Eugenia heaved a breath and then spoke again. “I’m sorry for making fun of you for not being able to shift. It was…small-minded of me, and uh…not appropriate.”
She sent a questioning look in my direction.
I nodded once and waved to the door. “Good enough. Get out of here. I think you’ve got some work to do, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir,” Eugenia mumbled as she hurried to the door, where she met up with her friends.
An awkward silence held for several seconds before low, subdued conversations began again. Turning back to June, Iopened my mouth, but she was already walking to the door, her anger reflected in her gait. When she got to the door, she shoved it open.
“June?” I called after her. For a moment, I stood there, rooted in place. Why was she angry with me? After a few seconds of hesitation, I ran after her, ignoring everyone who was watching me.
Outside, I spotted her walking briskly toward her bunkhouse. I sprinted to catch up.
“June, wait,” I said, touching her shoulder.
She spun and glared at me. The fire in her eyes was beyond anything I’d thought her capable of.
“Why did you do that?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest.
“Do…uh…dowhat?” I could feel the dumbfounded expression forming on my face.
“In there,” she said, pointing at the dining hall. “I had that under control.”
“I never said you didn’t,” I said. “I wanted to make sure she knew what she was saying was unacceptable. I didn’t think?—”
“I’m not helpless, Levi. I can stick up for myself without somemanjumping in the first time it gets tough.”
This was not what I’d expected when I spoke up. I saw what she was saying, but I still thought I’d done a good thing stepping in.
“I’m not trying to belittle you, but I’m the Alpha, and she’s part of my pack. I have to reprimand her if I see her doing something like that.”
“I get that,” June said, “but you didn’t even give me a chance. Don’t you think I might have been able to end it myself without you interfering? Then you wouldn’t have had to get involved at all. Plus, I could have gained some footing with her. Maybe evengained a bit of respect so she didn’t look down on me anymore. You removed that chance by jumping in.”
My mouth opened to speak, but I had no words. What she said made perfect sense, and I suddenly felt like an asshole. In hindsight, I should have controlled my anger and let things play out, only stepping in if things had gotten out of control. Shit.
June must have seen the realization on my face. She shook her head slowly and sighed. “I need to go help Linnea in the greenhouses.”
She left me, and I stood there, contemplating what an idiot I was. Perhaps Rainier was right. Maybe spending so much time in my wolf form was making it harder for me to connect with people in a more human way.
Instead of following June to force the issue, I headed back to my cabin. I went to my room, gingerly removed the painting of Naphele, then set it up in the living room. Grabbing a beer from my fridge, I sat in front of the painting and stared at it while I drank. Outside, the activity went on, but I stayed right where I was, wondering how much of my humanity had been lost since Naphele had died. At the rate I was going, I might not ever know.
23
JUNIPER
My irritation with Levi carried over to the next several days. I did my best to keep my distance. After what happened with him and Eugenia, I spent every second trying to figure out exactlywhyit had set me off.
Part of it was that I had been pissed off at the other woman. But I had been handling it. Before Levi walked in, I had been about to give her a piece of my mind. Levi’s appearance had stolen that chance from me. Yes, he’d been trying to help, but if he’d simply given me another minute, I wouldn’t have needed him at all.
The other part was that it seemed I always needed him to step in andrescueme. It was all Levi. Consoling me and giving me my first kiss? Levi. The one person I thought might help me learn to shift? Levi. Teaching me about seduction to ensure I wasn’t flailing hopelessly? Levi. Saving me from the Red Maw? Levi. And now saving me from Eugenia’s jibes? Levi. AlwaysLevi.
Having someone like him always there to help me should have made me feel content, protected, and taken care of. And it did, but it also made me feel neutered in a way. Like I couldn’t doanythingwithout him.
That was where most of my anger came from, and the more I thought about it, the worse I felt about my reaction. It wasn’t his issue, it was mine. I could have told him what I felt, but instead I’d chewed him out and left. How did I go about apologizing now? It always became exponentially harder to say you were sorry the more time you allowed to go by. A couple of days later, I decided to ask Linnea her opinion during chores.
I was helping out in the kitchen, and we had been tasked with preparing potatoes for dinner. Linnea sat across from me chopping the ones I’d peeled.
“So,” I said, having worked up the courage to talk. “Did you hear about what happened between me and Levi?”
