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He did promise not to kill anyone. I had to cling to that oath as he openly snarled his way through the corridors. Even so, watching him stand over Elvie and Reu at their basic little bench, spoons slowly dropping back into their bowl in the face of his silent rage, my wolf was braced for something bad to happen. I can barely handle Cal when he is doing something good. My resistance disintegrates every single time. He could rip their heads off, flash me those eyes and that grin that makes me clench my legs together, and I doubt I’d even get a vague-sounding reprimand out. The way his dark eyes devoured me from the bedroom floor this morning almost melted me. It’s a tall ask to walk away from a man like him. To even pretend I wanted to head out of the bedroom and face everyone. Thighs like tree trunks, his torso basically a trophy cabinet of muscles. His wide frame could carry my weight at the drop of a hat. His shoulder was still bandaged, but judging by how my day began, he’s alm
Elvie and Reu got the message. After that shitty back and forth in their creepy meeting room, everything started to settle into the same half-real way of living. The only real difference was Vera. Instead of pointlessly trying to seduce me, she had woken from her coma a tearful, guilt-filled mess. Ragged scars across her chest from Arlen’s self-defence and a mind broken by the loss of her brother. Hope volunteered to care for her. Arlen had tried, but his commitment to the injured Sol meant looking after two patients was too great a strain. Nobody said it, but I think all expectations were pinned on a return of the good, healing light produced by Elvie. If Sol could survive the Freeze. Drag his battered body out into the courtyard and pretend he wasn’t shot to pieces. For Vera, though, there was no such option. The light would probably remove the scars left by Arlen, but it was her mind that needed healing. Hope was more than willing to listen to her, feed, and bathe her. However
I completely forgot myself when I got out of that wretched hole, grabbing and embracing Mireille in front of everyone like that. Not that I regret it for a second. However after that moment, I got a grip. Guard back up. Just because Raze has gone doesn't mean everyone is trustworthy and friendly now. It was genuinely unnerving seeing everyone so thrilled to see me alive. Especially considering they all saw me as an enemy for so long. Then I found out Mireille had promised them a skull-wrecking session on moonshine if they found me. They found me like a pack of bloodhounds. Within a couple of hours. Convenient. Perhaps I’m just paranoid. Mireille, Quinn and Dee were on a giddy high. Quite rightly. I kept to the side, out of the way as Mireille and her ladies served the drinks. Her pale green eyes kept flashing to mine. I'd love to have known what she was thinking. Well, more accurately I’d love to grab her to me once again and not see any other face for a week. But she’s a
He’s alive. Every time I glanced at him he’s still there. Of course he is, it’s stupid to think he’s going to vanish from my sight again, but I can’t help my heart racing each time I allow myself a look. The moonshine has been dished out, people are merrily slurring, wrapping arms around each other and making plans for the gold they’re going to be swimming in after I get back home. That’s all fine. However, I make sure to look each man square in the eye as we dish out every measure. They all say “thank you Luna,” they all nod politely. That doesn’t surprise me. They all paid Raze respect to his face too, yet watched his evisceration without issue. It’s men like Ryan I’m studying. He swore blind to me in that room that he is going to do whatever it takes to make Hope happy. She was his world, every minute of his life, for her happiness. All the promises a girl would love to hear her mate make. So why am I overhearing him talking about setting up some kind of fucking boxing, bettin
The next few weeks were successful. The pack's hangovers were endured, work rotas picked up as normal. The temperature lowering allowed tempers to cool alongside, the general atmosphere was that of being able to see the finish line. If anyone did talk out of line or grumble, they were shot down by their own friends. Nobody wanted to rock the boat. A sack of gold bigger than they ever envisaged hangs just out of their grasp. Sven was an ardent reporter, so keen to prove his trust. Cyrus and I spent every night together. I am his angel. He is my everything. The world only makes sense when I am near enough to fill my head with his rosemary scent. We should be so happy. We’re practically safe, looking ahead to spring. Except he is having increasing periods where he is in his own head. Surlier, quieter than even I’m used to. For every blissful night we spend together, he seems to curse himself with guilt. When Raze ruled Cyrus brood without discovery for hours on end and get it out of
64. Cal (0.0k)Men will do an awful lot of things for sex. I’m no exception. I once jumped off a cliff straight into the sea trying to impress a woman whose name I can’t even remember years ago, in the hopes that after the bonfire on the beach that night she’d find me irresistible.It worked, of course. But it was a stupid, foolish, idiotic thing to do all the same.Yet I would take on that cliff again rather than head willingly towards Vera. Every day Hope continued to mention how bedraggled she was. How miserable life without Ervin was making her. The risk of her doing something crazy from grief grew every day. Somehow a problem only me and a wide paddle brush could fix.Not in the way Vera ever hoped for.Laughing at my grumpy expression, her hand ran over the bulge in my pants, “thank you for doing this, Alpha,” threatening to send me feral. Fuck she’s just exquisite when she laughs. All eighty-seven of the freckles of her face enchant me. “What exactly are you going to be doin
Unpacking reams of bandages with Elvie in her suite, I waited. I figured, like Cal with his hairbrush, the longer we stuck at a menial task together, someone would break and start talking first. “Peel these,” she muttered, placing a bucket of potatoes on the counter. “What, for dinner?” “No, we’re making a poultice. It’s worked for generations. Draws out pus.” I looked down at the bucket and grimaced. Just how bad is poor Sol’s infection if we mash up enough potato to cover his body. “Will you be performing the ceremony when we get out, see if the good light comes down?” I asked casually. Elvie sighed, her long silvery hair tied up in a huge bun, sitting on the top of her head like a crown. “It’s too early to test the ice. We should be out before the sixth full moon, so yes, I think I will lead it.” “I hope it works.” “It should do. The readings have suggested the issue…the issue is the host, not the ceremony itself.” So Mireille is the problem. “I’m sorry about Mireille’s ce
I never really met Sol, both of us were injured during the night the Rogues took Mireille. Yet his death cast a long shadow over the following weeks. Reu ordered the beige clothing be abandoned for grey for a start. It made the elderly ones who liked to meditate resemble statues. Or gnomes. Apart from that, it was an improvement, a slight de-culting of the place. Unfortunately Hope’s nightmares returned too. Waking up clutching at my chest, panting, eyes wide with fear for at least a week. It killed me to know there was nothing I could do. Embraces, my arms, my kisses aren’t enough to soothe what’s going on in her head sometimes. It also meant there was no opportunity to mention what fully happened with Vera, and what she suggested Ryan was capable of. As far as everyone knew, I left her room, smashing the mirror because she tried to seduce me. Vera hasn’t said a word to challenge that rumour either. Reu and Elvie tutted away at my actions as you would expect but nothing more wa