This Dark Wolf (Soul Bitten Shifter #1) - Everly Frost Page 0,12

My wolf’s energy rises inside me, but my rage is dulled, confused. I’m used to being able to read shifters, my wolf’s energy allowing me to sense their emotions. Tristan’s thoughts are completely contained, as deliberately controlled as his movements as he turns his back on me and takes up position between me and the other alphas again.

“I want her,” he says.

The alphas glance at each other, brows furrowed, heads drawn back, many of them startled.

I give myself a shake. I can’t have heard Tristan right.

Peter Nash steps forward with Baxter Griffin close behind him.

“You can’t have her,” Peter snaps. “She dies tonight.”

“Only by unanimous vote,” Tristan says smoothly. “You voted to kill her—that means you wish to cast her out of your pack. Since you’ve cast her out, another pack can claim her. I’m staking my claim. I want her in my pack.”

Peter sucks in a sharp breath, his nostrils flaring, his teeth gritted. His voice lowers to a dangerous growl. “Are you playing me, Tristan?”

I can’t see Tristan’s face since his back is to me, but Jace has frozen at the side of the clearing, wide-eyed and even more alert as he studies his alpha. Jace’s face suddenly pales, his shoulders tensing. He’s poised, on edge as his focus flicks from Tristan to me.

Tristan’s answer to Peter is a shrug, but his voice fills with derision. “I thought an alpha as cunning as yourself would see it coming.”

Peter spits into the grass. “I may have cast her out, but if you want to claim her, you have to win her from me.”

Tristan nods, a slow, deliberate movement. “Then let’s fight.”

His challenge is like a trigger. The other alphas jolt away from the two men, hurrying to get clear. Baxter Griffin is the slowest to move, snarling at Tristan, but even he picks up his pace, taking himself a safe distance away.

At the same time, Jace advances on me at speed, reaching out as if he’s going to haul me out of here. I suddenly feel like the rose trapped within his tattooed wolf’s teeth.

“Don’t touch me!” I snap, backing away rapidly while he chases after me.

“You don’t want to be anywhere near Tristan right now,” Jace says, not giving up, his arms outstretched as if he’ll herd me like an animal if he has to.

He compels me to move all of the way back to the cabin’s porch, driving me up the stairs before pointing to the old wicker chair near the door. “Sit.”

Any other shifter would obey an order spoken so forcefully. Jace may be a beta, but he’s as commanding as an alpha. But I’ve never felt compelled to follow pack hierarchy. Without a wolf’s soul, I don’t have the instincts that force me to recognize the rules that govern other wolves.

I remain standing. “Don’t think for a second that you can tell me what to do,” I say. “I don’t follow pack law.”

Jace’s gaze rakes over me. “Clearly.”

He places himself at the top of the stairs, half-turned so he can keep me in his sights while blocking the way down.

Out in the clearing, the motion-triggered lights on the cabin roof finally flood the space from the front steps to the far edge of the forest.

Tristan removes the jeans he just put on while Peter also strips off his clothing, preparing in case they decide to shift. I shudder at the difference between them. Peter’s chest, thighs, and biceps are solid muscle—thick and brutish—while Tristan is leaner but no less muscular. Peter will rely on brute strength and the crushing power of his fists while Tristan… well, I have no idea how Tristan plans to fight.

The fact that he wants to risk anything for me baffles me.

“Why is Tristan doing this?” I ask Jace, my voice quieter now. As Tristan’s beta, he must have some idea.

“Fuck knows,” Jace murmurs, exhaling heavily as he peers at me across the distance, dark green eyes narrowed as if he’s trying to figure me out before he turns back to watch the two alphas. “But whatever power your scent has over him, I don’t plan on succumbing to it.”

I grin and take a challenging step toward him. “You’d better not get too close to me then.”

Despite my bravado, I’m rapidly trying to process what’s happening around me and why. My father said that only the strongest alphas would sense my true scent. The golden aura around Jace is not as strong as the blaze around Tristan, but it’s close to