Chapter 20
Wolfe
I watched Corrin’s face tighten as the silence stretched between us.
Saw the calculating look as his eyes flicked between the table and both of us, but it was too late. There was no way out; he was caught and he knew it.
“I’ll ask once,” I said. “Submit.”
“To what?” he asked, voice a shade too smooth. “A witch hunt? Paranoia?”
I stepped forward, slow and unhurried. My power rose with every step. “To my Will,” I said. “If you have nothing to hide, then you won’t mind.”
The room darkened. Not with shadow, but with weight as the air thickened—charged, dense. My Will was rising, and I was no longer holding back.
Corrin’s mouth opened. To plead? To stall? I didn’t care, I was tired of waiting.
Kneel.
Instantly, the body complied, and I heard Rowen’s soft gasp beside me, but I ignored her, my focus solely on the traitor at my feet. My alpha power uncurled, ancient and alive—the bond between alpha and pack. The thread that let me command. Protect. Break.
I pushed.
“Tell me your truth,” I said, my voice layered with Will, low and resonant in a room that had probably seen far worse than this. “Hold nothing back.”
Corrin jerked like he’d been struck. His spine stiffened, lip curling in a snarl as his eyes shone with hate—but he was bending. I let more power bleed out, a sliver licking up my spine, electric and eager.
“Speak,” I growled. “Tell me what you’ve done.”
Corrin gasped, sweat beading at his temples. His back bowed, just slightly, but I held my Will steady—not enough to destroy, just enough to bend.
“I—I passed the patrol schedules,” he choked out. “To someone outside. I didn’t know who. They left messages. Instructions. Payment came later.”
Payment?
I didn’t look at Rowen. She’d already seen what I had—guilt buried under arrogance, rotting slowly beneath the surface.
Corrin bent over, his head almost on the stones. “I didn’t mean for it to go this far,” he whispered. “I thought…pressure on the new alpha would force you to rely on the council of the pack elders again. On me. I never thought any of my pack would die.”
“Who else?” I asked him. “Who else in the pack is working with you?”
“I don’t know,” Corrin mumbled feebly. “I know there’s more, but I don’t know who. We are kept separate.” He whimpered. “Please, Alpha, I know nothing else.”
I pulled my Will back, and Corrin felt it leave him as he collapsed forward, breathing hard, trembling.
Coward.
You can come in, I sent Diesel, who stood just outside the door. He walked in silently, took one glance at the three of us, and I knew he didn’t need to be told anything further. “Take him to the cells. Keep him breathing. For now.”
Diesel nodded and hauled Corrin up without ceremony. When the door shut behind them, I looked at Rowen. Her expression was unreadable. But I felt her wolf rise beneath her skin—watchful.
Burning.
“Of his pack,” Rowen mumbled. “I don’t think he cared if Stonefang bled,” she told me bitterly.
“I doubt it.” My Will still thrummed beneath my skin, pulsing along my nerves. Wanting release. Raw. Wild. Unspent. “This doesn’t end with Corrin,” I told her. “Whoever was giving him orders—they’re still out there.”
“And they probably know you’ve started digging,” she said with a sigh, and I nodded in agreement. Her gaze wandered over me, tight, heated. Wanting.
“Mate?” My voice was a rough growl, and I heard her sharp intake of breath. “You look…agitated.”
Rowen blushed but kept my gaze. “I can feel you,” she said, pressing a hand against her stomach. “Your power, it’s strengthening the bond. I can feel your need.”
My need? The need to fuck her. That’s what I needed. I needed to sink into my mate’s wet heat and fuck. Rut like an animal.
“Rowen…” I didn’t know what to ask for. It had never been like this. I’d never felt this wild, this unhinged.
I reached for her, and she took my hand without question. We walked up the corridor quickly, my eyes on the open door to her father’s old office. My office now.
Rowen didn’t say anything as I slammed the door shut behind us.
Didn’t flinch when I backed her against her father’s old desk, my hands on either side of her on the desk, my face in the crook of her neck, breathing her in.
My tongue darted out, tasting her, right at her pulse, my knees buckling as I felt her desire for me peak, and the bond between us answered.
Her chest rose and fell in sharp, uneven bursts, and I saw my own eyes burning silver, reflected in her gaze.
My Will was still riding my senses. It hadn’t fully receded; it was still in me, crackling like lightning that hadn’t found a place to land.
Goddess help me, I wanted that place to be her, but I stepped back, not wanting to crowd her.
Rowen didn’t move at first, didn’t speak, and then with her own wildness brimming in her gaze, I stepped forward, grabbed her hips, turned her, and bent her over the edge of the desk. I unbuttoned her pants and, in one rough motion, I yanked them down her legs.
I heard her moan—it wasn’t in protest. It was desperate. Her scent filled the room, thick with the same need burning in my veins.
My hand wrapped around the back of her neck, not tight, just there, grounding her, and I pushed inside—fast, deep, all at once.
She gasped, her back arching, her moan low, guttural.
“Fuck, Rowen,” I growled into her shoulder. “I need this. Need you.” My hips moved against her soft ass as I fucked into her. “I’ve never been like this…”
I could barely breathe.
I moved hard, fast, hips snapping against hers like I couldn’t stop, like my body was chasing something only her sweet, tight pussy could give me.
And she gave it. Her body moved against mine, meeting me, thrust for thrust. Her fingers gripped the edge of the desk, using their hold to push back against me.
To take me.
All of me.
Her nails scraped across the desk. With her cheek pressed to the wood, she looked so fucking beautiful. So fucking mine.
My wolf howled in my chest, clawing for her, and I saw her reach up and bare her throat, begging for my bite, and I almost came right then at her submission.
My wife.
My beautiful mate.
She was panting, begging for the release she knew only I could bring. My hand gripped her neck tighter as I picked up speed, hammering into her soft, supple body, relishing the slick feel of her as she tightened around my cock.
“Wolfe…”
I dropped my hand from her hip to her pussy, my finger rubbing across where she needed me most, and Rowen called out as her body tensed, her pussy tightening its grip as she came while I fucked her.
It was over fast. This wasn’t lovemaking, it wasn’t even sex. It was the need to fuck.
I slammed into her one final time, groaning low in her ear as I emptied myself, my teeth grazing her skin as my body folded over hers, chest heaving against her back.
We stayed like that, both of us shaking, breathing hard. Slowly, I moved my hand from her neck to her waist, then down to her thigh, just resting there.
No words were spoken as we caught our breath. Just heat. Heartbeats. The bond simmering, still incomplete, but alive.
Finally, I stepped back, fixed my clothes, and helped her to stand. Bending down, I pulled up her pants and helped her dress.
Only then did I speak—my voice low and rough and sure.
“I don’t know what that was,” I admitted.
“It’s never been like that before.” I felt it was necessary for her to know that.
Know that this wasn’t usual for me to react like that when using my Will.
“I needed it. Needed you.” She’d been fixing her clothes, but she looked up at me and nodded, once, in understanding. “You too?”
“Yes… It must be a mate thing,” she mused quietly. “But if you’re worried you can’t control it—”
“I’m not.”
We held each other’s stares. Rowen didn’t look away, though I saw her slight frown. “We have a lot to learn about us, the bond, being mates.” She swallowed. “But we don’t have time,” she added truthfully. “Are you feeling…better?”
I nodded. “Now I can face them.”
She looked up at me and brushed my jaw with her fingers. “Then go,” she told me softly. “Be the alpha they need.” She reached up and kissed me, gently, just once. “You have what you need.”
I could hear her heartbeat, still pounding against her rib cage, and I knew that no matter how this ended—we were no longer pretending we weren’t in it together.
I turned toward the office that led to the main pack hall, and as I left the room, I reached again for the alpha bond—the thread that tied me to every shifter in this territory. Whether they were Stonefang, Blueridge, loyal or treacherous. They were all my pack.
My Will rose.
Hot. Heavy. Irrefutable.
I walked down the corridor, the scent of sex and power still clinging to my skin like smoke. I didn’t slow my steps as I walked toward the hall—didn’t give myself time to think, to come down, to second-guess what came next.
There was no space for reflection now.
I was still running hot. Still burning, and the pack was going to feel it.
Diesel and Killian stood at the entrance to the main hall. I didn’t have to say a word—they moved aside as I passed, their shoulders straightening, eyes locked forward. They’d felt the shift.
Everyone had.
The pack hall was full. Wolves lined the stone walls and filled the benches in tense, murmuring rows.
Some stood. Some sat, postures wary and stiff. Some had bowed heads. Most did not.
I stepped into the space, let the silence ripple through them, and then I let my Will rise. Not in a sudden surge—but in a slow, unrelenting climb. Like pressure pressing against the inside of a sealed room. Like breath waiting to be snatched.
Heads turned. Spines straightened. Even the most defiant wolves twitched.
“Corrin confessed,” I said, voice steady, amplified by the force coiled behind it. “He sold information. Passed patrol schedules to someone outside this pack. He claimed ignorance, claimed good intentions—none of that matters.”