Page 9 of Cowboy Wolf Christmas

“I . . . I reallyreallydon’t like anyone touching my tools.” She laughed. Her voice was still happy, chipper, but there was a worried edge to it that made the cheer less-than-sincere. Fearful.

Anyone would have been blind not to see it.

“I’m just trying to help you, Cheyenne. Why do you have to freak out about everything?” Asshole moved to take the tools again.

As he reached for her, Cheyenne recoiled. Like her packmates’ touch wasn’t simply unwelcome—though that would have been enough—but like the thought of it genuinely filled her with terror.

Silas didn’t think.

He shoved his way between her and her packmate, shielding her behind him. “Get in the truck, Cheyenne,” he heard himself saying.

She let out a surprised little sputter. “W-what?”

“Fuck off, Silas. I was just trying to help her.”

Silas growled, low and feral. But his eyes didn’t leave Cheyenne’s. He wasn’t ready to deal with the pushy fucker. Not just yet.

“I said get in the truck,” he told her again. His eyes flashed to his wolf in warning.

This time, she didn’t question him. She did as she was told, trusting him implicitly. Though fuck if he deserved it. Yet.

She stepped around him, scurrying to place her tools into the truck bed with the other kits. Silas waited until she was safely sealed inside the cab before he turned toward her packmate again.Hispackmate.

He still couldn’t bring himself to think of them like that.

Asshole was glaring at him now, scowling like he was looking for a fight. From his smell, he’d already started the Christmas festivities and he was several whiskey and eggnogs in.

“I was trying to help her. She doesn’t have to be such a bitch about it.” Asshole leered.

“Don’t call her that.” Silas snarled. “It’s not help if she doesn’t fucking want it.” He stepped away, prepared to leave it at that, but as he walked back toward the truck, Asshole’s grating voice followed him.

“Coward.” Asshole chuckled. He and his friends laughed. “You Wild Eight bastards always were too scared for your own good.”

Silas stilled.

Once a Wild Eight, always a Wild Eight.

He’d said it to Wes only because he’d already heard it so many times before, but hearing it now when he was trying to protect Cheyenne, and from her own packmate, was different.

It was a reminder of everything he’d never have.

Silas swallowed, holding down a growl. Let this idiot call him a coward, worse. All while he hid behind a pack that promised to keep him safe. The Grey Wolves were the leaders of the Seven Range Pact, the rulers of the Montana mountains their kind called home. They could do whatever the hell they liked, and every surrounding shifter pack would follow, support them.

The Wild Eight had never had that privilege. All over a difference of opinion.

Pack politics.

Cowards too often held all the power. Used it as a weapon against others.

This bastard had no idea what atruecoward was.

Silas refused to take the bait, continuing toward the truck. The last thing he needed was a conflict with some drunken alpha Grey Wolf.

As he reached the cab, Cheyenne poked her head out of the passenger window, searching for him. Just in time to hear Asshole say, “She’d be a better lay, if she wasn’t so fucking weird.”

Silas stiffened.

Asshole said it like it was some kind of weapon. Something to wound and hurt her. As a descriptor, weird was a pathetic word. Meant for childish school yard bullies. Barely an insult. At least, to him. But as Silas watched Cheyenne visibly cringe, he knew it meant somethingdifferentfor her. Something far crueler.

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