Page 18 of The Wolf Queen’s Curse

I think I know what he means, but I stay silent. Don’t interpret. Let him explain.

“I’m Alpha now,” he says. “Alpha at the worst possible time for the Albion Pack. And I fear … I fear I’m not the right Alpha for this moment. I was the right Alpha yesterday, when I won the challenge. The Pack has been fractured for years, and I could make them strong and united. Heal the wounds Silas inflicted. But what the Pack needs now is…”

Again, I resist the urge to jump in.

He swallows. “When I first joined the Pack, I hoped I wouldn’t need to ever challenge Silas. I fantasized about an ideal world where he would guide and mentor me to Alphahood. That hope gradually faded, and when I realized what he’d done to your mother—and witnessed what he did to your aunt—I knew a slow and bloodless ascension wasn’t possible. It wasn’t that I balked at killing him. I balked at how many others might die. I kept thinking of Montague, who dreams of executing anyone who might conceivably stand in my way, including Oliver. I feared that wolves would die supporting or opposing me, but I also feared that I might fail to act because allowing more deaths would make me like Montague.” He glances at me. “I’m not making sense, am I?”

“You are,” I say carefully. “You’re worried that, in trying to not be like Montague, you might be unable to do what is necessary. Fighting a cabal will require you to be ruthless, and you can be. But if it requires you to be brutal, even cruel, can you do that for your Pack? Or will fear of becoming your grandfather hold you back?”

His hand tightens on mine so much that I think I’ve made a mistake. Then he’s in front of me, his hands going to either side of my face, holding it gently, as he says, “Yes. That’s it exactly. Thank you.”

“I can’t see you becoming your grandfather, Bishop. The seed isn’t there. He can be cruel. I saw that. There isn’t a drop of cruelty in you.”

I take a deep breath and push on, “I’ll be honest. You’ve done things I hate. Taking me into protective custody when there was nothing I needed protecting from. Lying about the threat against me. I know that was on my father’s orders, and you had to go along with them because open disobedience would hurt your chance of deposing him, but it still rankles. And yet…”

I look up into his eyes, dark and unreadable, shadows roiling behind them. “And yet it rankles because it was me. Because you kidnapped me and lied to me. But if you said, today, that we needed to capture a stranger and lie to them, and that would help save the Pack? If you promised we’d take care of that stranger, to the best of our ability, as you did with me? What would I say to that?” I reach to touch his chin and whisper, “I would not hesitate to do it, and I know you wouldn’t either. That’s manipulation, and it isn’t kind, but it’s not cruelty.”

I continue, “Lenora was considered a dark witch, and she practiced lethal spells that I couldn’t bring myself to learn. I thought the two of us represented the spectrum for a dark witch. From me to my aunt. But now I’ve met my grandmother, and I laugh at my naivete. If that is a dark witch, I’m not even on the scale. Now I need to decide how I can learn some of that magic while not falling down that hole to becoming someone I don’t want to be.”

I meet his eyes. “What if I become Beryl, who’d murder half a Pack because their dead Alpha crossed her? Or what if my fear of becoming her holds me back from learning magic I need to fight her?”

He lets out a slow breath, relaxing with it. “Yes, you understand.”

“So, can we help each other then? To find the boundaries? The one we don’t cross and the one we need to cross. To pull each other back if we near the one, but push each other forward if we shy away from the other?”

“Please. Yes, please.”

His mouth comes to mine, and there is such need in it, such raw need that it’s like ripping the bandage from a wound, all my own fears rushing out to meet his. That kiss is a connection like I’ve never felt before. As if we’re two swimmers keeping each other from being dragged into a whirlpool.

My hands move to his face, cupping it as he kisses me, and he groans, the kiss going deeper still, until the world constricts to the pinpoint of that contact between us. I press into him, and his hands slide to my hips, lifting me against the tree.

I rise up, trying to get my legs around him, growling in frustration when my skirts refuse to let me. I reach to tug them, but he’s already there, one hand on each side of my skirts, hiking them with a single motion to my knees and then another, getting them up around my hips, and my legs wrap around him.

My hands go to his hair, raking through it, and his lips never leave mine, that deep kiss of connection, of life itself, as if breaking it would steal the air from my lungs.

His hands slide between my arse and the tree, cradling me while pulling me against him, and I open my legs wider, wrap them tighter, feeling the faint rasp of his trousers between the split legs of my drawers as that hardness finds exactly the right place.

I arch my hips, and he thrusts against me, and it is fast and it is rough and it is exactly what I want, exactly what he needs, and release comes quickly for both of us, glorious and welcome release.

When we finish and he pulls back, his laugh ragged and a little awkward, I press my fingers against his lips.

“Thank you,” I say.

“I think that’s supposed to be my line.” He kisses me again and then sighs and lowers me to the ground. “I really need to stop doing that.”

I tug my skirts down. “Not at all. You just need to be better prepared. I’d suggest packing an extra pair of trousers. At all times.”

He laughs and kisses me, tender and sweet now. Then he scoops me up, ignoring my protests, and carries me down the path.

SEVEN

We’re walking hand in hand, Bishop dodging trees on the narrow trail rather than letting go.

“You said you don’t know what my grandfather did,” he says.

“I do not.”

“You need to. So you understand and also…” He inhales. “You have lost so much because of Silas. Your mother. Your aunt. Your home and your life there. He ripped everything from you, and I am very aware of that, and of your grief, for all of it.”