Page 10 of The Alpha’s Unclaimed Mate

I let out a breath, shake my head at myself, and go inside.

Raising a child isn’t easy. Especially when their confidence isn’t all that great. Bella hates coming to the park because nobody will play with her. Shifter children play rougher, and she doesn’t like it. That leaves the human kids. But some part of them senses the predator lurking dormant inside her, and they keep their distance.

Leaning against an oak tree, I watch her drift toward the swings, and I feel like a monster when I catch her downcast face. I know she doesn’t want to be here. But I want her to learn to fit in with kids her own age. She loops a dandelion chain around her wrist, content enough on her own, and something in me aches at the sight. I’d take on anything for that kid. I just don’t know how to hand her a friend.

Then a girl in a red jacket trots up to her.

I straighten off the tree. Bella goes still, wary, slow to trust a stranger. The girl says something and holds out her hand. For a long moment, Bella only looks at it. Then she takes it. The two of them bolt for the swings, and I’m left blinking at the space where my lonely niece used to be.

I stay against my tree, arms crossed, and let myself enjoy it. Bella pumps her legs, laughing, real and loud, chasing the other girl higher. I can’t remember the last time I heard her sound like that.

“Attagirl,” I whisper proudly. “See? That wasn’t very hard.”

She falls.

One second she’s twisting off the swing, the next she’s down in the wood chips, clutching her knee. I’m already moving, three strides in, when a woman beats me to her.

I freeze as she drops into a crouch, a long coat pooling around her, her back to me. The other girl hovers at her elbow. There are too many kids screaming across this park for me to make out a word she says, but I watch her dig something out of her bag, take Bella’s knee in one hand, and clean the scrape with a careful sweep. It’s nothing, a graze, gone by morning. She doesn’t know that, and she wipes it gently and thoroughly, careful with a stranger’s child.

Then she stands, takes both girls by the hand, and starts walking them off.

My feet move again. I don’t like a stranger leading Bella anywhere. But they only go as far as the ice cream cart, where the woman buys two cones and crouches to hand them down. Bella’s grinning so widely I can see the gap in her teeth from here.

The woman turns, and my wolf makes a small sound.

It’s the woman from the road. Jessa.

She’s laughing at something one of the girls said, and my breath catches at how mesmerizing she looks. My gaze snags on the soft pink of her mouth, the crease at the corners of her brown eyes, the loose strands the wind has pulled across her cheek. I want to close the distance just to stand near her.

I cross the grass over to them. Bella spots me and lights up. “Dad!”

Jessa glances up at the call, and then she sees me, and whatever was on her face falls away. Something flickers behind her eyes, close to fear, and she pulls her daughter in against her hip. I don’t know what to make of it. I pretend I don’t see it.

“We meet again.” I slide my hands into my pockets and stop in front of her.

Her gaze cuts quickly between Bella and me.

Bella comes to stand by me, and I ruffle her hair as she licks her cone.

“So this is your daughter.” I turn to look at the girl properly for the first time.

She’s wiry and quick-looking, all coiled energy even standing still, dark hair scraped up into a high ponytail that’s come loose at the sides. Ten, maybe. She’s got her mother’s coloring, the same brown eyes, though there’s a stubborn set to her jaw that’s purely her own. She meets my look head-on, unafraid, sizing me up the same way her mother did on that dark road. A scrape on her knee, grass stains on both shins. A kid who plays hard.

Something in my chest pulls tight, low and strange, and my wolf lifts its head the way it did in that car. I don’t understand it. She’s a stranger’s child, Bella’s new friend, nothing to me. I tell the animal as much. It doesn’t settle.

“Yes.” Jessa is already half-turned, gathering her girl in. “We have somewhere to be. It was nice to meet you.”

I step into her path. “Let the girls finish their ice cream.”

She stiffens, and then her daughter chimes in. “You said we could stay for an hour.”

Jessa looks like she is barely holding herself together. Jaw tense, she looks down at her daughter, and I take advantage of the moment and crouch to Bella’s level. “Take your friend to play. Be careful on those swings this time.”

The two of them gulp their cones and tear off before either adult can change their mind. I drop onto the nearest bench. After a moment, stiff and reluctant, Jessa sits too, leaving a careful foot of space between us.

I lean forward, forearms on my thighs, and watch the girls. Jessa holds herself rigid, braced for something. I don’t know why I rattle her this badly, and I’d be lying if I said the question didn’t interest me. What interests me more is my own reaction to her. My wolf has come fully awake beside her, restless, preening, wanting to be noticed. I have to bite down on a smile. I’ve never in my life had to talk my own instincts out of showing off for a woman.

“So how long are you in town for?” I ask mildly, just to make conversation.