Page 17 of Wolf's Redemption

Ulrik peered at her through the darkness. What nonsense did she speak of? What first night rule?

“This lord of yours, he’s a good man then?” she asked.

He brushed her ramblings aside. “Yes, he is a good man.”

Another truth. One he had not been able to see for so long, his vision clouded by grief, anger and shame. He touched a hand to the scars on his neck. The welts from the silver shackles were gone, leaving nothing to show they had ever been there. These scars, years old now, would always remain. The wound inflicted too deep to heal fully, they were a constant reminder of that day. Of what he had done.

“And you’re loyal to your lord?”

“Yes.” Though Gaharet had doubted him. As had the others, he suspected.

“Does that make you a good man, too?”

Ulrik’s step faltered. Was he a good man? He was trying to be. To make amends.

He shook his head. Enough of her questions. He turned, ran his gaze over her from head to toe. Ulrik liked seeing her draped in his surcoat, though it covered all her curves. He would like her better naked.

He smiled down at her, letting his desire for her show. “Oh, I am good,Rebekah. You will not regret ‘hitching your wagon’ to me. That I promise you.”

Bek’s breath stuttered, and she stared up at him. Bearded, rugged and strong. God, the man was her own personal wet dream. And he’d made his intentions clear. Thrown down the gauntlet. She gritted her teeth and forcibly ignored the fluttering in her stomach and the dampening of her knickers.

Not. Going. To. Happen.

Even if chevalier did sound sexier than knight. Biker had a nice ring to it, too.Better than outlaw gang member.Look where that’d gotten her. A stint in jail, that’s what. A victim of her own naivety. Unlike his lord, who’d defied this Comte Lothair for his wife, her man had used her, betrayed her, and thrown her to the wolves.

Ulrik might sound like a loyal, chivalrous knight. As Vice President of the Demons, Spider had shown a devotion almost religious to his crew. But self-preservation, and his crew, had proved more important to him than any connection he’d had with her. He’d walked away from her without a second thought. Left her to wallow in jail while he’d moved on with someone new. Bek had sworn never to be in that position again. That she’d get her shit together. Live a better life.

Ulrik tugged on her arm, and they started walking again. Getting her life back on track meant making good, responsible decisions. Sir Ulrik Voclain didn’t feel like a good decision. More like a feel-good decision. She’d made enough of those to last a lifetime. And she would never trust, nor give herself, to a man like him again.

Chapter Eight

Lothair paced the floor of his underground chamber. One dead guard. One living. No werewolf. Ulrik Voclain had escaped. The silver shackles and a ring of keys lay beside the body. The surviving guard trembled before him, his face ashen and a bloody gash on the back of his head. Free, Ulrik would have easily overpowered the inexperienced guard. And the battle-hardened veteran. But how had he gotten free? How had he gotten the key to the shackles?

“How did this”—he waved his hand over the scene before him—“happen?”

“Mon Seigneur Comte, there was—”

Archeveque Renaud stepped into the room, the candle in his hand casting shadows over his gaunt face, making him seem more like a walking corpse than usual. “After all the trouble I went to, to catch him alive, you let him go?”

Lothair leveled a glare at the clergyman. “You are treading on dangerous ground, Renaud. The hour is early, and I am not in the mood for your disrespect.”

He shifted his hand to the grip of his sword. If the threat perturbed Renaud, he did not show it. Lothair gritted his teeth. The hourwasearly, not yet dawn, though he had not been sleeping. Neither, it seemed, had Renaud, but his appearance so quickly after the change of guard had raised the alarm suggested only one thing. Renaud had an informant in his keep guard. Maybe more than one. His grip on his sword tightened, and he itched to draw it from its scabbard.

He would not stand for spies in his own guard. He would rout them out and hang their entrails from the ramparts as a warning. Or place their severed heads on pikes at the gate. He would like nothing more than to place Renaud’s head on a pike and be done with it, but the repercussions for killing an archeveque were more churchmen in his county.Thathe did not need. Not when he had plans involving werewolves.

I wonder…Could he sniff the spies out if he were a werewolf? Would his sense of smell be that strong?

Renaud retrieved the ring of keys from the floor. The archeveque was almost salivating at the prospect he would take the risk of being turned into one. Baiting him to take it. The archeveque played a dangerous game. Lothair relaxed his hand, releasing his grip on his sword, finger by finger. Best to avoid temptation.

He returned his attention to the quaking guard. “Explain.”

The guard’s lip trembled and his hands shook. “I heard voices. We came to investigate. I… I do not know how it was possible, Mon Seigneur. No one passed by us. We did not open the grate for anyone, but…”

The pack had used the amulet. A risky move that could have resulted in two werewolves trapped. Lothair had not taken Gaharet, or any of Gaharet’s vassals, for fools.

“But?” demanded Renaud.

Lothair bit back a snarl. The guard’s eyes bulged, his gaze shifting between Renaud and him, settling on him. As it should.

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