Chapter 5: The Post

I watched the whole video standing at the bench with my coat still on.

Ten minutes.

Bettany said she'd known Leander since freshman year, when he was "just a sweet, lonely boy."

She said I'd "trapped him with a debt" and "followed him to events in my Heat."

She said I'd shown up at his door "in a state" while she was visiting "as a friend."

She said she'd been scared for her safety.

She cried at minute eight, right on cue, and the ring light caught it in both eyes.

"I just think women need to support women," she said at the end. "Even when it's hard. Even when the woman is the problem."

Leander had reposted it with a gold heart.

Pray for our family.

"I'll kill her," Wilda said. "I'll put her in the walk-in and let her think about women supporting women."

"Don't touch her," I said. "That's what she wants."

By noon Quenby's had three hundred one-star reviews.

Rude staff.

Hair in the bread.

Owner employs a homewrecker.

One said the cardamom buns gave someone's dog diarrhea.

Wilda printed that one out and taped it to the register, because she said it was the best review she'd ever had.

The regulars came anyway.

The wolf-kin crossing guard bought two dozen and told everyone in line she'd eaten here for nine years and never found a single hair.

A woman I'd never seen came in, took a photo of me with her phone, and walked out without buying anything.

Then another.

By the third night, I'd stopped going to the front of the shop.

Orrin came at midnight.

He looked at the cracked case where somebody had kicked it that afternoon, and at the paper sign Wilda had taped over the crack.

STILL OPEN, it said. STILL DELICIOUS. STILL NOT SORRY.

He didn't say anything.

He just sat on his crate and started knotting buns, badly, which was the kindest thing anyone did for me that week.

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Rejected Beast Bride's New Mate from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.