Page 19 of Wolf’s Fated Bride

Runa steps away from me.

I follow and bump her shoulder with my nose, then lift my paw.

Finally, she looks down at it. From her frown, I can tell she’s puzzled.

“You stepped on something.” She searches the ground. “It’s not paint. Keep walking.” I pace around the pool, but my pad feels sore. I reach Runa again and lift my paw, so she can get a better look.

Runa crouches and swipes her thumb over my front pad. That tickles.

She does it again. “There’s a strange sheen, like you crushed a pearl. It’s not coming off.” She sniffs. “Doesn’t smell like anything bad.”

Blade rushes into the cave and comes straight for us. A growl rips out of me that makes him stop and lift his arms.

“Easy, big guy. You called me, remember?”

“I remember,” Runa says, then points at my foot. Before she gets a chance to talk about the pearlescent discoloration on my paw, I shift back into human.

Blade crouches by Peter, keeping his hands to himself. “He drowned?” my friend asks as he regards the small, relatively shallow pool. “How deep is the bath?”

“Maybe seven feet,” Runa answers. She tosses my jeans to me. I dress while Blake looks from her standing with her hands crossed over her chest, seemingly fuming, and to me in a similar position, not fuming but thinking about what to do about Runa’s display of affection.

I should think about Peter’s death, and not only because it means I’m out of my meds.

The humans will never allow me to go unmedicated, but I won’t accept potions from just anyone. This will become a problem in a week’s time. I scrub my face. “This is a disaster. Thoughts?”

“I have them,” Blade says, briefly glancing at Runa, telling me he’ll share his thoughts with me in private.

“Poor guy,” she says. “What will you tell his family?”

“I’ll tell them he died in a fire.”

She gasps. “Why would you lie?”

“I can’t tell them he died face down in the water.” Unwanted memories flood my brain. I let them, because fending them off could spark my fire.

I wish my mother had never told me how she found my sister. I wish I hadn’t been home that day. I wish I didn’t have to investigate. But when you’re an Alpha, you must do what an Alpha does.

The scents of the group of men in their twenties that crossed into our territory that morning are still cataloged in my memory. They raped then strangled her. When we requested justice, the humans refused to hand them over to us, and the young men wouldn’t take responsibility for their actions.

Since the humans protected their men despite the indisputable evidence of their crimes, I declared war.

The humans and the Stormcrest pack would have everyone believe that I lost control of my element for no reason whatsoever. That I unleashed the fury of my fire because I couldn’t contain it. They denied and buried all reports of any wrongdoing.

Meanwhile, on at least six separate occasions, they tried to abduct me so they could trap me in one of their prisons. They would love nothing more than to experiment on the fire alpha.

Our war raged for over a decade because we found my sister discarded like a piece of trash. She was a Fireborn princess. A goofy, gray omega wolf. The kindest girl I’ve ever known.

I was seventeen at the time. The rest is history.

Gently, Runa touches my arm, her eyes softening as she probably senses my sadness. “I’m sorry.”

I roll my shoulder. “It’s fine.”

“When you say we should report that he died in the fire, do you mean your fire, not just a fire that broke out?”

“Mmhm.”

Runa frowns. “Wouldn’t you be accused of murder?”