All Chapters of The Rogue's Reluctant Mate: Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

AUSTIN_____That smirk. It wasn’t meant to be reassuring. It was the wolf baring its teeth just before the snap. The girl ,Selena ,stood there on the stairs, trembling like a leaf in a storm, but her eyes... fuck, her eyes held a spark. A desperate, burning ember that even her terror couldn’t quite extinguish. She’d offered herself. Anything I want huh...? The sheer, idiotic bravery of it, or maybe just the depths of her despair, was almost intriguing.My mind, usually a well oiled machine of logic and calculation, was still reeling from the mate bomb she’d dropped into my meticulously ordered existence. A mate. Me. Austin ‘I work alone and like it that way’ Kaelen. It was a cosmic joke. A fucking disaster. This.... connection, this unwanted tether, hummed between us, a live wire sparking with an energy that made my skin prickle. It was an invasion, a vulnerability I hadn’t felt since.....well, since a long damn time.“You’re offering yourself?” I finally said, my voice deliber

She hesitated for only a heartbeat before placing her small, cold hand in mine. Her fingers trembled slightly, but her grip was surprisingly firm. The contact sent that damn spark arcing between us again, stronger this time, a silent acknowledgment of the pact we’d just made. A pact sealed not with ink, but with desperation and the promise of blood.I turned and led her down the grand staircase, her hand still in mine.She followed, silent, her face pale but set. Her transformation was about to start. And I, Alexander Thorne, formerly Austin Kaelen, had just acquired a very interesting, very complicated, and potentially very dangerous new...project.“First things first Selena,” I said as we reached the bottom of the stairs. “You look like a drowned rat, and you smell faintly of river mud and fear. We need to fix that.” I glanced down at her bare feet on the cold marble. “And find you some shoes. And clothes that don’t look like they were scavenged from a beggar’s cart.”A tiny, almos

Just then, the door, which had been left slightly ajar, swung open wider and Austin leaned against the frame, arms crossed, an unreadable expression on his face. He was dressed impeccably, as always, in dark, expensive looking clothes that made him look like some kind of predatory bird.“Is the girl learning to howl yet Miss Moreau?” he asked, his voice smooth and laced with that familiar, unsettling amusement.Rachel jumped, a little squeak escaping her. “Mr Thorne! Just getting started! Selena’s a bit shy, but we’ll get there!”Austin’s dark green eyes flicked to me. “Shyness is a luxury we can’t afford Freckles.” There it was. That stupid nickname. It made my skin prickle, a weird mix of annoyance and something else I didn’t want to examine. “When you’re standing over the ruins of your enemies, you’ll need to articulate your victory speech, not just stare.”“I don’t stare,” I muttered, glaring at the floor.“Oh, but you do,” he countered, pushing himself off the doorframe and walk

The next few weeks were a relentless assault on my senses and my sanity! Rachel chirped about fashion and makeup, Miss Albright drilled me on history I didn’t care about, and Jaron..Jaron was a special kind of hell. He was built like a mountain, an ex-Beta warrior Austin had apparently known from his pack days, exiled for some forgotten slight by Vorlag. Jaron didn’t believe in gentle instruction. He believed in pain, exhaustion, and pushing me until I wanted to curl up and die.“Again Omega!” he’d roar, after I’d failed to block a punch or stumbled during a run. He never called me Selena. Just Omega. Or sometimes, when he was feeling particularly vicious, “Pack runt.”Austin watched these sessions sometimes, leaning against a wall, arms crossed, his green eyes missing nothing. He never interfered, never offered a word of encouragement or criticism. He just observed. His presence was a constant pressure, a reminder of the bargain I’d made, of the weapon I was supposed to become.

A flush crept up my neck. I looked at Austin. He met my gaze, his eyes holding a challenge. ‘This is part of the price, Freckles. Your discomfort is irrelevant.’ he seemed to say.Swallowing my pride, my fear, I nodded at Morwen.She led me to a small back room, bare except for a woven mat on the floor. She handed me a simple, loose fitting linen shift. “Remove your garments. Wear this. Then come to the clearing behind the cottage when the moon touches the tallest pine.”She left me alone. My hands trembled as I undressed, the expensive clothes Austin had bought me feeling like a costume. The linen shift was rough against my skin, but it felt.. right. More real.When I stepped out of the cottage, the sun had set, and a sliver of moon hung in the inky sky. Austin was waiting by the edge of the trees, his arms crossed. He didn’t say anything, just watched me as I walked towards the clearing Morwen had indicated. His gaze felt like a physical touch, prickling my skin. he was going to