Keeping what I hoped was a serene smile on my face, I tried to step away from Ryker, only to freeze as a low growl rumbled from him. I felt the second his nails shifted to claws and bit into my skin, stopping just this side of drawing blood. I knew if I pulled away again that he would cross that line.
Ryker had . . . control issues.
“Regretting your decision yet, Rynn?” a raspy voice drawled.
My jaw clenched as I finally really looked at the man I’d been avoiding since stepping foot into this room. Alexis stood on Gavril’s other side and looked exactly as I’d remembered. Like me and Ryker, he was also a lycanthrope. Built hard and lean with golden-brown eyes and a face that most considered handsome.
But I also remembered the way he’d smiled after breaking my arm in three places and shattering the right side of my body. He’d never be handsome to me.
“Not at all,” I answered, proud of myself for not letting a hint of a tremble slip into my voice despite the mixture of fear and rage battling for supremacy in my mind. “Your voice sounds much better. You can barely hear the difference anymore.”
The gold of his eyes sharpened at the reminder. Alexis may have hurt me in the past, but I had given as good as I’d gotten. The last time we’d met, I’d ripped out his vocal cords when he’d demanded I submit to him. They’d healed, but prior to the injury, his voice had been smooth like honey. Now, there was a roughness to it that, personally, I thought fit his monstrous personality better.
Tension filled the room. Gavril stared at me with outright hatred, Remy’s usual amused expression was nowhere to be seen, replaced by a careful blankness that I envied, and the Alphas were silent as they tried to figure out what in the hells was going on. At least Bastian and Ryker were; Cade was still in the hallway, likely thinking about strangling me for fucking everything up.
Alexis turned his attention to Ryker, still talking to me. “Keep spending time with that rabid dog and perhaps you’ll sound like me one day, love.”
A growl bubbled up my throat before I could stop it. He did not just call me love and Ryker a rabid dog. Regardless of my issues with Ryker, he didn’t deserve Alexis’ vitriol.
“Enough.” Cade strode into the room with a thunderous expression. He gave Ryker a pointed look, and the hand immediately dropped from my wrist, then Cade’s gaze lingered on me for half a second before going to Bastian. Taking the hint, I promptly walked away from Ryker to Bastian, who held out his hand again.
I didn’t like being this much closer to Alexis and Gavril, who were standing in front of Bastian, but I’d just have to manage. Things had already gone sideways and I needed to not make them worse. I slid my hand into Bastian’s, and he immediately tugged me into his side and then dropped my hand so he could slide his arm around my waist.
Alexis’ jaw hardened as Bastian’s fingers lingered on my hip, like this was the norm for us. It wasn’t. My entire body felt tighter than a bowstring. I wasn’t used to people casually touching me and definitely not in the proprietary way Bastian was slowly running his fingertips across the fabric of my pants. Barely a moment passed before I felt Ryker’s chest pressed against my back, pinning Batsian’s arm between us while Ryker rested a hand on my shoulder.
A whirlwind of emotions hit me. Nervousness. Indignation. Lust.
I tried not to think about the latter.
“You will speak to the members of my pack in a respectful manner or not at all,” Cade said in a tone that brooked no argument. He was standing close to me, but unlike the other two, he maintained just enough distance to not touch me.
Part of me really didn’t like that, and I did my best to smother that part.
“Of course,” Gavril said smoothly. “Forgive our manners. It was a long trip here and we barely made it to the outpost before sunset last night.”
I didn’t miss that neither he nor Alexis apologized for their behavior, but I wasn’t all that surprised. None of the Alphas called them on it, and the tension in the room dropped a little.
“The wraiths were particularly bad once we got into Avala territory,” Remy added with a grimace.
“They’ve always been more abundant up here.” Bastian shrugged. “The mountains are full of them. Closer you get, the more wraiths you’ll see.”
Another thing I’d gotten used to since moving in with the Alphas. Wraiths were all over Lunaria, but in both the Moroi and Furie realms, they were sparse enough that it was feasible to avoid them at night. Since the Narchis and Fervis territories were in the southern part of the Velesian realm, they only saw a slight uptick in wraith activity. Cade had made it very clear when I’d moved here that going out at night in Avala territory was more or less a death sentence.
When I’d pointed out that Warrick was regularly out at night, Bastian had stormed out of the room and Cade hadn’t responded. I’d never brought it up again. It wasn’t like any of them would have given me a straight answer when it came to Warrick.
I had no idea why there was such bad blood between him and Bastian or what exactly Warrick was so obsessed with finding in the mountains. Maybe someday they’d trust me with at least some of that information, but I doubted it would be anytime soon.
“Why don’t we take a seat?” Bastian waved a hand at the chairs set around a low table in the corner of the room. “We still have some cider left from this year’s harvest.”
Gavril didn’t so much as glance at me before striding towards the chairs. Alexis’ gaze lingered on me for a moment before he followed after his packleader.
“Might I speak with Rynn for a moment?” Remy asked.
In an instant, the Alphas tensed around me, and Alexis stopped in his tracks, causing Gavril to pause midway and turn so he could give his second a questioning look.
“Yes,” I said quickly. “We can grab some food from the kitchen. I meant to swing by there on my way here.”
Bastian’s head swung towards me, his eyes narrowed, sensing the lie. Damn it.
