Wrong Girl, Right Alpha novel · Chapter 19 of 48

Chapter 19: Celia's Last Move

At dawn the sentries brought Celia up from the cellar, and the whole pack was waiting in the hall.

She had done her hair in the dark.

She came up the aisle in the same pearl earrings and the same cardigan, with her chin raised.

She sat in the chair they put in front of the council table.

I sat in the Luna's chair on the dais with Ronan's hand locked around mine, under the table where nobody could see.

His thumb drew slow lines across my knuckles.

I held on to it.

"Celia Hallett," he said. "You called a Challenge with Blackwater silver in your boots."

"You sold the ford and the east pasture for it, and you sent six men to take my Luna."

"I did nothing the old law forbids."

"You took a Luna off the pack's land by force."

"I borrowed a girl for a day, and she came home," Celia said. "Show me the law that hangs a woman for that."

Her voice was perfectly steady.

Around the hall, a few of the elders shifted.

It was possible she would talk her way out of it.

I felt it in my stomach, cold and plain.

"My mother," I said.

Celia turned her head and looked at me for the first time.

"You said you took her necklace the night she died," I said. "Tell them how she died."

"She fell down the cellar steps. Your Alpha's father carried her home himself."

"There was a sheet waiting for her."

"I was a careful housekeeper."

"Nobody had told you she was hurt," Ronan said.

For the first time, Celia's mouth shut.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Wrong Girl, Right Alpha from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.