Page 28 of Alpha’s Wife

I should tell him to get lost on principle; I feel the rage bubbling up at the threat to my coven. But he’s offering me the one thing I’ve wanted since I woke up here, a chance to speak to them, and we both know I’m not going to throw it in his face.

“Fine,” I say.

“No ‘thank you’?” he asks, a glimmer of amusement dancing in his eyes.

I lift my chin slightly. “I’m not going to thank you for the bare minimum.”

He nods, and I know he was expecting no less. I see something ease in his shoulders, and the wolf flickers gold in his eyes again, brighter this time. He pushes off the counter and crosses the kitchen toward me before I can even think to move.

He doesn’t touch me. He just steps far too close, and I have to tip my head back to look him in the eye. I can practically feel the heat rolling off him, and considering I know just how hot he can burn, my body seems to light up for him.

“You keep doing that,” he says, voice low.

“Doing what?” I reply, but my voice comes out far too small for the space.

“Stepping back from me, as if it would help.” His eyes drop to my mouth and stay there, his wolf right there, hungry and yet almost patient. “I can hear what your body does when I’m near. I can smell it, Selene. You can fight it as hard as you like, but you won’t win.”

My heart is beating so hard that I know he can hear it loud and clear, and the worst thing is, I only want to move closer. I think about his hands and mouth, the way they made me come apart for him like I’d been waiting my whole life for him to touch me.

But then I think about how close I came to just opening the door to the bond magic and the war he would take to the island. He still might without my help, but at least I wouldn’t have all that blood on my hands.

“Then it’s a good thing I’m stubborn,” I manage.

He huffs something that sounds almost like a laugh, but it barely breaks through the tension, and for a moment, neither of us moves. Then he steps back, slowly, as though it’s a decision he just made and not a given. He walks to the island and pulls a tablet out of the bag.

“It’s already programmed with their email, and there’s nothing else on here that will help you,” he says, handing it to me.

“I get it, okay,” I say, taking it with a hand that annoyingly refuses not to tremble.

I’m excited to talk to my coven, but my mind is also racing with another possibility. Ronan has told me all about the island—all those games of chess have given me plenty of information about the three brothers and their mates, including a witch named Emily.

I’m going to have a straight line to my coven, who can reach any other witch with enough time. I have a decision to make. I won’t ask them to risk themselves, but perhaps there’s another way. A way to try to calm this situation down and offer this settlement a different path.

He leaves me to it, and for a while I just sit at the kitchen island with the tablet, my fingers hovering over the keypad.

Ronan thinks he’s giving me a way to connect with my coven, but he’s handed me something even more valuable: a straight line to my coven and, through them, to this Emily, if I ask for it. Ronan could read every word I send if he wanted to, but I’m not sure he will. I think he imagines the only danger is witches at his door trying to get me back, but that’s not my plan.

I won’t ask my own coven to risk themselves. But there might be another way to starve this war before it starts, and I’d be a fool not to try.

So I open the email, and I write plainly, because I’m too tired and too far from home to be clever about it.

Maren, it’s me, Selene. I’m alive, and I’m safe.

I’m in the settlement by the coast—the rogues with Alpha Ronan. I’m staying for now, of my own choice, to help here. The people are good, and I’m okay.

Please don’t come for me, and don’t send anyone. I mean it. If a witch comes here to try and get me, it will end in bloodshed, and I couldn’t live with that. I really am safe, and I can talk to you now by email, so please don’t worry for now.

One last thing, and it’s really important. I need you to get word to a witch on the island, a woman called Emily, mated to one of the alphas. Tell her a bond witch needs to talk to her about stopping a war before it starts. Give her this address and ask her to write to me via your email address so it looks like it’s coming from the coven. S

I read it back once and send it before I lose my nerve, then sit there with my heart racing while the screen does nothing at all.

Maren writes back within an hour. I can picture her at the old kitchen table, reading it three times over with her glasses at the end of her nose.

Selene, we’ve all been so worried. I’m so happy to read your email and know you’re safe. We have searched everywhere for you, and we’d never give up.

I won’t come, for now, even though it goes against everything in me to leave you there. You were always far too brave for your own good.

I’ll find the witch, Emily. The covens still talk across the water, and a bond witch talking about war isn’t something anyone ignores. But be careful what you’re setting loose, my love. And be careful of this alpha. Maren