Page 13 of Reject Him

“Becca Webb is a complicated story,” he explains while sliding on his pants. He zips them and then looks her square in the eye.

“An ex-girlfriend then?” She quirks a brow while she finishes dressing herself.

“Sort of. Well . . . sort of.” He doesn’t like where this conversation is going, but he knows he’ll have to explain Becca’s actions truthfully if he’s ever going to get Eme to trust him.

She crosses her arms, and he huffs.

“Becca came from the city with the rogues,” he begins. He ignores the way Eme gasps and continues, “She came here to mate with me in hopes that she could lead this pack. She pitched the idea of uniting the rogues and Brook Mountain.”

“Why would you ever try to align with them?”

He admits it was a dumb idea, but it was an attempt to squash the squabble between both packs. Both packs have big numbers, and uniting them would be an asset. He tells her as much.

“Well, what happened?” Eme asks, a blush rising to her cheeks. “Why didn’t you mate with her?”

He shrugs. “She lived in the house with me for a few weeks, but I – I couldn’t do it. We had nothing in common, and her personality . . . She ordered Val around like a servant. No one orders Val to do anything.” Val may be sweet, but she certainly is at a higher rank than Becca. He tells her this, too.

“So you were creating an alliance with Becca, a shifter who isn’t an alpha?”

He doesn’t like where this is going, and he can feel himself feeling defensive. “That was a few years ago, Eme. I . . . removed her from the alpha house and called it off.”

“And she stayed?” Eme drops her arms back to her sides, incredulous.

“I get the feeling that the Brook Mountain Pack is a better life for her, so I never asked her to go back to the rogues.”

Eme rubs the spot between her eyebrows. “That’s such a terrible idea.”

“I won’t turn someone away.”

She drops her hand and searches his eyes. He doesn’t know what she finds, but she softly says, “Okay.”

“Okay?” Just like that, she folds?

“I don’t like it, but you’re right.” She shrugs and looks at anything but him. “Should I expect more trouble from Becca?”

“Yes,” he says flatly. Today was just the beginning—this he knows. Becca hasn’t approved of any female he’s brought home and had made her feelings over his rejection plain and clear. “The sooner we mate, the easier it’ll be.”

“So you keep telling me.”

“It’s just the truth. Why, Eme? Why are you holding out on me?”

He watches her nibble on her lip, and finally, she looks back at him. “I don’t know you. I know nothing about you. You can’t expect me to tie myself permanently with someone I don’t know.”

He drops his head, sighs, then looks at her from under his lashes. So that’s it. It isn’t simply because she hates him but because he’s done nothing to prove his worth. He vows to make that change, vows to prove himself. Romance has never been his thing, but for her, for this woman before him and the growing feelings he cannot explain (albeit one-sided), he’s pretty sure he’ll do just about anything.