Chapter 3

Mother is waiting for me the moment I step through the door. “Ashton is here,” she hisses, reaching to fuss with my hair. I dodge her and she clucks in frustration. “What were you thinking, running around the lawn like a stray dog?”

“I was thinking how nice it is to be home.” I blink innocently at her.

Her eyes narrow. “Is this all a game to you?” Before I can answer, she goes on. “After the stunt you pulled, leaving the pack and now whatever that display was at the ball, it’s a miracle that anyone will still associate with us.”

“Why wouldn’t they—”

“Because they’re afraid that what you did will spread!” Mother snaps, loud enough to be overheard, so she immediately lowers her voice again.

 “You were the first werewolf in a hundred years to reject the transformation and invoke the Right of Accord. Everyone was terrified that you’d opened the floodgates. People wouldn’t speak to us because they were afraid of losing their young, too!”

It never occurred to me that by invoking the Right, I might inspire other teenagers to take a break and consider their futures with the pack. I don’t see how it’s a bad thing, but I do see how my parents would interpret it that way.

She isn’t done lecturing me. “You put your sisters’ futures at stake, as well.”

“They did all right for themselves,” I say under my breath. I’m the youngest. They had already undergone the transformation and their mating pacts had been arranged. “And it’s not my job to live their lives for them.”

“It’s your job to behave in the interests of the pack. Not in your own interests.” Mother gets so close I can’t really focus on her face, which is harder and colder than I’ve ever seen before.

 “You will go upstairs; you will clean up and make yourself presentable and you will come down here and receive your fiancé graciously.”

I want to demand to know what fucking Jane Austen novel she stepped out of with her “receive your fiancé graciously” line but she’s never hit any of us and I don’t want to break her streak.

There’s nothing I can say or do but nod silently and go upstairs.

I catch sight of myself in the mirror over my vanity. The hair is easily fixed by throwing it into a ponytail. My makeup is still fine, though my cheeks are flushed. I don’t look nearly as terrible as Mother insisted I do.

But I changed into a different pair of dark blue jeans; the pant legs of the ones I wore to the restaurant are soaked.

I’m expecting Mother to be waiting downstairs, but she’s totally disappeared. I know where she’ll have stashed my fiancé, though.

Ashton is in the sitting room. His back is to the double doors when I open one and step inside. He turns, his concerned frown easing into a blindingly white smile. 

“There she is.”

He moves through the seating area, somehow graceful despite having to slip between the massive coffee table and one of the sofas. 

I take a few steps but let him come to me, because I’m not sure what he’s expecting and it’s easier to let him take the lead. He puts his arms out and hugs me, kissing the air beside my cheek.

“Sorry I kept you waiting,” I say. Even though it’s not my fault because I had no clue you’d even be here. Dropping in unannounced better not be a hallmark of our courtship. “I was at lunch with my sisters, and I just got back.”

“Yes, I know.” One eyebrow arches playfully. “I saw you.”

I glance over at the giant picture window and spot my footprints leading a dizzying path up to the house.

“Yeah…” I don’t have a good excuse for that. “I was—”

“It must be hard for you. Being your age and not yet truly a werewolf.” He talks over me as he walks to the window. His tall, slender figure is like a streak of blue ink in his beautifully tailored jacket and trousers.

 The cold gray light outside can’t diminish the warm copper in his hair. When he turns back to me, I’m struck by just how handsome he’s become while I’m away.

 I noticed it at the ball, but now that we’re alone, in better lighting and without our fancy formal clothes, it hits me that it’s not like he’s the worst thing that could ever happen to me. I’ll look good on his arm, and if our kids got my complexion and his eyes…

What is wrong with me? Is this what happened to my sisters? One minute, a guy is condescendingly interrupting me, the next I’m like, “oh well, better have his babies?” If this is what a mating pact can do before it’s even executed, I have no interest in what comes next.

Especially since my future mate apparently thinks I’m suffering some kind of deficiency. I try to sound as sweet and non-confrontational as possible. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“You haven’t transformed yet.” He states the obvious as if I need some kind of refresher. “At least, I assume you haven’t.”

“You were at our first ceremony,” I reminded him. “You know that I didn’t transform.”

“There are full moons in England.” He lets the sentence hang between us and I can’t decide if it’s an accusation.

“There are,” I confirm, all sugar. “But there wasn’t a pack.”

“Oh, there’s a pack.” He goes to the sofa and sits without me inviting him. Infuriatingly, it’s him who gestures to me to sit down. In my own home.

I take a seat across the big coffee table from him, on the other sofa. I would rather chew my own foot off to escape a snare than get close to him. “Well, I’ll have to take your word for it. I didn’t have any contact with other werewolves while I was there.”

His expression totally changes to one of utter mortification. He puts a hand to his chest. “Oh no, Ella. I hope you don’t assume that I was accusing you of anything. I just wondered if you’d chosen to…try it out on your own.”

“I wouldn’t even know where to begin.” The thralls oversee the magic that lets us control whether we shift our forms on the night of the full moon. I have no idea how to accomplish the change without the ceremony.

 “It sounds like that would be stupid and dangerous.”

Still, his sad, apol

ogetic eyes seem so sincere. “I would have thought it very brave.”