Moon Claimed (Werewolf Dens #2) - Kelly St. Clare Page 0,67

buildings behind, but I knew every wolf in over a kilometre radius could hear us.

My phone rang, and I fumbled to grab it.

Rhona swiped it up and turned on speaker. “Hello?”

“Hey,” Wade said. “How did she go?”

Ah, shit nuts.

Thunderstorms closed in over Rhona’s face. “She went fine.”

Inaccurate. I’d tell Wade the truth later.

“Oh, heeey, Rhona.”

I coughed. “Wade, Rhona is driving back with me.”

“Apparently.”

“You know everything,” she said.

“Huh, what?”

She gripped the phone hard. “Don’t fuck with me, steward.”

Wade was silent for a beat. “Yeah, Rhona, I know. And guess what? Andie made a mistake, but you’re being a massive bitchhole about this.”

I groaned inwardly, squeezing the steering wheel. “Thanks so much for the input, Wade. I’ll see you later.”

Now she’d think I was bitching about her. He’d just made things ten times worse.

Wade squeaked and hung up as we rolled past the harvest fields.

“When did you tell him?”

“He came across me in a down moment a few weeks ago.”

I hadn’t thought she could be angrier at me, but yep, it happened before my very eyes to a startling degree. The rage spilling everywhere was methodically tucked in and frozen until a chilled shell remained in the passenger seat beside me.

“Rhona, I’ll always love you,” I whispered. “I know this doesn’t make sense, but we can survive what’s happening. I’m not going anywhere. I promise.”

She glanced out the window. “Love from someone like you doesn’t mean much when all you can do is love others. I mean, you could hardly love yourself.”

18

“I wasn’t sure at first, but he turned up at the riverside apartment when I was there once,” I said for the fifth time.

Rhona was nowhere to be seen and the head team wasn’t inclined to involve her in this discussion after the display on pack lands.

I was on the verge of fainting from exhaustion. I had to shift and yet this talk had to happen while I had their sympathy. From most of them anyway. Valerie was off Team Andie for good.

“We can use this to our advantage,” Roderick said. “He put antlers on her chair. The pack leader is inclined to be softer where Andie is concerned. I think there’s truth in this.”

That was a nice way of saying Sascha had a boner for me—which was essentially what I’d said.

“Why are we only hearing of this now?” Pascal asked. She’d been silent for the last half an hour.

I sighed. “Because I’m new to the valley, new to being a steward, new to head stewardship, and new to basically everything here. I thought this information could be detrimental and cause division between the stewards. I didn’t really know any of you, even when Herc asked me to sit in on your meetings for Rhona sometimes. I thought this could harm the way stewards and this team perceived me. It was a risk I didn’t want to take.”

“You sat in on head meetings?” Trixie asked.

I lifted a shoulder. “I thought Herc was embarrassed Rhona wasn’t around at the time, but now I wonder if he did it on purpose.” I looked at them. “What are the thoughts moving forward?”

Nathan looked around the table. “I’m inclined to agree that this should be kept from general steward knowledge. We can strategize in private.”

“The stewards have a right to know what their head steward is up to.”

It was time to put Valerie in her place. My patience for her bullshit ran out sometime last week. “Valerie, while you offer valuable contributions to this team, I will always, no matter how you feel about me personally, listen to your opinions. As long as your opinion is made with the welfare of this tribe in mind. I understand that you loved my father, and that you greatly prefer his second daughter to myself. I understand that you dislike me so much it’s very hard to keep it under wraps. But as long as you can keep your opinions of me separate from your advice, you’ll find I don’t care.”

“What, like you’re doing?” she sneered.

I smiled. “Can you name one instance where I brought my issues into this room?”

“Rhona—”

“Exactly,” I cut her off. “Rhona.”

Valerie’s jaw set.

“Do you understand what I’m telling you?” I didn’t move my gaze from hers until she glanced away. And I had a feeling that my wolf got involved there.

“Yes,” she muttered.

I glanced at the others. “Today has upset us all, me included. In the interest of keeping the tribe strong and in the interest of protecting Rhona’s feelings, I’d appreciate everyone keeping