Lachlan leaned back slowly. “I am never so grateful to be without yer gifts as I am in moments like these.”
“Not just normal horny,” Owen continued, with the focus of a man running a scientific project.
Callista cleared her throat. “Should I go put coffee on?”
“No need.” Rex shot Owen a look. “If my asshat Beta is finished, I’ll explain everything.”
Silence.
He exhaled.
“I think I found my mate.”
Not that hard. Really.
Except, no one was talking—which, from this group, was its own kind of loud—until Callista made a sound that could only be described as a delighted squeal, launched off the armchair, and threw her arms around him in a hug that was deeply awkward given that he was sitting and she had to basically fold herself over him to make it work. He patted her arm once. It was the best he could offer.
“That issoexciting,” she said into his shoulder. “Who is she?”
“Zoe Greenwood.”
The silence that followed was of a different quality entirely. More silent, if that was even a thing.
It was Callista, again, who broke it. “Oh, she’s human like me!” She pressed a loud kiss to his cheek, waved off Owen’s low growl with a laugh, waltzed over to kiss her husband, and then floated toward the kitchen with the serene confidence of someone who had long ago made peace with the fact that the men in this house sometimes needed a minute. “My very human sixth sense is telling me this is complicated news. So I will, after all, go and put that coffee on.”
The three of them watched her go.
Owen spoke first. “I don’t smell the bond on you.”
“It’s not complete.” Rex pressed his forearms to his knees. “It’s more like a very strong guess. But at this point, I’d be surprised if she wasn’t mine.”
Lachlan turned to look at him, the way he did when he was deciding whether something was worth the energy. “Right. What’s the holdup then?”
“That she’s human.”
“Aye. And so’s Callista, and the pack would take a blade for that woman without blinkin’.” He shrugged one shoulder. “Dinnae see yer point.”
“I’m the Alpha.”
He watched Lach work through the meaning behind the words, watched him glance at Owen.
Rex hadn’t opened the mental link between him and his Beta, there was too much noise in there right now, too much want and confusion tangled up together, and no matter how much he trusted Owen, he was still the Alpha. Some things he carried alone.
“There’s a group,” he said, steadily. “Came in two years ago with the Harlow pack when they lost their Alpha and couldn’t find a successor. There were a couple of strong wolves, but none strong enough to beat me. Leaderless wolves go one of two ways: feral, or swallowed up by something worse. So I took the whole lot.” He paused. “Most of them folded in fine, but there were five, maybe six, who never quite... settled. They’ve been looking for a crack ever since, something to leverage the fight.” His jaw tightened. “I’ve been watching them.”
“Donovan’s been circling for months,” Owen said. “Nothing actionable. He’s careful, I’ll give him that. But the last three wolves who pushed for shit? All ran with him.” He looked at Rex. “It’s not a coincidence. And I know what I smelled on them. Their submission is thin.”
Rex looked at his hands. “They are looking for a reason to challenge my leadership, and this would be one. A human mate—myhuman mate—handed to them like a gift.”
Lachlan was quiet for a moment. “How bad are we talkin’? Bad enough they’d go after her directly?”
“They’re not good people,” Owen said, and the flatness in his voice closed the door on any optimism.
“I handed them a loss not a week ago, and they know what I’m capable of. They won’t come at me—they’re not stupid.” Rex sat back. “But her... She’s human. She’ll share my longevity once we bond, but she won’t share my strength. She won’t shift. She won’t heal the way we do. And the bond itself is the problem. The second it’s sealed, the whole pack will feel it, including them. They’ll know exactly what she isto me,and exactly what sheisn’t.” His jaw tightened. “I can’t be with her every hour of every day. And they know that too.”
The room sat with that until Lachlan exhaled slowly through his nose. "So ye took in a wolf with a bad leg, and now it’s eyein’ the furniture.”
“Poetic,” Owen said drily.
