Page 12 of Knot What I Expected

A life.

A kid who needed her.

And they both deserved stability.

Safety.

A male who came home every night.

A male who could toss that little boy onto his shoulders without worrying his claws might come out.

Someone Gabriella could fall asleep beside without wondering if this would be the night the monster finally broke loose.

She needed normal.

Hell, she deserved normal.

And there wasn’t one fucking thing normal about me.

I’d spent years building my life around that truth.

Keeping my distance.

Burning off the rage.

Giving the Wolf fires to fight and mountains to run so he didn’t turn his teeth on people who didn’t deserve them.

I knew what I was.

Dangerous.

Unstable.

Too fucking dominant for my own kind and way too feral for a soft female with a little boy depending on her.

So whatever this obsession with Gabriella was?

I’d handle it.

I always handled my shit.

Whatever my Wolf thought he knew?

He was wrong.

He had to be.

Because I’d already almost destroyed one innocent female when I was eighteen.

I sure as fuck wasn’t going to risk doing it again.

Not to Gabriella.

Never to her.

The thought of frightening that woman—of putting even one second of fear into those tired, pretty eyes—made something savage twist inside my chest.

No.