Go, Allie. He’s waiting. Let’s get this over with so we can leave.”

I shared a look with Clay, a silent thought passing between us.

We would make Jared tell us what the hell he was up to later. Once we were safely back at the cabin.

“Hang on,” Vivian called, breaking away from her mate and Layla to cross the circle. “I’ll go in with you.”

“He wants to see her alone,” Jared said. Viv’s nostrils flared.

“My Uncle doesn’t do apologies,” he explained in a low voice so the others wouldn’t be able to hear.

His meaning was clear without his needing to explain further.

Ryland wouldn’t speak to me—definitely wouldn’t apologize to me—with an audience.

He wouldn’t want one of his newest recruits thinking him weak.

“Allie will be fine,” he added pointedly, his gaze hard. “I made sure of it.”

“I’ll be back in a minute,” I said before Viv could fight Jared on it anymore.

Clay caught my wrist before I could walk away though. “You shout if you need us. I’ll hear you a mile away.”

I tugged my wrist back and gave him a nod, walking away from the group in a daze. A thousand different thoughts racing to be analyzed in my skull.

Was Ryland actually going to apologize to me?

There was no fucking way that was going to happen, right?

So what was his play?

Apologize now and make me pay for it later?

Or had he just told Jared he would let me off the hook when in fact he planned to punish me in private, and Jared had just given him the perfect opportunity. Was there a gag and new, stronger manacles waiting for me on the other side of that door?

I stepped up onto the porch and through the wide- open screen door into the main lodge. Ryland’s peppery scent mingled with the woodsy, mothball odor clinging to the timber walls and dusty cushions in the living room.

The hallway and Ryland’s open office door loomed to my right.

Just get it over with, Allie. What’s the worst that he could do?

But I knew the real question—the real worry—

wasn’t about what he would do, but more about how much I could handle before I snapped.

I soothed the flutter in my chest with a few deep breaths and put one foot in front of the other. The longer I put it off, the harder it would be to go through with.

Just go in there and sit down and shut up and take whatever he gives you.

My wolf elicited a little inward snarl, and I hissed at her to pipe down before entering the room. I thought I heard a sound from somewhere else in the cabin, a door opening somewhere maybe? But no one else came down the hall.

Brows furrowed, I turned to face Ryland, a hard ball in my throat.

I swallowed it down and clenched my hands together at my front. “You wanted to see me?” I asked, working hard to keep my voice level.

Ryland sat behind a long rectangular desk. Head bent as he poured over a sheet of paper caught between his hands. His dark hair was half tucked behind an ear on one side and falling forward to cover his face on the other.

He flipped the page over so it was blank side up and raised his head, fiery gaze fixing on me. “Please,” he said, as though the word tasted foul on his tongue. “Come in. Sit down.”

I glanced around the room, bristling as an odd sensation of being watched washed over me. A strange smell permeated the air and made my nose wrinkle. I knew the scent but couldn’t seem to place it.

Fuck, I was being so paranoid.

Shaking my head, I stepped forward and dragged the chair opposite Ryland from the desk, wincing at the scraping sound it made as the metal legs scratched along the old hardwood floor.

I sat like I was told and pleated my fingers in my lap. “About the other night, I—”

Ryland raised his hand to silence me, and I let my lips fall closed.

My alpha pushed his hair back from his face, revealing the newest scar in his cheek, still puckered and ridged in dark pink flesh.

The movement made another similar scar catch my eye.

One in his shoulder, partially hidden by his undershirt.

Though this one healed a little better and was more silver in color than dark pink, it was clear what it was.

A bite mark.

My bite mark.

Ryland, catching me looking, tipped his head to afford me a better view of my handiwork. “My nephew seems to think I owe you an apology,” Ryland said, knotting his fingers atop the desk and leaning forward as though he might jump right over the desktop and throttle me at any moment.

I knew the bastard wasn’t going to apologize and there was a certain satisfaction in knowing I was right even if that wasn’t exactly a good thing.

My wolf moved to high alert, but I willed myself to remain still.

“Nothing to say?” he pressed, his eyes sparking to a dim orange glow. “Do you think I should apologize for doling out punishment where punishment was due?”

Asshole.

“No.”

“Then we agree.”