“Satisfied? You’re alone at the head table now,” I say.
“Very,” Caden answers as he licks butter and jam from his thumb, the corners of his eyes crinkling.
Heat blooms in my cheeks at the display. I track his tongue, captivated by his mouth. He eyes me alluringly, giving the impression he knows where my mind’s strayed.
Shaking my head, I go back to the kitchen. My wolf is basking in all this. Since he scented me last night, she’s on a high, proudly strutting around smelling of her mate in front of the pack. She loves the way it broadcasts that we’re his to everyone, as it should be.
I bite my lip, stomach tightening pleasantly at the thought. My heart gives several thudding beats. I don’t hate the feeling, or the idea as much as I should.
The whispering isn’t as bad the second time I go out with eggs and sausages. Surprisingly, there isn’t as much hostility either. Maybe that’s why he insisted on this, to show the pack he doesn’t view me as his enemy anymore. A few people even wave at me and offer tentative smiles. I almost trip, smacked in the gut from how much I’ve longed to feel like I belonged in the pack instead of existing in its shadow.
Caden thanks me again, then stops me. “Do you want to sit? Have breakfast with me.”
I blink. “No. Probably best I don’t.”
“Why not? Have you eaten yet? Here, try mine.”
I back away before my wolf takes him up on the offer to eat off his plate. “I’m fine. Wouldn’t want to give anyone the notion you don’t mind people slacking off their assigned rotation.”
He lets me go with a nod. I retreat to the safety of the kitchen.
The respite only lasts a short while before Taryn finds me.
“Avery,” she sing-songs. “Apparently, Alpha Blackburn’s appetite isn’t satisfied.”
She waggles her brows.
“What? He’s still here?” I blurt.
She shakes a basket of scones. “He wants more.”
“Food,” I clarify.
“Of course.” She winks. “What else would I mean?”
Sighing, I brave the dining hall to bring him a second helping. This time rather than watch me, he stares down everyone else, giving those that still eye me in distaste a hard glare.
I deliver the food and hurry out of the hall, certain that this will be the end of this bizarre breakfast shift.
Except just as I get ready to leave, Taryn finds me a third time.
“Avery.” She can’t keep her smile in check and puts another dish in my hands. “The alpha’s still hungry. Called for you again.”
“Again?” I exclaim in exasperation.
A hot tug pulls in my chest with his will to draw me out. I swallow, fighting how much I want to answer.
Another tug.
Come to me, it whispers enchantingly. I inch towards the dining hall.
Damn it.
I try to give the food back. “You take it.”
She smirks, peeking through the window. “I don’t think so. He’s watching the door, waiting for you.” She nudges me out and smacks my backside. “Good luck. Go get ‘em.”
This time I circle his table and loom over his chair when I plop the third helping down. “Why do you keep calling me back every five minutes?”
He lifts his amused gaze to me. “I’m hungry.”
“Should I stand here and feed you, too?” I mutter.
His enticing hum is laced with intrigue. The deep, smoky noise stirs something pleasant in my core.
“As much as I like that idea, no.” His knuckle brushes the inside of my wrist and his lips twitch. “I should get my day started. If Liam pokes his head in here one more time to check on me, he’ll drag me out by my tail.”
I roll my lips between my teeth, wrestling back the urge to follow him out before he’s even left. “Well, I hope you enjoyed this.”
“I did.” He stands and gives me a drawn out once over, tracing his lower lip with his tongue. “My wolf, too.”
“Good,” I huff. “Because it won’t be happening again.”
His mouth curves and he dips his nose, inhaling with the faintest rumble of pleasure that makes my insides melt. Everything in me strains to lean into him, to tilt my head and give him my throat. My cheeks heat at the hooded look he pins me with before he sweeps his gaze at all the packmates in the dining hall.
“I’ll see you later.”
Caden leaves me standing at the head table with every eye in the room on me. The inside of my wrist tingles with the memory of his touch.
19CADEN
Liam nudges my boot beneath the desk from his guard position next to my chair. It’s the third time he’s done that since my office opened for this week’s hearing hour.
I tune back in to what Josine Merryweather’s come to complain about.
“And I just think it isn’t right. Not after all that trouble the Morgans brought for your father when he was such a great man. A capable and noble leader, didn’t deserve no challenges to question his right as our alpha.”
“Sorry—you’re looking for me to…?” My brow quirks.
“Well, do something about it, Alpha Blackburn.” She clicks her tongue. “Someone ought to check for sure if that girl wasn’t lying about feeling you were True Mates. My daughters both are much worthier matches.”
Liam coughs to cover his amusement because it seems all the dams have come out of the woodwork to play matchmaker to find me a mate. He stands at my side, along with others on security detail dotted around my office. The line stretches out the door and down the hall. Possibly out to the covered front porch.
These meetings are open to hear the concerns of the pack. Usually they’re an opportunity to bring their disagreements before me, like the elders that bicker over land disputes, applying for a chosen mate ceremony, or requesting a visit with other packs.
Today it’s been nothing but this, full of gossip. The first few days following the bonfire, there were only murmurings amongst the pack about what happened. Rejecting your fated mate isn’t common, though after the initial shock the pack spread it around that I was right to do it because I needed a strong mate.
Maybe it would’ve passed if I’d stuck to ignoring Avery. Or at least attempting to while I fought everything in me yearning for her. I’m not fighting the bond anymore. I want to show the pack I accept her, as a Morgan I’ve forgiven and as my mate.
The whispers returned in full force after this morning when she made her way through the dining hall to the head table. My lips twitch in satisfaction.
Avery smelled mine.
Last night in the clearing, and this morning. A message to every male of who she belongs to.
It’s the reason I was late getting back to the lodge before we started, lingering far longer than I usually do with a second and third helping just to spend another minute basking in her covered in my scent, sweet delectable honey mixed with my musk all over her.
Josine stares at me expectantly.
“I assure you, it’s true that we are fated.” I touch my sternum, anchored by the resonation in the bond. “There’s no way to fake this.”
She blinks in disbelief, growing desperate. “But you rejected her.”
I frown, rubbing the ache flaring behind my ribcage. “I did.”
“Are you going to accept her, then? It’s not right.”
“I plan to, yes. Do you have a problem with your alpha accepting my True Mate?”
She squirms at the flat look I level her with, dropping her gaze with a mutter and shaking her head.