Page 48 of The Werewolf’s Wrong Mate

“You hear the doctor. Any threat made at this door harms the human before it reaches my brother. Anyone who pushes him risks forcing the mark into her blood. If you came here to protect the pack, start by shutting your mouths.”

A long silence followed.

Then Malrec spoke, lower now. “Alpha, this cannot continue.”

“No,” Ronan said. “It cannot.”

That was not reassurance.

It was promise.

“She should be ended before the full moon,” Malrec said. “If your brother will not permit it now, then separate them. Let the mark starve. Let the human pass naturally.”

My vision narrowed. Pass naturally. A coward’s words. The room bled red at the edges and Cassie made another broken sound.

Sava said my name, but it was far away. Ronan stepped back into the room and closed the door in Malrec’s face.

For a moment, none of us moved. Then Ronan crossed the room and stood in front of me.

“If you go through that door, I will stop you.”

I looked at him. “You can try.”

His face hardened. There it was. Brother against brother. Alpha against enforcer. Blood against blood. The old nightmare wearing morning light.

“I will stop you,” Ronan said, “because if you kill them for speaking, every wolf outside this room learns the woman matters more to your wolf than the pack. Then they will not argue for mercy. They will argue for war. Against her. Against you. Against me if I stand between.”

“She does matter.”

The words left me before I decided whether to let them live.

Ronan went still.

Sava looked down at Cassie, giving us the only privacy the room allowed.

My wolf accepted the truth without shame. The man felt it cut through every oath I had ever made.

“She fell into the circle by accident,” I said. “She didn’t ask for the bite. She didn’t know what we were. She should not pay with her life because my wolf chose before I could stop him.”

“Your wolf choosing is exactly the danger.”

“I know.”

“No, you do not.” Ronan stepped closer. “You think the danger is them killing her. You think the danger is you losing control when they try. That is only the first layer. The deeper danger is that your wolf has already moved her to the center of you, and he did it in front of witnesses.”

I said nothing.

“He will choose her over the pack if pushed.”

My hands curled but my silence answered for me.

Ronan’s expression didn’t change, but something in his eyes tightened. My brother had known. He had needed to hear whether I would deny it.

I could not.

“Then I have to make sure no one pushes,” he said.

“And after?”