since Logan thought about the pack he’d grown up in. If he’d had his way, he wouldn’t be thinking about it now.
“I was a hothead growing up,” Logan confessed into the darkness of his bedroom. Bailey scooted closer and laid his head on Logan’s chest. Logan found his mate’s hand and held it. “Nothing too outrageous for a wolf, but I knew I was going to be an alpha, so I was cocky and overly confident. I thought I knew everything about being a wolf and being an alpha. I was wrong.”
Bailey ran his thumb over Logan’s. His heartbeat was steady and calm. Logan hoped it would stay that way.
“When I was about fifteen, I realized things in my pack weren’t great. Our alpha was older and set in his ways. Old-fashioned would be putting it mildly. He didn’t like me. Well, looking back, it was more that he knew I was a threat.”
“At fifteen?” Bailey asked.
“What can I say, I matured young.”
“More like your alpha was an ass.”
Logan huffed and pecked a kiss onto the top of Bailey’s head. “You’re defending me when you don’t even know what happened.”
“Yeah, well, I know you. Sure you’re confident and full of swagger. You still are. I’m sure you were full of crap when you were a teenager, but guess what? So was I. We’re all hormonal and think with our dicks at that age, and I don’t even know what adding a wolf to the mix would do.”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what being a human teenager is like, but I can tell you that I saw some things I didn’t like. Women treated like objects to be bartered away. Weaker wolves humiliated or basically forced to do everything for the alpha. The older I got, the more I knew it was wrong. It wasn’t what I thought pack should be. So when I turned eighteen, I challenged him.”
Bailey stilled and his heart began to beat faster. “Does that mean fight him?”
“Yeah. But the thing is, I didn’t want to kill him, just put him in his place. God, I was so naive. I thought if I put him down enough times, he wouldn’t get back up. I thought they’d all want me to be the alpha and I’d change things. I’d make their lives better.”
“But that was all they knew,” Bailey said quietly.
“So unless I killed him, they wanted nothing to do with me. I hadn’t proven myself to them, and they didn’t trust me. I couldn’t do it. I could kick his ass because I was younger and faster. But kill him? It was too late, though. I’d already challenged him, and we’d already fought. He wasn’t going to let me go because I kept winning. So I did it. I killed him.”
Logan held his breath while he waited to hear Bailey’s reaction.
Bailey lifted his head and opened his mouth, then closed it again. “Processing,” he said softly.
His scent hadn’t changed, though. Logan held on to that.
“What happened next?” Bailey asked after a minute.
“The pack rejected me. Another wolf stepped up, one of the older ones, just like the previous alpha. They didn’t trust me, and honestly, by that point, I didn’t trust them either. I’d grown up with these people. I wanted to make their lives better. But I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. They kicked me out of the pack, and I joined the military the next week. I swore then and there that I’d never have a pack of my own. That it wasn’t for me. I kept that promise to myself for years.”
Bailey scooted farther up the bed and looked into Logan’s eyes. “And now?”
“Now I want to give you a pack. I want you to know what it’s supposed to be like. To always have your pack at your back, to know without a doubt that you’re taken care of, no matter what. I want to be your mate and your alpha, to experience all of this with you so I can see it for myself. This doesn’t make sense, even to me. How the hell can I expect you to get it?”
“So basically, this is new. To both of us.”
Logan frowned. “I’ve been a wolf my entire life.”
“But you haven’t had a pack of your own as an alpha. That’s new.”
Logan sensed the trap. “Yes?”
“So I say again, this is new. To both of us.”
“Yes.”
“So we’re doing it together. Figuring it out as a team.”
Logan’s wolf perked up. His