JASMINE I sighed, looking at the ground, and said, “I just feel like I’m not cut out for this alpha stuff.” “What do you mean?” he asked, forcing me to make eye contact with him again by pulling my chin up with his hand. “For a while, I’ve been thinking that maybe that’s why I was mated to the beta and not the alpha. This alpha stuff is just too much for me.” I started walking forward and Blake followed. “But you are mated to the alpha.” He took my hand in his, the warmth of his calloused palm feeling nice in this weather. “You’re my second-chance mate. Anyway, why would you sell yourself short like that? You yourself come from an alpha family. To me, it seems like a perfect match. You’re intelligent, strong, great at fighting, and you have an amazing ass.” He smirked. “What does my ass have to do with being an alpha mate?” “It has everything to do with it. I’m the alpha and I love that ass. I want to tap it nonstop, all the time. Perfect trait for this alpha’s mate.” He had a gl

JASMINE I’d never really had a normal relationship with my father, at least not the kind that other daughters seemed to have with theirs in sitcoms. My dad was just never really the goofy, understanding, “his princess has him wrapped around his finger” type. He was always strict growing up. My mom was worse, but he definitely wasn’t the type where I could go ask Dad after Mom said no. It was only in recent years that he’d begun to lighten up some, especially after the whole “secret love child” thing came to light a year earlier. Suffice to say, we’d never been close. However, now I felt even more distant from him, like I didn’t know him at all. While you couldn’t really describe my family as warm, I’d never thought my father was the type to be a cold-hearted torturer. Granted, Tyler was his son, and what had happened to him was horrible and sickening. I still felt nauseous when I thought about it. Blake didn’t spare any details when he told the story, graphically explaining the bruis

TALIA The week after Thanksgiving, in early December, Lucy convinced me to go over to her house after we finished up with work for the day. “Luke is so busy lately. It’s nice to have someone to hang out with.” She smiled at me as she unlocked the door to the packhouse. After we walked in, she took Libby from the nanny, dismissing her for the day. The nanny looked relieved as she pulled on her coat and practically sprinted out the door. Libby was in terrible spirits, howling. Lucy looked overwhelmed trying to calm her. She walked the entire first floor of the packhouse rocking her. When she got close to me, Lucy moaned, “I forgot colds even exist! I haven’t had one since I was probably twelve years old! Poor Libby.” She looked devastated looking at her daughter. “It will be so nice once she gets her wolf and doesn’t get sick anymore. Of course, then I’m going to have to deal with a teenager in the house. Ugh!” “How did she get sick?” I asked. “It’s been going around the pack, with a

ALEXANDER Fuck, fuck, fuck. I was worried. This was really bad. I’d never seen a full-grown werewolf get sick before. Adult werewolves didn’t get sick. At least not until they got past a certain age. I’d, of course, known of elderly werewolves who got sick, growing weak from the aging process. But not twenty-year-old ones! My legs were restless and my stomach churned, my heart incessantly beat in my chest, as if my inner wolf was clawing at me, needing to get to my mate. When I’d hit traffic during the ride, I’d grow impatient, throwing my palm against my car horn. I needed to be with Talia. As I drove, I also worried about my mom. She’d aged ten years since my father died and was a shell of who she’d been previously. Even when things were bad in her relationship with my father, she still always managed to have a smile on her face, humming different songs as she cooked and cleaned, always presenting herself immaculately. I’d never known my mother to have a hair out of place. Now sh

TALIA A flying deer??? It all happened in slow motion. Alex slammed on the breaks as the deer in the sky shattered the glass in front of us. Our car spun out, sending us in sporadic circles until we abruptly stopped with an earth-shaking thud. My whole body crashed against the seatbelt and my neck ached from whiplash. I instantly undid my seatbelt to turn in my seat to see what happened. We’d hit a tree, denting the whole car inward—luckily toward the back of the car rather than the front. I probably wouldn’t have died, but it would have been painful had the car landed against the tree a meter forward. Alex instantly jumped from the car, tearing his clothing as he shifted into his wolf form. And then I saw them—a group of three wolves dashing toward us. Was Alex going to fight them by himself? I watched in horror as they attacked him, swiping their sharp claws at him and biting into his fur. But he was good, really good. While the wolves got some good swipes and bites in, overall, A