My Alpha Gave Me to His Impotent Uncle novel · Chapter 3 of 32

Chapter 3: Town Price

Roxanne humiliates Bryn at the pack store, Bryn sells Fern four dozen cinnamon rolls on the spot, and they drive home to find the ranch power line cut, with Colt's tire tracks at the pole.

I didn't answer Colt.

I put the phone face down, took eighty-one dollars out of my wallet, and counted it twice.

"Twins," I said. "Shoes on. We're going to town."

The pack store sat at the bottom of the valley, a long green building with gas pumps out front and the Pup House behind it.

I parked Gunnar's truck by the pumps and looked past the store at my house.

There was a new padlock on the front door.

"Bryn," said one twin. "Our stuff's in there."

"I know."

"My rock collection's in there."

"I know, bud."

We went into the store.

The store was the pack's. Pack wolves paid pack price, and humans from town paid the price on the shelf tag.

I filled a basket with milk, flour, eggs, butter, cinnamon and brown sugar.

At the register, the cashier wouldn't meet my eyes.

"That's a hundred and twelve forty," she said.

It should have been about sixty.

"That's town price."

"Luna's orders." She glanced over my shoulder.

Roxanne Vail was standing by the honey shelf in cream cashmere, holding a jar up to the light.

"You're not pack anymore, Bryn," she said. "You belong to a man who isn't anything. So you pay what strangers pay."

Every shopper in the store had stopped moving.

"Colt didn't release me from the pack," I said. "He released me from him."

"Same thing, really." She smiled. "Oh dear."

She opened her fingers.

The honey jar hit the floor and burst.

Glass and gold spread across the tiles to the toes of my boots.

"Clean that up," Roxanne said. "Practice. You'll be doing a lot of it soon."

One twin moved toward the mop bucket.

I put my hand on his shoulder.

"No," I said.

Roxanne tipped her head. "No?"

"I'm not your housemaid for twenty-eight more days. I'll let you know if that changes."

Somebody near the coffee machine snorted.

Roxanne's smile stayed exactly where it was, which is how I knew it had stopped being real.

"Then pay the lady," she said. "Or put the milk back."

I looked at the eighty-one dollars in my hand.

"Bryn!"

Fern Mabry came through the swinging door from the lunch counter, red hair tied up in a scarf, flour to the elbows.

"Thank God. I need four dozen cinnamon rolls by one o'clock or the lunch crowd's going to riot."

I stared at her.

She stared back very hard.

"Same as the bake sale," she said. "Your recipe. I'll pay you a hundred and sixty up front, cash, and I'll throw in the oven."

She pulled bills out of her apron and pressed them into my hand right in front of Roxanne.

Then she turned to the cashier.

"Bryn's on my payroll now," she said. "Staff get pack price. Store rule. Ring it again."

The cashier looked at Roxanne.

Roxanne looked at Fern.

"Store rule," Fern repeated, louder. "Unless the Luna-elect wants to rewrite the store rules in her first week. In front of everybody."

The cashier rang it again.

Fifty-eight dollars and ten cents.

Roxanne stepped over her own honey and walked out without a word.

Her heels left sticky gold prints all the way to the door.

Fern grabbed my wrist and hauled me and the twins through the swinging door before I could cry in public.

"You don't owe me anything," I whispered.

"I know. You owe the lunch crowd four dozen rolls. Get your hands in that dough."

She shoved an apron at me.

Then she reached under the counter and pulled out a duffel bag.

"Got this out the back window before they changed the lock," she said. "The little one's inhaler, your good knife, and a rock collection somebody's going to want."

The twin made a sound.

I buried my face in Fern's shoulder for a brief moment.

"Okay," she said. "Okay. Roll."

I rolled.

I hadn't made my mother's cinnamon rolls since the August bake sale, and my hands knew them anyway.

The twins sat on upturned buckets and ate the scraps.

By one o'clock the lunch counter smelled like sugar and butter, and there was a line out the door.

Pack wolves who had laughed at me last night bought two each and wouldn't look at me while they paid.

By two the trays were bare.

Fern counted out what was left over after her cut and slapped it into my hand.

"Two hundred and forty. Same time tomorrow?"

"Same time tomorrow."

It was a week of groceries.

I drove home up the ridge road singing with the twins, badly, with the windows down.

The sun was going behind the mountain when I pulled up to the ranch.

The porch light was off.

The kitchen window was dark.

Glory was sitting on the steps with the baby on her lap and the little one leaning on her.

"Power went out an hour ago," she said. "Rancher went to look."

I found him at the bottom of the drive, at the pole.

He was standing very still, looking down.

The line hung loose from the top of the pole, the end of it chopped clean.

In the mud at the foot of the pole were tire tracks.

Wide, deep ones, with a tread like a zigzag.

I knew that tread. I'd watched that truck pull out of the lodge garage for seven years.

"Colt," I said.

Gunnar didn't answer.

He was looking at the cut wire.

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