Chapter 24: Go to Sleep, Your Majesty

The first night we slept in the house, there was still no glass in the upstairs windows.

Declan had hung blankets over the frames.

They moved a little in the wind, and the smell of cut pine and fresh paint drifted through the room.

Down the hill, I could hear the pack.

There were two hundred and eleven of them now.

They were asleep in the cabins and the converted barn, and in the trailers June had talked a dealer out of.

The sound of so many wolves breathing carried up the field.

I stood at the bedroom window with a cup of tea gone cold in my hands.

The field was green now, and it was mine.

"You're not in bed," Declan said.

"I'm admiring the blanket."

"It's a very good blanket."

"You hung it crooked."

"I hung it with feeling."

I laughed, and he crossed the room and came up behind me, and I leaned back against his chest.

The bond hummed under my ribs.

I could feel how tired he was.

He had spent the whole day on the roof with the carpenters.

He had hit his own thumb twice with the hammer.

He had refused to let anyone else take the last row of shingles.

"Marianne called," I said.

"What did she say?"

"The Aaltonen pack wants a seat at our table. They're asking nicely."

I turned my cup in my hands.

"She says Cora wrote the letter."

"Cora wrote it?"

"Cora wrote it. By herself. It had four drafts and a sticker on it."

"A sticker."

"A little gold star."

He laughed against my hair.

"And Rhett?"

I thought about it.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Mated To My Cheating Ex's Powerful Alpha from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.