April’s body surged—not with more fear, but with strength and calm. As though the core of her, deeper than thought or reflex, knew his growling threat was not for her—never for her—but instead for anything that would hurt her.
“April?”
Safe.
The word reverberated again and again through her mind.
Malachi is safe.
She didn’t believe that, yet some part of her did. She shook her head. “What’s happening, Alpha?”
“I can tell you, but you might find it difficult to believe.”
When she thought back to her life before Drew, before Nik—a life of studying, dreaming, loving friends and family up close with no idea she’d allow herself to be pulled away—well, nothing in the last year was particularly believable. “Tell me.”
“You know about acclimation?”
Another shudder took her. “In Drew’s house, I was put in a corner. The wolves circled me, then one at a time lifted me off the ground and forced my gaze.” At which point, every time, she had screamed and kicked uselessly while the pack cheered and laughed.
“Without permission.” The alpha’s rasping voice grew rough as sandpaper.
“Permission?”
“A wolf asks permission before acclimating a human. Waits for the human to meet his eyes, then allows the focus of his gaze to fall on them unshielded.”
A laugh broke from her. Her chest felt fractured with it. “Wolves never do that.”
“My pack does. Always.”
She shook her head, sudden light-headedness overtaking her. She lowered her head to her hands. She knew about wolves, knew what they were and what they did. Acclimation was a game to them; humans were toys.
Unless these wolves were more different than she’d even hoped they could be.
“April, will you let me try to acclimate you?”
Humans could not be acclimated to a seventeen-percent wolf. Kyle had told her so. Her heart pounded. She wouldn’t acclimate to Malachi, but she would survive the attempt. When she could leave this place, she would. When survival no longer required her to stay, when she no longer had to tolerate the enemy of her enemy. She lifted her eyes to the amber-eyed alpha’s.
“You can say no,” he said. “I’m asking because you asked me what’s happening here, and this is the simplest way to show you.”
“All right. Um…go ahead.”
“Thank you,” he said. But he didn’t leave his chair, didn’t rush and grab her and hoist her over his head. Instead he simply looked into her eyes.
Safe.
April blinked. Gritted her teeth. Any second now.
Safe.
No, she wasn’t. Not with a wolf. Not with an alpha beast. Not…
Safe with Malachi.
“I don’t understand,” she whispered.
“You don’t have to acclimate to me.” His rasp came as quietly as her whisper. “It isn’t necessary.”
“But how? Every wolf—I had to—every wolf.”
