Roman pressed his lips together. “And then I’ll take steps to rectify it, if necessary.”

Kevin shook his head. “It wasn’t an Orphan. It was Fenrir. He attacked me.”

Roman paused like a switch had been hit. He looked at Kevin long and hard.

“You didn’t know.”

Roman set the paper neatly aside. “When exactly did this…attack occur?”

“In the mountains, during our hunt.” Kevin took a deep breath and let it out. “And there’s more. He’s left

me messages. Threats.”

“Perhaps you’re mistaken.”

“I know it was him, Roman. He wants me out of the pack.”

It was difficult to read Roman’s expression. He was old, that much was obvious, and a master of control.

His face revealed nothing. “I decide who joins our pack and who doesn’t. I’ve decided that you’re in and

you are.”

“I think Fenrir has a different opinion, Roman. I think he’s more dangerous than you think.”

Roman steepled his fingers together. “If Fenrir—or anyone else—is deliberately threatening our cover in

this city, I, as alpha, shall deal with him.”

“You better deal with him. Or I might have to.”

Roman narrowed his wolf eyes. “What exactly are you implying?”

Kevin thought about that. He reminded himself that the truth was usually the best route to take. “I’m not

sure, exactly. Believe me, I don’t mean him, or you, any harm. I want to be here. I want to be one of the

pack. But, Roman, I’m not going to take this lying down. You either reign in your lieutenant or there’s

going to be a problem.”

“You realize I can construe that as a threat.”

“I don’t care how you construe it, just as long as you talk to him…before I do.”

A smile suddenly curled across Roman’s lips. “I don’t know if you realize it, but you talk like a

Pedigree.” He stood up and offered Kevin his hand. “We’re planning a celebration tonight in your honor,

a little party that Anya wants to throw to welcome you into the fold. Stay with me today. I want to be with

you. Later you may enjoy the bounty of being one of the pack.”

Despite everything, Kevin felt a rush of desire. His traitorous cock twitched in his pants, and when

Roman kissed him he felt himself melting against the other man. Roman cupped the front of him,

massaging him through his jeans with a wise and wicked smirk. He knew. He knew how badly Kevin

wanted in. He knew how much he wanted Roman. Against his better judgment, Kevin took his alpha’s

hand.

***

Chapter Seventeen

Kevin woke alone in Roman’s bed. He felt sore, well-used, and wonderful. They’d spent considerable

time licking and biting each other before Roman invited Kevin to mount him from behind. Kevin had

considered it a privilege. Afterward, they’d switched and Roman had ridden him hard to climax. Their

mating had been brief, rough and satisfying. Kevin couldn’t imagine ever sleeping with a human being

again.

He turned over on the rumpled sheets and stretched in the darkness. The sheets smelled like wolf and sex.

He scented some of the other pack members as well, but that didn’t bother him so much. He liked the

smell of pack. It felt safe. It felt like home.

Roman had explained that werewolves, unlike real wolves, were not naturally monogamous creatures.

The drive to mate was too strong. Even if he and Roman were to become alpha mates at some point in the

future, they would not be what human would call “exclusive”. They would want—would need—an open

relationship. Sex cemented the relationship between an alpha and the wolves in his charge.

At first, Kevin expected the idea to offend the human in him, but he quickly found it didn’t really bother

him, and when he thought about it, the long string of emotionally-detached relationships he’d had fit the

werewolf lifestyle very well. Underneath it all, he’d never been a monogamous type of guy. He liked

being with Roman, but he also liked mating with the other werewolves, and the idea of Roman mating

with them even turned him on.

He sniffed the pillow, sifting a myriad of scents through his acute sense of smell, but detected nothing of

Anya, which he found strange. They were alpha mates, according to Roman, yet they didn’t seem to have

the kind of intimacy he expected. More like an old-fashioned arranged marriage of some type.

Then again, werewolf relationships were complex and he didn’t understand everything just yet. After

making love, he and Roman had lain snuggled together for hours while Roman explained the ins and outs

of pack structure to him. All the members of the pack had open relationships—that is, any member of the

pack could mate with any other, so long as it was a consensual union.

That piqued his curiosity. “What kind of…union…do you have with Anya?”

“You sound jealous, Golden Eyes.”

Kevin shrugged. “I’m just trying to understand.”

Roman sighed and rubbed himself in a slow and sensual way against Kevin. “Long ago, I was like you

once. Alone. Untrained. I didn’t know my parents, didn’t know the slightest thing about being a wolf. Then

Anya came along and we became good friends. She is very old, older than even I. She became my mentor,

you might say, and from there, we developed an intimacy. She understood my preferences in a partner, of

course, but she didn’t care about that. She was old before I ever met her, and she’d had many ‘true loves’

over the centuries. She was seeking a trustworthy friend to father an unborn Pedigree child with her. Thus,

we came to his arrangement. She allows me to have my boys, and I service her in her desire for

offspring.”

“Yet there are no offspring.”

“What makes you say that?”

Kevin sat up and cradled his head on his hand as he looked down at Roman’s smooth, aristocratic face.

“Because you’re still together after a hundred years.”

Roman’s eyes darkened, the first genuine emotion that Kevin had ever seen in them. “Anya has never

successfully carried to term.”

“She can’t have children?”

“She can conceive but she can’t carry the child for long. Perhaps it has something to do with the

mechanics of her shifting, or her body, or this is just the way she is. We don’t know why.”

Kevin felt a tension in the air. Obviously, he’d hit on a sore spot for Roman. “Sorry.”

“I’d rather not speak of such unpleasantness,” Roman said, cupping the back of Kevin’s head and pulling

him down for an open-mouthed kiss, his cock already springing to life between them.

Now, as he lay there alone, he went over their conversation in his head. It bothered him more than he’d

thought. Roman had always seemed a little overenthusiastic about having him in the pack. His pack. He

said Kevin had the potential to be an alpha, but how would that work, three alphas leading the pack?

Unless, of course, he had some other more dubious reasons for keeping Kevin around. Was Kevin the

sacrificial lamb in wolf’s clothing to be given to Anya to satisfy her desire for a pup while Roman went