Safe with Malachi. The words strengthened her all the way to his side, and she walked with him to the back of the serving line.
“As a guest, you’re permitted to cut the line,” he said with a tilt of his mouth. He nodded her forward as if assuming she’d take advantage of the privilege, but when she moved to do so, he stayed where he was.
“What about you?” she said.
“I’ll join you wherever you’d like to sit.”
“What?” That made no sense at all. “Come with me.”
Her confusion seemed to confuse him in return; then his face smoothed. “Ah. You don’t know the custom.”
“Custom?”
“Wolf custom. The alpha eats last, always. It’s a symbol of my vow to the pack, that I’ll use my strength to serve them, never to take from them.”
Her mouth opened and stayed that way. “Then…can I make a plate for you too, at least? While I’m in line?”
“No,” he said. “I do not eat before my pack is fed.”
Every earnest line of his face, the straightness of his posture as he explained it to her conveyed how seriously he took this pledge. She shouldn’t care, couldn’t explain why she suddenly needed to ensure his needs were met above any other’s. Heat coursed down her arms into her fingers as they curled into her palms. Somehow she wanted to rage—at the custom itself, at Drew for spitting on it whenever he broke a wolf’s wrist in order to claim the last of the barbecue.
She held her voice steady with effort. “This…gesture…seems unnecessary when no one here is in any danger of starving.”
“It’s valuable for the promise behind it.”
All his promises wouldn’t fill his empty stomach. “You won’t budge on this.”
“I won’t.”
She looked up the line. No one had turned toward them, but wolf hearing had to be aware of their argument. Closest to the back of the line were Nathan and a young-looking wolf with dark hair. While April stared at their backs, they kept their faces forward.
“Do they all hold you to this custom? Expect it of you?”
“I hold myself to it,” Malachi said quietly.
“Which is another way of saying, if you walked to the front of the line right now, no one would say a word.”
He growled quietly.
“Right, so just go step into line somewhere and fill a plate. This custom of yours is pointless.”
He looked away, but not before she saw his expression crumple.
April’s anger evaporated. She had the power to hurt Malachi. She hadn’t known; she didn’t want it; yet she had just used it. Panicking as though he might truly starve, she had just berated something he deeply valued.
“This custom is sacred to you as a wolf. As alpha. It matters to your heart.”
After a long moment, he nodded.
Even a whisper would be heard by his pack, so she couldn’t tell him privately unless she told him later. But she had to speak now, while the pain lived in his eyes. “Malachi, I’m sorry. I got angry too fast, and I stepped on your heart, and I’m sorry.”
His face cleared like an overcast morning lit by sunbeams. He looked at her a long moment, and the serving line moved forward without them. He seemed to have lost his words.
She touched his arm. “But if you’re not cutting the line, I’m not either.”
Some piece of her own heart fell into place as she stood beside him and honored the integrity that meant so much to him. Her heart swelled with deep pride in this honorable alpha, almost as if Malachi did belong to her.
Ten
