Chapter 18
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
maverick
My arm was wrapped low around Bloom’s waist as we strode out to meet my challengers on the Erren pack’s lawn. My gaze was sharp as I scanned the gathered crowd.
There had been six female challengers and four male when I spoke with them earlier. Cassidy had let me know on the phone that I was up to twenty-two females and ten males.
It had been a damn long time since I fought that many challenges back-to-back. It wasn’t ideal by any definition of the term, but I’d be fine.
I hadn’t expected the number to be that high, but it wasn’t a surprise given Cassidy’s pack’s problems with vampires.
All of us grew up training for challenges, so it was expected that anyone who mated with a vampire or a human—the second of which was extremely ill-advised because of the difference between a human’s lifetime and an immortal’s—would be fighting in their place in the case of a challenge.
For unranked wolves, challenges were extremely rare.
For those of us who ranked, they were expected.
All of the werewolves gathered on the lawn went silent as Bloom and I approached.
Every set of nostrils flared. The wind was on our side, if nothing else, because it blew the scent of recent sex right into their lungs.
A few faces scrunched.
The line of female challengers remained unchanged for ten seconds.
Twenty seconds.
Thirty.
The first woman stepped back, shaking her head. “I can’t challenge fate.”
She walked away.
“Are you supposed to fight all of them?” Bloom murmured to me.
“Yup.”
She paled. “One at a time, right?”
“Yeah. I’ve handled worse, Sugar.” I kept my voice light.
She didn’t need to know how long it had been since I had handled worse. It didn’t matter, and most of these fuckers were going to leave.
Three more women stepped away in the next thirty seconds.
Five more in the following two minutes of tense silence I let pass.
One of the men looked over at the line of women, his expression growing slightly grimmer.
Now, I was only looking at thirteen women and ten men. That was a little better. The men were the ones I really needed to work on, though. The women were much smaller than me, and size was absolutely an advantage for someone who had spent as much time fighting as I had.
I released Bloom for a moment, stepping up in front of her and blocking her from everyone else’s sight.
“Welcome to the newest Erren challenge. I recognize a few of you assholes who’ve eaten dirt at my feet before.” My gaze scanned the line. A handful of the men went red.
Good.
I wanted them to remember the way I’d beaten them, so they could realize I wasn’t fucking around this time.
They’d threatened my mate.
This was war.
“On a normal day, you all know I love a good challenge. This isn’t a normal day. A bunch of fuckers in this pack have declared themselves better matchmakers than Fate herself.” I glared daggers at the women.
Two more stepped back and walked away.
One of the men followed them.
Down to eleven and nine.
“The rest of you think you’re either better than me, or better than my mate, who I have loudly, clearly, and enthusiastically accepted.”
A few more of them, both male and female, grimaced.
I was going to slash their numbers.
Definitely should’ve warned Bloom that this was going to be brutal.
“Whichever category you fall into, you need to get one thing through your thick fucking skull.” I took another step forward.
A few of them flinched. Those were the morons who were never going to go through with their challenge.
“I am not going to go easy on you. I am not going to hold back. I’m going to get these fights over with as quickly as possible so I can get back to the people who matter to me.
That doesn’t include you. So either walk away, or prepare to be dragged off this field barely breathing—if you’re lucky enough to leave it at all,” I finished.
Two more women walked.
Two men followed.
There was a tense beat of silence.
Nine women, seven men.
It could’ve been worse.
I looked at the crowd, raking my mind for memories of the women. I recognized most of them, but only one had tried to bite me in the past. She was the strongest of them.
I’d break her to scare the others off.
Bloom was going to be fucking scarred.
I itched to reach out and assure her through a mental link of any kind. Even just a pack bond would’ve done it. But that wasn’t possible, obviously.
So I turned my back to the crowd, walked over to my vampire, and kissed her. Slowly.
Cheers erupted from a grand total of one person in the crowd.
That would be Shelley. She’d be on the receiving end of a few glares, but she had thick skin considering how close she was to her brother, who was mated to a vampire.
No one in this pack would risk offending an Omega anyway.
They were fairly rare, and packs tended to implode without them.
The Erren pack scaring theirs away would be particularly bad, since they hadn’t managed to keep one around for longer than a few months over the last few dozen years. Shelley was among their last options.
“This is going to be bad for the people I fight. I’d recommend keeping your innocent little eyes closed,” I said into her ear as I pulled away. The sting of her earrings on my lips barely registered.
“My innocent little eyes can handle it.”
“I don’t want you to be afraid of me.”
She patted my chest, over the fuzzy, pink sweater I’d borrowed. “Don’t get blood on my favorite sweater.”
I shook my head. “So stubborn.”
“You like it.”
“I do.”
“Don’t get hurt either, Mav. I’m tired of driving.”
I chuckled as I released her and stepped back. “Yes ma’am.”
The slight curve of her lips eased my worry just slightly, and I turned back to my challengers. “Get on out here, Olivia Iron.”
My mate’s first challenger stepped out onto the field. Her expression was determined, her black hair tied back securely, but her tan skin was ashen.
If she was scared, the rest of them were going to shit their pants after watching me nearly kill her.
She could withdraw her claim in the middle of the fight, of course.
For her sake, I hoped she would.
I pulled my mate’s sweater over my head and stripped out of my jeans. Nudity was a part of being a werewolf, but that didn’t stop anyone from staring any less.
Bloom’s gaze burned into my back as I stepped out of my boxer-briefs and turned around to hand her the clothes with a wink.
She didn’t look amused.
I may have forgotten to mention the indecent exposure part of the challenges.
Olivia was already naked when I turned back around. Without wasting time, I shifted and lunged toward the woman.
In my bones, I was no different than any other wolf.
At birth, we all shifted equally fast and fought equally well.
But years of doing nothing but training, fighting, and killing had honed me into a weapon.
I could watch someone’s body position and know what move they would make before they made it.
I could react faster than them. Dodge smoother. Bite harder.
Olivia was a warrior too. One who should’ve known better than to challenge me.
I was the fucking king for a reason.
I snapped my jaws at her as she finished her shift and rolled away. Tonight wasn’t for fun and games—it was a statement.
Fuck with my mate, and you’ll regret it.
The challenger was lucky I would let her off the field at all, because she was far too slow.
Before she was back on her feet, I was tearing through the muscle above her back leg.
Olivia covered her cry with a growl, snapping her teeth at me as she took the weight off that leg.
I dodged easily, and tore a chunk from her opposite shoulder.
She collapsed to her belly, and I made a show of ripping through the muscles on her other four joints as well, because she didn’t surrender.
When I went for her throat, she finally conceded with a shout through the pack’s mental link, knowing I was connected enough to hear it.
“I WITHDRAW MY CLAIM.”
I tore her throat anyway, leaving her with a wound just shallow enough to avoid any lasting damage.
It would still be a bitch to heal.
With that, I stepped back and howled.
Responding howls rang out through the entirety of the crowd gathered around the field, echoing through the hills and trees around us as every wolf within hearing distance responded to my dominance.
I bled, fought, and killed my way into my position. If anyone thought they could challenge my mate just because they didn’t like that she had fangs, they were going to suffer.
Shifting back to my human form, I made a show of sweeping my glare over everyone in the row of challengers one by one.
Most of the women looked like they were at least a little nauseous. One looked like she was going to pass out.
Someone carried Olivia’s broken body off the field. I didn’t bother watching her go.
I was too busy waiting for the line of challengers to shrink.
I decided to go with the most brazen way to make them leave, and looked straight at the dizzy woman, speaking to her through the link. “Willa. You’re next.”
She stepped back hastily. “I’m sorry. Fate is right. I withdraw.”
The woman next to her was sweating bullets. The terror in her eyes was almost comical.
I looked at her.
She withdrew too.
Women were equal to men, and could be really fucking strong, but most of them never had a reason to fight a man as deadly as I was.
One by one, I called each of them to the field, starting with the most-terrified looking one and moving up through the women. With every one who dropped out, the remaining challengers would know they were closer to being called to the field, and that no one else thought they could win the fight.
When the final woman withdrew her challenge, I turned to the men.
A few of them were gone. Only five remained.
I’d fought most of them before. Some were strong, but none of them were anywhere near strong enough to beat me.
I called the best fighter out first.
Might as well get it over with.