My Alpha Found a New Love novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Her Father

Haakon Torsen can't pull his daughter away from her fated mate, Espen renounces Greyfir rather than kneel to her, and Kari's silent wolf stirs when Haakon touches her.

Nobody answered him.

The big man came up the lodge steps two at a time, and I didn't move out of the doorway fast enough.

He stopped with his chest a foot from my face.

He smelled like cedar smoke and diesel and a wolf much older and bigger than any in Greyfir.

His eyes went to my neck.

To the blood.

"Who did that?"

"Your future son-in-law," I said.

Something moved behind his eyes, cold and very fast.

Then he stepped around me into the lodge, and sixty wolves found somewhere else to look.

"Papa." Freya didn't let go of Rune's hand. "You followed me."

"You left a note on your pillow. You're twenty-two, not twelve."

His voice was quiet.

It carried anyway.

"Get in the truck, Freya."

"No."

Rune stepped half in front of her, which was brave of him, or stupid.

"Alpha Torsen. Welcome to Greyfir."

He offered his hand.

Haakon Torsen looked at it until Rune put it away.

"I know how this looks. But you can smell it yourself. She's my fated mate. The Goddess made that choice, not me."

"I can smell what you are," Haakon said.

Freya laughed, high and furious.

"You can't break a fated bond, Papa. Nobody can. That's the law, and you love the law."

She lifted her chin at him the same way I'd lifted mine at Rune ten minutes earlier.

I hated that I noticed.

"So here's what happens. You give us the ceremony at Kingsfall, next full moon, in front of everyone. Or I let Rune mark me tonight, here, in this ugly little lodge, and you can explain that to the north."

The glass from her wine was still on the floor by her feet.

My moonstone sat in a puddle of red among the pieces.

Haakon looked at his daughter for a long time.

"Next full moon," he said. "At Kingsfall."

Freya smiled, and kissed Rune's jaw.

Rune smiled at me over her head.

I went out to my truck.

The Greyfir lot was gravel and pine needles, and my hands were shaking too hard to get the key in the ignition.

I put my forehead on the steering wheel instead.

The mark kept bleeding. Slow, warm, into my collar.

Somebody rapped a knuckle on the window.

I rolled it down.

Haakon Torsen leaned on my door with one forearm.

Up close, the scar on his cheekbone was old and ragged.

"You're the Luna," he said.

"I was the Luna for about five years and ten minutes."

"You rejected him in front of his pack."

"You heard about that already?"

"Your whole pack is out on the porch talking about it." He looked at my neck again. "You should get that stitched."

"Is that why you're at my window? First aid?"

"No."

He didn't explain.

He just looked at me, the way nobody had looked at me in five years.

Like I was the only thing in the parking lot worth his time.

My face went hot. I hated that too.

"Come north," he said. "Kingsfall has room."

I laughed. It hurt my neck.

"So I can sit in your hall and glare at your daughter for a month? I'd be a great weapon, Alpha. A rejected Luna with a grudge. You could point me at the wedding."

"I don't need a weapon."

"Then what do you need me for?"

"I didn't say need."

I stared at him.

He held my stare without blinking, and he didn't take it back.

"I'm not going anywhere with another Alpha," I said. "Not tonight. Not ever."

"Kari!"

Espen's voice.

I was out of the truck before I knew it.

The whole pack had spilled onto the lodge porch and the yard.

Rune stood at the top of the steps with Freya on his arm.

My brother stood at the bottom, rigid, with his fists clenched at his sides.

"Kneel to your new Luna," Rune said. "Greet her properly."

The Alpha voice again.

Espen's knees bent an inch.

He made a sound through his teeth that I'd never heard a person make.

"Rune, stop it," I said.

"He's Greyfir. He kneels to Greyfir's Luna." Rune smiled down at me. "Which isn't you."

Freya held out her hand for Espen to kiss.

My brother's knees bent another inch.

Then he looked at me.

Twenty years old. My father's eyes.

"I'm sorry, Kari," he said. "I should've done it first."

He straightened his knees by force. I heard them crack.

"I, Espen Vold," he said, loud and cracking, "renounce Greyfir. I renounce the pack and its Alpha."

The yard went dead silent.

"Espen, no," I whispered.

It was too late.

Espen jerked.

He hit the gravel on his side. Blood poured from his nose, bright and fast, down his mouth and chin.

I was on my knees beside him with his head in my lap.

"Stupid," I said. "You stupid, stupid boy."

"Learned it from you," he mumbled, and grinned with red teeth.

On the porch, Rune laughed.

"A packless wolf with a torn link," he told the yard.

"He'll be fevered by morning and feral in a week. Nobody in this valley will take his oath."

He looked at me.

"Maybe you'll come back and beg for him."

Freya giggled into his shoulder.

A shadow fell over us.

Haakon bent down and picked my brother up off the gravel, one arm under his knees.

"Kingsfall will take his oath," he said.

He carried Espen to the black truck and laid him in the back seat.

Then he turned and held his hand down to me.

I didn't take it.

He took my arm instead and pulled me up off the ground.

His hand closed around my bare forearm, big and hot and rough.

Inside me, in the place that had been silent and empty since the rejection, something moved.

My wolf lifted her head.

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