Page 124 of Rejected By the Alpha

“We lost one of our own packmates,” Andres said. “Why do you insist⁠—”

A ferocious growl left my mouth, and he snapped his closed. I turned toward him, my jaw twitching. We had gone over this already, again and again. I had even returned Ember home after listening to their so-called advice.

But it was bullshit. All of it was bullshit.

Ember would be mine, and I didn’t care what they thought about it.

“Why?” I repeated, stepping toward him. “Do you not trust me, Andres?”

“I trust you, but⁠—”

“Then trust me,” I ordered. “Or leave the Crimson Order.”

If I had learned anything about leadership while studying the greatest leaders who had ever lived and the reasons for their downfalls, it was that not everyone needed to know everything. Some wouldn’t understand it; others wouldn’t agree.

“I don’t want to leave,” Andres said. “This is my home, but she’s not your mate.”

No, Ember wasn’t my wolf’s mate.

But she was mine. In a different way.

In a way that nobody would understand.

I couldn’t prove it yet. Dr. Yoder had been complete shit at running those tests, all of them coming out incomplete. How he had become any kind of doctor blew my fucking mind. But one day, I would prove it. Without him.

“Do you trust me to protect you against the Hunters?” I repeated to him. “Because if you don’t, you should leave our pack right now. Our pack needs to trust each other if we have a chance at defeating them.”

“The Hunters,” Andres said, a moment of worry on his face. Then it was erased in a millisecond and replaced with a stoic expression. He pushed his shoulders back. “Yes, I trust you, and I trust my pack.”

“Good,” I said, glancing around at anyone else who might have a problem. “Then we return home.”

And one day, I’d return with Ember because she didn’t know it yet, but she was mine.

Mine. Mine. Mine.

All fucking mine.

Chapter Sixty-Eight

Ember

Pain slithered through every part of my body, my legs and arms weaker than after I went to the hospital every single day, being pumped full of meds. My bones felt like they were cracking in half, my throat tightening by the second.

I stared out the packhouse window, breathing in Davix’s scent, which was everywhere.

“I’m never going to speak to him again,” Hazel said, pacing in front of me. “I swear it.”

It was barely even noon, and this was already the worst day of my life.

Pumpkin had almost died, a war had broken out, and Davix had … rejected me. For real this time, not like his usual rejections, where he pushed me away one day and then crawled back to me the next.

No, this was for forever.

“Hazel, he’s your brother,” I whispered, in an attempt to hold conversation.

But I just … I couldn’t understand it. How could … how could he do this? Just hours ago, we had been good. He had killed someone for hurting an animal that I was fond of. How could he go from that to a rejection? It didn’t make any sense.

She threw her arms up, completely outraged. “How are you not angrier about this?! He’s a complete fucking asshole, and he knows you don’t deserve all the pain he’s caused you. And to fucking do it on your birthday?! I want to strangle him!”