Page 49 of Alpha’s Wife

“Yeah, okay, let’s sit down and talk it all through.”

Selene tightens her grip on my hand, and when the medic tells me to, I gather her in my arms to take her down to the clinic, careful not to disturb her wound and hating every moment she’s uncomfortable. I walk her back through the settlement, Ryder leading our half-brothers down too, all walking together.

And for the first time in thirty years, I feel no rage—I’ve got everything I want right here in my arms.

Chapter 23 - Selene

“Hold still,” Ava says, “or I’m going to end up sticking this pin straight into your skull, and Ronan will kill me if you end up injured again.”

“That’s true, I don’t think he could cope,” Emily chimes in, not looking up from the ribbon she’s threading. “Though I think he’d just marry her down at the clinic today if that’s where she ends up.”

“I think he might prefer that to all this fuss; he looks so stressed,” Savannah laughs, unpacking more of the bakery goodies that she brought over from the mainland this morning. I watch as Maren helps her, laughing as she has been all morning, her voice so full of happiness.

It’s a good sound, and I let myself enjoy it. A month ago, I couldn’t even sit up without help, and now I’m fully recovered, and there’s a room full of women, half of them wolves I was terrified of a few weeks back, half of them coven I never thought I’d see again, and every one of them here on the island just for my special day.

Maren catches my eye in the mirror. “Your mother would have loved this,” she says quietly, just for me. “All of it.”

My throat goes tight. “I know,” I tell her.

“No crying.” Serena appears with a tiny brush. “We have just finished on your beautiful face, and I will not be beaten by feelings.”

Emma snorts inelegantly from the corner, where she’s supposedly guarding the flowers and actually eating all the snacks. “Give it up, Serene. There won’t be a dry eye on this whole island by sundown. You know how folk get at these things.”

Ava fixes the last pin and steps back, as everyone crowds around to look at me in the mirror, and for a second, nobody says anything at all until Emily gasps.

“He’s going to lose his mind,” she giggles.

“He lost it long ago where this girl is concerned,” Maren says. I laugh along, but in reality, my hands have been trembling all morning. It’s nerves and excitement, not fear. After a lifetime of being scared I would only ever be wanted for what I can do, I’m about to be mated to a man who wants me just for me.

They get me into the dress I chose just last week when Maren and some of my friends from the coven arrived. It’s simple, pale pink, cut low across the back and one shoulder, and I know instinctively that Ronan will love it. My stomach flips every time I catch sight of it in the glass.

“You’re shaking,” Emily says softly, and takes my hand.

“I’m not nervous.” I am a little. But that’s not it. “I just keep thinking about how I got to this point. I came to this pack kidnapped. And now…”

“And now you’re mating with the idiot who kidnapped you.” Ava grins, but her eyes are gentle. “Romance isn’t what it used to be.”

Savannah opens the door, and the sound of the party already starts to drift in from the street with laughter, voices, and somewhere down the hill, a band warming up.

“Second time lucky,” she laughs. “The first time didn’t count because the whole pack didn’t celebrate. This is a proper party, and it’s about to start.”

We chose the island to host our mating ceremony, combined with the winter fair everyone had been so looking forward to. It was going to be the mainland, home ground, but Callum talked Ronan round by saying that they wanted to welcome all of us, and a celebration was just the way to do it. The brothers have supplied all the food, and all four packs have transformed the settlement square by the harbor into a stunning winter wonderland scene—Savannah’s wildest dreams for the fair have all come true.

Lights have been strung the length of the coastal path, hundreds of them, swinging in the wind with their twinkling lights dancing on the water. There’s a bonfire built high behind the half-finished storehouses that will be lit as soon as it falls dark. Stalls line the square, ready for the party to follow, and the crowd parts as we walk through, and I hold my head high, trying not to give in to the emotion of the moment.

Then I see Ronan, and my eyes fill with tears of pure happiness as everything and everyone else falls away until it’s just the two of us. Ronan sees me at the exact same time, and I watch the moment hit him as his whole face changes—a smile, one of his most genuine, that makes him look younger and even more handsome.

I walk to him, Maren at my side the whole way, her hand in mine. When we reach the small stage, she puts my hand in his and whispers something to him that I don’t catch, and whatever it is, he nods like it’s a promise.

The ceremony feels quick, or maybe I’m just not listening because I’m too busy enjoying the way Ronan is rubbing lazy circles on my wrist as we recite our vows. There aren’t many words, because everything we want to say to each other has been felt a thousand times over the last few weeks.

“I spent my whole life thinking I had to take everything I wanted,” he says, looking into my eyes. “I thought I had to fight for it all, bleed for it, and then finally, I took you, and you…” His voice catches. “You gave me more than I ever even knew I wanted. You saw something in me that I didn’t even know existed, something so much more worthwhile than the image of myself that I’d built.”

“You made it very hard,” I whisper.

His mouth twitches. “I know.”

“I choose you,” I tell him, and I feel it move through the crowd, through the pack, that word, choose, because it means everything to both of us. “Because of who you are, and who we will be together. You were always worth it.”