Page 36 of The Wolf Queen’s Curse

“The only choice,” Julius murmurs.

“I will not fall for your scheming, boy,” Rufus growls. “Are you going to pretend you just happened to come through Leeds? On your way to broker an alliance with the Caledonian Pack? Bringing along no one who can watch your back?”

“I have Julius and I have Cordelia,” Bishop says. “With luck, I have Kenric, but I am not counting on that. I brought him primarily to verify my account of what happened. As for ‘just happening’ to stop here? There was no direct train to Edinburgh and we fled Trevelyan with the clothes on our backs, and in some cases, less than that.”

“Cordelia was in her underthings,” Julius says, lips twitching.

Rufus turns to me. “Did all this catch you abed?”

“Have you ever tried fighting in a gown and petticoats?”

He stares at me and then bursts out laughing. “I haven’t, but I can well imagine.”

“No,” I say. “You probably cannot.”

“The point,” Bishop says, “is that we needed supplies before we reached Edinburgh. Leeds has what we needed, and since we were here, we were hardly going to pass through without paying our respects. It is, in essence, your territory. I also wanted you to know what happened, so you didn’t hear a secondhand account.”

Rufus eyes him. “You didn’t come to ask me to join you?”

“No.”

“You didn’t come to ask me to be your enforcer?”

A short pause, and Rufus smacks his thigh. “I knew it. You conniving—”

“I know you do not wish to rejoin a Pack, but I hope, at some future time, that you might reconsider and, yes, join as my enforcer. Once this matter has been resolved and I have a stable Pack to offer.”

“You want me to join you now. You just want it to be my idea.” He pokes a finger at Bishop. “I know how that brain of yours works, boy. Like your father’s. You don’t ask. You certainly don’t beg. You lay a trap that I can’t resist.”

“If I recall correctly, my father offered you a job when you were in need of one, and you accepted. There was no trap. He paid you very well, valued your services—and your friendship—immensely while making it very clear you were always free to go.”

“That’s the trap. Being too reasonable.”

Bishop shakes his head and puts his hand to my back as we rise. “It was lovely to see you, Rufus.”

“I am not going to Edinburgh with you.”

“If I may be so bold,” I say, “I can confirm that Bishop said no such thing to me.”

“Or me,” Julius says.

I continue, “And I’m not sure it’d be wise to arrive with an enforcer in tow. Couldn’t it send the wrong message?”

“It could,” Bishop says. “We must walk a fine line here, neither supplicant nor threat—”

“The enforcer always accompanies the Alpha,” Rufus says. “That’s his job. Showing up without one is like going to a gunfight unarmed. It doesn’t make you strong. It makes you a fool.”

“I am not unarmed. I have Julius and Cordelia. Also, please remember that I defeated Silas Stockwell in an Alpha challenge.”

“You cocky little—” Rufus bites off the rest. “You need an enforcer. That’s protocol. You just don’t know it because Silas cut himself off from the other Packs before you joined. If you think I’m letting you go there without—” He stops and curses. “Fuck.”

Julius squeezes Rufus’s arm. “We appreciate the concern, but we will be fine.”

“No, you won’t, and it’ll be my fault. Your fathers took me in and looked after me. I helped raise you boys. I owe a debt—”

“No debt,” Bishop says firmly. “We’ve always made that clear, as did our fathers. You have never owed us anything. You may have known us as boys, but we are not boys now. I hope to prove that to you, with a Pack that you’ll someday be proud to join—”

“Fuck!” Rufus shouts the profanity at the ceiling. “Fuck!” He waves both arms, as if shooing away flies. “Fine. Yes. Give me an hour to pack. I’m not saying I’ll join your Pack as your enforcer, but I’ll go to Edinburgh and play the role for this visit.”