This Dark Wolf (Soul Bitten Shifter #1) - Everly Frost Page 0,103

her lap.

I attempt to tiptoe past them, but she spots me.

The dark rings under Jemimah’s eyes shout exhaustion.

I should probably be tired too, but after sleeping through an entire day and night, I’m doing okay.

The little girl jumps off her mom’s lap and runs to me as soon as she sees me. She lifts her arms up to me. “Up. Up.”

Since her mom doesn’t look like she wants to stab me, I bend and prop the child on my hip. She promptly starts gnawing on my hair again.

“Sorry. She’s teething,” Jemimah says, rubbing at her eyes. “Teething shifter babies are not fun.”

The little girl makes chomping noises at my ear and I think she might be chewing my hair right off.

Meh. It’ll grow back.

“Do you have anyone who can help you?” I ask.

Jemimah sighs. “The other ladies try to help out, but, you know, they’re struggling to get enough sleep too. All of our mates are…” She presses her lips together, leans forward over her knees, and quickly looks away before she swipes at her leaking eyes.

I take a hesitant step toward her, wary of making an unintentional mistake. “Are you okay?”

“I miss him,” she says, nodding and wiping at her eyes. It’s a losing battle as the tears continue to fall. “Even if he wasn’t my true mate. Our pack number is too small to have any hope of finding a true mate anymore.” She shrugs, her voice wobbly. “Unless you look outside of the pack like Jace did. But what happened to Ella was…”

She shudders visibly, her tears falling, and now she doesn’t try to wipe them away. “I don’t blame Tristan for not acting faster. How can you kill someone you’re supposed to love? But I wish he’d ended his father sooner. Our mates would still be alive if he had.”

Taking a deep, shuddery breath, she drops her head into her hands before she wipes her face again. “I’m sorry. I have no filter when I’m sleep-deprived. I shouldn’t have said any of that.”

“It’s okay,” I murmur, not sure how to process all of the fragmented pieces of information she just gave me.

She said that Jace looked outside of the pack for a mate—and she implied that Ella was that mate. I’d suspected from comments Helen made that there was a connection between them, but I don’t know what that has to do with Tristan killing his father…? Or why other shifters died because Tristan didn’t kill his father sooner? Tristan himself told me that his father would encourage fights and then kill the loser, but I assumed that only happened once or twice.

A glance at the little girl tells me that—surprisingly—chewing on my hair has sent her to sleep. She drools on my shoulder, her lips parted enough that it only takes a gentle sweep to extract the remaining strands of my hair before I hand her back to her mother.

Jemimah swallows visibly. “You do know that we hate you because you’re strong enough, right?”

My forehead creases in confusion. “Strong enough for what?”

“To be with Tristan.” The corners of Jemimah’s mouth turn down. “Nobody else is.”

I’m not sure what to think of this revelation. I’m not with Tristan. As for being strong…

I sigh and leave Jemimah with her daughter, then tiptoe down the corridor, aware of the other moms who need their sleep as I slip quietly into my apartment.

I find Danika crashed on the couch, where she was probably waiting up for me. She looks a lot better now that she has showered and washed off the soot. I do a quick visual check for wounds, but she appears okay, her breathing deep and peaceful.

Retrieving the blanket from her bed, I rest it over her before I check on Iyana, who is also crashed out on her bed. A wide bruise is visible across the top of her chest above the V of her nightshirt, and the intensity of the bruise makes me reluctant to leave her alone in case she needs me.

Pulling a blanket from the bed in the third room—a bed I’ve never slept in and doesn’t feel like mine—I make a place for myself on the floor beside Iyana’s bed. I’m still wearing my damaged clothing and it’s not made for sleeping in, but now that I’m back, I don’t feel like I can leave Iyana alone.

I failed one woman tonight. I won’t fail another.

I toss and turn for the next half an hour, struggling to work through everything that happened in