Page 11 of Untamed

Mia clutches her stomach. “That made my whole week. My whole month. I’m going to tell my little sweetie pie asshole that the next time I see him.”

Nathan chuckles and rolls his eyes. “You do that.” He bites into an apple and peers back at me. “So?”

Oh, right. Me.I blush. I’m really screwing up this friend thing. “I’m Kinsey. Rejected for not fitting in, I guess.”

Mia helpfully supplies the true answer. “Her mate said she didn’t ever try to fit in with the pack.”

“And he thought that sending you to the place for the ultimate castoffs would change that?” Nathan squeezes the apple in his hand until it splits in half with a crunch. Mia pats his shoulder while he drops the remnants of it right onto the table and glances away.

Behind us, someone sniffles. We all turn to find a girl with blonde hair entering the room. Complete despair mars her face as she peers around, wide-eyed. We instantly sober. My wolf mirrors the girl’s emotions, mewling inside me. I rub my chest, and Mia frowns. “It’ll get better.”

“Sometimes worse,” Nathan adds unhelpfully.

Mia hits him. “Don’t tell the newbie all the bad things.”

He doesn’t listen. His face sours as he watches the blonde girl. “Wait until the first counseling meeting when you see him for the first time since the rejection.”

He’s not kidding about that. Last night in the hall, the same horrible despair ripped through me. “I already saw him again.” I place a sliver of pancake in my mouth and start to chew. It takes a moment for me to notice that they’re staring at me slack-jawed. I hurry and swallow. “What?”

“You saw him already?”

I shrug. “During my meeting with Ebon, I kind of shifted. Accidentally, of course. I ran out into the hall, and he was there.”

Mia grabs Nathan’s arm. “You fucking shifted in the academy?”

Heat blooms on my cheeks. I peer around to make sure no one’s listening to us, then turn back. “Yeah, it was an accident. I got mad.”

Nathan watches me quizzically as if he can’t figure me out. Mia picks up on his face and says, “I know, right? I dropped by her room yesterday. No tears.”

“You have a heart of steel.” He studies me even further before staring right into my eyes. “Even I shed a few tears on my first night.”

“Please, you were a wreck,” Mia points out, poking him playfully.

I glance down at my plate. “Just used to people not liking me, I guess.”

Nathan groans. “Sorry, Kinsey. I didn’t mean anything by it. I’m shocked is all. I’m sure your mate is an asshole.”

“Aren’t they all?” Mia muses.

“Yep,” Nathan sighs, popping the p. “Perfect, hot assholes with an ass that just, mmm,” he bites down on his knuckle while his eyes seem so far away. “I could sink my teeth into it.”

I guess his response answers one of the questions I woke up with. Judging by the looks of longing on Mia’s and Nathan’s faces, it doesn’t get any easier to think about your fated mate. “This isn’t fair,” I grumble.

“Aww, you already figured out Greystone’s true motto.”

The corner of Nathan’s lip curves up and then flattens. “The fucked-up part is, if she walked through those doors right now, I’d be on my knees in front of her, begging.”

His words cast a somber feeling over the whole table. Eventually, he demolishes the rest of his food and gets up. He doesn’t even utter a goodbye, but both Mia and I watch him leave. My heart feels like an anchor in my chest as he walks past the crying girl at a table all by herself, grabs strawberries from the buffet, and drops them next to her. She peeks up at him gratefully, and all he does is smile and nod before leaving the room.

“He goes through mood swings,” Mia informs me. “We all do. One day we’ll want to rip their throats out and roll around in their blood. The next, we just want to jump them.”

I spin back toward her. “Is there anything you guys can do about your situation?”

Mia heaves a sigh. “We’ve tried, but nothing yet. We’re the ones who ended up here, so we’re supposedly the less trustworthy ones. We literally have no sway here. No rights. We’re at the mercy of our mate. I hear that’s a thing that happens now. Newly fated wolves write up a Mate Rejection Slip so the other can’t do it to them first. Then, they sort everything out during the initial meet and greet.”

“You’re kidding.”

Mia shakes her head. “Happens a lot in families who’ve had a sibling end up here. Think about it, your brother or sister is banished to Greystone and then goes home to tell you how awful it is. To save your ass, you fill out the form so it can’t be done to you.”

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