Page 16 of Primal

My fingers are once again pressed to my right temple, the ache that has been steadily increasing since I first found Noa Alderwood standing on my back deck flaring with each vexed syllable out of Talis’s mouth.

“We need to take a breath,” Canaan interjects, his usual calm cutting through the tension stuffing up the conference room. Ever the peacemaker of our leadership duo, he adds, “We won’t be able to get anywhere with this conversation if we keep letting high emotions run the show.”

Copper hair flies around her shoulders as Talis whirls on my second. “Another female just publicly claimed your Alpha as her mate. Do I have to remind you he’s already betrothed tome? So, pardon me for taking offense to the whole embarrassing display we just watched.”

With a cutting attitude that would make his mate proud, Canaan’s gaze sweeps coldly over the redhead. “Talis, I don’t think there’s a single wolf in this pack who needs a reminderof your impending union. You do such a damn good job at reminding us of it every chance you get that it would be near impossible to forget.”

“You’re such a?—”

“Talis!” I cut off her shrieking insult, one I have no doubt was aimed well below the belt. When words are all you have to fight with, you learn to wield them like knives. And if there’s one thing Talis McNamara excels at, it’s turning insults into weapons. Even if they’re cheap shots more often than not.

“Get your man under control, Fallamhain,” Cathal, who’s been silently stewing across the room since we all funneled in here, grumbles from where he sits at the table. “My daughter is your Luna-to-be, no one should be permitted to speak to her in such a manner.”

Aside from Oswin, a council member who is pushing eighty years old, Cathal is the only one sitting at the long oak table. The way the other pack Alpha has claimed a spot at the head of the conference table doesn’t go unnoticed by me or my wolf. Despite my animal’s grumbling, I don’t have the bandwidth to entertain a petty display of dominance right now.Not that it would be a hard-won battle for my wolf.There’s a certain power in a quiet kind of dominance. It’s the kind that doesn’t need to be flaunted. It’s always there, pulsing just beneath the surface. It's the type of authority that commands respect without the need for words or a single growl. There are only two other people I’ve encountered whose dominance rivaled my own, and neither of them are in this room right now. One of them is Rook, and the other is the nearly feral Alpha of the equally volatile pack based in northeastern Montana.

“Then again, she’s only your intended mate if our contract still holds,” Cathal continues, one thick ruddy blond brow arching, the challenge in his brown eyes clear. “Is this littleconundrum with the Alderwood female going to interfere with the arrangement we’ve agreed on?”

The arrangement.The one where I sacrificed my future to ensure the safety of my pack’s omegas.

“Do we know for certain if this girl—Thalassa’s daughter—is our Alpha’s mate?” a council member asks, but I don’t bother looking to see which one. “Should we not be trying to confirm this before a conversation regarding our packs’ alliance goes any further?’

My mind is a battlefield right now and I am in the trenches fighting for my life. Despite the panic and outrange coming from the McNamaras and a few of the council members after they overheard Noa’s declaration, I refused to leave the little unconscious female until I knew she was under the supervision of our healer. Zora, a woman who moves at her own pace and dances to the beat of her own drum, answered my summons uncharacteristically fast. My wolf fought me tooth and nail when I put Noa on the den’s sofa and left her in the care of both Rhosyn and the eclectic empath. His persisting unrest has me vibrating as I stand here nearly half an hour later. He wants to see with his own eyes that she is all right, even though both Rhosyn and Zora had assured me that Noa may be unconscious but she’s stable. His devotion to her is steadfast, and no less perturbing than it was when he first caught her scent.

“With all due respect to Alpha Fallamhain, whether the Alderwood girl is his scent match or not is a moot point,” Yrsa, the alpha female who’s built like a shield-maiden with her near pure Scandinavian bloodline, pushes off the far wall she’s been leaning against. “He agreed to the accord with McNamara Pack months ago. For our Alpha to break his word now wouldn’t just be dishonorable and in poor taste, it would be a heedless betrayal of our people’s safety.”

Oswin hums his disapproval, cloudy eyes narrowing at the alpha female. “An Alpha’s loyalty to his pack should be second to only one. His mate. If this female is truly Rennick’s scent match, then it’s safe to assume our pack’s participation in this prescribed alliance is all but null and void.”

A rage only a mother’s grief can ignite flickers across Yrsa’s features, her eyes shifting into the yellow gleam of her wolf’s. “That may be easy for you to say, old man, but those of us whose children have vanished don’t have the luxury of sitting back and letting a theoretical fated mate bond take precedence over the safety of our young. We need action, and more importantly, we need protection. As of now, seven unmated omegas from our pack have disappeared, one of them my daughter. The alliance with Cathal offers us that security. If we’d had his extra guards at our northern borders seven months ago, my daughter might still be here. Instead, I’m left wondering if she’s alive!”

The Eklund girl vanished from our territory within the first month of my reign as Alpha. She had only presented as an omega the week prior when she came into her wolf four days after her eighteenth birthday. For three days, I ran in wolf form, forgoing sleep and food, chasing every trace of her scent. I was desperate to bring her back to her mother. For the first time since my mom had passed, I’d prayed to the Moon Goddess for her assistance, but it was in vain. Just like the young omega before her and the six after, Yrsa’s daughter disappeared without a trace.

It was the soul-piercing howls of despair, the hollow anguish in Yrsa’s eyes, and the grief etched into the faces of every family with a missing loved one that drove me to accept the Canadian pack Alpha’s offer for support. By the time we’d started to discuss terms, four omegas had gone missing from under my nose, and I was damn near willing to agree to anything. Eventaking his beta daughter on as my chosen mate and the Luna of my pack.

But that was before.

Before her.

Noa.

Now, the ground has been ripped out from under me, and I’m barely holding myself upright. I’m questioning everything I thought I knew about finding your supposed scent match. And yes, I’m using “supposed”, because I’m still trying to wrap my mind around what happened out there when my wolf lost his damn mind.

Every story I’ve heard about finding your fated mate share the same defining moment—the instant you meet the one you're destined for, you just know. There’s no hesitation, no doubt, because your wolves recognize each other on a level beyond reason, beyond logic. It’s pure instinct.

And there shouldn’t be any division between wolf and man on this matter.Yet, I can’t ignore the doubt creeping in, questioning the echoing declaration my wolf made in my mind. He and I are not on the same page, something that seems to be happening more frequently as of late. A rift has formed in our once seamless bond, and it’s only deepened with the arrival of Noa.

“Alpha Fallamhain.”

The sharp bite of my name snaps my head up. My downward spiral had pulled me away from the room, tuning out the voices of those who now argue over a matter that, under different circumstances, I’d say is none of their business. A mate bond—confirmed or not—is a private matter, something that should be discussed between the two parties bound by it. Not debated by a room of people with their own agendas. No matter how well-intended their motives are, they’re still motives all the same.

My love life—my future mating bond—stopped being solely mine the moment I allowed it to become a bargaining chip.

My focus locks onto the impatient culprit, a silent warning flashing in my eyes as my wolf pushes forward, reminding Yrsa exactly who she’s speaking to with that tone. “What is it?”

Oswin doesn’t permit the piqued female to speak, instead he’s the one who asks the question on everyone’s minds. Including my own. “Is Noa Alderwood your scent match? Your destined mate?”

You know those scenarios where there is no right choice? This isn’t one of them. There sure as shit is a right answer. It doesn’t matter what I say, it’s going to stir up untold problems with varying parties. Then there’s the other complication—who’s answering? Me or my wolf? If it’s up to him, there’s no hesitation. He’s furious this is even up for debate, and his answer is an unwavering, resoundingyes.In his eyes, the little female with cascading espresso-colored hair is his. But if it’s me? Well…

“I don’t know.”

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