The Alpha Who Threw Her Away

id nothing for the cold coming up through the bench. She hadn't cried yet. She kept waiting to, the way you wait for a h

ck gatherings. *Money: forty-one dollars. Phone: dead by noon if she didn't find an outlet. Pack contacts: none who'd risk being seen helping her.* She'd known that last one before

ing a coffee she didn't want. The woman behind the counter had a Voss pack tattoo faded on

ou shouldn't have," the woman said,

d

jec

d up. "How'

woman shrugged, wiping down the counter without much interes

t kno

oward the tree line past the parking lot. "Ridge territory's twenty miles north. Damon Ridge doesn't

d you tel

d I didn't listen for a week longer than I should have." The

nt that

-

ake it to Ri

d of the road because the road felt too exposed and she didn't ye

lves when they're trying not to be heard and don't quite know how. Elena had g

stead, crouched behind a fallen trunk, and waited with the same patience

then a second one flanking wide, the kind of spacin

of them said, low. "Voss cut her

me either way. R

in a language she almost understood. Nobody put bounties on unran

t to do with that information before the

hat usually did the deciding was still asking questions. Her body moved before her mind finished processing *threat*. She was already inside his reach, already re

he kind that gets untrained wolves killed, except it worked, her elbow finding a gap she hadn't

ing hard, hands shaking now that th

ching her own hands like they belonged to someone she'd ju

nty paid. "She's not - " he started, to nobody, to himself, and then just ran, dragging the

learing for a long time af

shaking by the time

ed to call ordinary in a tone that, looking back now, had never quite sounded like the truth. It was warm. Not hot. J

same flat certainty she used to count exits, that it

-

name for yet. The guard at the checkpoint didn't ask her rank. He took one look at the state of her,

the kind of Alpha who didn't need to raise his voice to be listened

d you six miles south,"

u already

s channels." He tilted his head slightly, reading something in her face she hadn't meant to show. "What I wa

She had a warm mark on her wrist and a set of i

aid, and for once, th

then nodded once, like she'd confir

said. "I think we'