“It’s peaceful.” And there’s no one to watch us come and go.
He sighs. “You know, I put you guys up here to keep you away from—” He cracks his jaw. “From, uh, males who’d take advantage.”
I never knew why he did it. We’d been living various places until one day, Cheryl told the four of us that Alpha said to pack our shit and move up the hill.
Seems weird, though. To put all us lone females out here alone for our protection.
Killian seems to read my mind. “My cabin’s straight down wind. Anyone approaches, I know.”
Oh.
“And I got the patrols overlapping up there.” He points to the crest of the ridge behind our cabin.
I had no idea. Oh, shit. Why don’t we scent them? They can definitely smell us from that close. Kennedy smokes her pipe on the back deck.
Killian cracks a slight grin. “We know you ladies cut loose sometimes up here.”
“I—”
He raises a hand. “Keep it up here, and we don’t have a problem.”
“We didn’t—Why can’t we smell the patrols?”
“If they didn’t have the sense to stand downwind, they wouldn’t make good scouts, would they?”
I guess that’s true.
“Listen. I know what you all think, but I do shit for a reason. Do you remember what it was like before?”
I was sixteen when his father died. I remember. I kept my head down. Mixed with the pack as little as possible. If I wasn’t at school, I spent my time in the kitchen, the laundry, and up at Abertha’s. You couldn’t avoid the gossip, though. Packmates disappearing, coming back hurt and not saying where they’d been. Packmates who didn’t come back. And you saw the bruises.
And the females who broke down and cried in the middle of dinner.
“Yeah, I remember.”
“Males—they took what they wanted. Females got hurt. Young got beaten.”
I know it used to be worse.
“I changed that,” he says. “You’re safe now.”
He pauses. Does he expect me to thank him?
I guess he deserves it.
Old Noreen is always bringing up the bad old days. She thinks we’re ungrateful, so she reminds us—in Declan Kelly’s time, that male would have bent you over the table. Be happy he just slapped your ass.
In Declan Kelly’s time, if a babe was born small, they’d leave him out in the woods. If he was still alive in three days’ time, his dam could keep him.
And don’t get her started on the dens. In the dens, females weren’t allowed to wear clothes, except furs in winter. In the dens, enforcers didn’t just eat first, they ate their fill. Low rank got scraps—if there were any left.
We all roll our eyes, but we’re not unaware that we’re lucky. Even though it doesn’t feel like it.
Killian hasn’t gone on, so I say, “Um. Thanks?”
He huffs, annoyed, clasping his hands behind his head and stretching. He tilts his head up toward the moon. “I don’t need your thanks. I’m just saying you’re safe here.”
“I’ve got the patrols above on the ridge at fifteen-minute intervals. I keep my window open so I can scent any approaching threat at night. I keep you all in the kitchen or the laundry, away from the males. They know not to get near any of you alone.”
They do? I guess that’s another reason the run in with Eamon and Lochlan was so unsettling. Males will be gross at dinner or at the swims after runs, but they don’t corner us.
I don’t understand what he’s getting at, though.
“You’re safe,” he says again, emphatic. He glances over at me, his eyes intense. “So why can’t I leave?”
I blink.
He wants me to answer? I don’t know.
“Well, maybe your wolf—”
He cuts me off. “It’s not just my wolf.” He sort of pounds his chest once with his fist. “I can’t leave.”
“Oh.”
A surge of something, something tingly, almost sparkly, rushes through me. My belly flutters.
“Well, um, we are perfectly safe here. Like you pointed out.” I sniff the breeze. “I don’t smell anything.”
He inhales, and his eyes drift shut. He groans softly. “I do.”
Now he blinks. He glares at me, tense, frustrated. “You smell like bread.”
“Thank you?”
I guess it could be worse. I try to casually duck my nose toward my shoulder and inhale. I don’t smell anything but fabric softener.
“Maybe you should come back to my cabin,” he says.
His voice lowers. His expression is somehow less alpha. It’s not exactly friendly, but he’s set aside the usual domineering bluntness. He’s trying for charm. It doesn’t quite work, but it’s interesting to see.
I’ve seen him look at females at the lodge like this, late at night. Then they follow him outside.
“No.” I swallow past the tightness in my throat.
“It’ll be good. I’ll do you, too, if you want.”
What does that mean?
There’s a rumble to the words. He strokes the tip of his fingers down my cheek, and while my brain spins, every inch of my skin comes alive.
“No, thank you.”
“Aren’t you curious?” he says.
Am I?
I can’t afford to be. I don’t want to be.
But sitting next to him is like sitting next to an energy source. Sensation arcs in the space between us.
He’s so strong, so above everyone else. We’ve lived together all our lives, but his orbit has never intersected mine. But now he’s here.
It’s like sitting on a jetty in a stormy sea.
The power makes you feel small and magical at the same time.
My body is responding. My belly swirls. My nipples rub against the cool cotton, creating an achy heat. My pussy lips swell. I press my thighs together as hard as I can, but the next time he inhales, his nose quivers.
His lips rise until they’re almost curved. “You are, aren’t you?”
“No. I—” I shake my head, but inside, my body hums in agreement. I clasp my hands until my knuckles blanch white. This is a bad idea. Dangerous. Stupid.
My wolf isn’t feigning sleep anymore. She’s alert and pissed and letting me feel it. Bad male. Go to the other female’s cabin. She huffs and turns her back.
Killian twists his torso, reaches over, and gently lifts my chin. Then he bends down and brushes his firm, dry lips against mine.
Time freezes.
I exhale a sighed, “Oh.”
And suddenly, I can feel it all at once, his touch shining a floodlight on the emptiness inside of me, the years of touchlessness after Ma and Da passed when I was fostered, the cold ache that settles into your bones, and remains, no matter how much your friends care for you when you’re grown.
It’s the place left when Ma no longer brushes your hair for a hundred strokes. When Pa’s no longer there for you to rest your head on his furry belly and scratch behind his ears.
It’s raw, always—still—and Killian’s touch exposes it and soothes it at the same time.
It’s what I needed.
What I missed.
And the thoughts don’t make sense, but it doesn’t matter because I’m rapt.
He draws his nose along the side of mine and then kisses my forehead. His hands stroke over my shoulders and down my back. He draws me closer. My fingers land on his bare chest. It’s hot to the touch.
My heart pounds. We’re both breathing heavily, and it stirs the air between us, creating a heat, an urgency.