The Wolf King: A Fantasy Romance

Ryan’s chambers are warm and quiet.

A fire crackles in the hearth, casting light onto Callum’s face as he sits in the wooden chair beside it. He’s changed out of his blood-soaked clothes—as have I—and he’s bathed. His hair is damp and brushed back from his face. He looks younger and more boyish when he’s clean.

Becky snoozes in a chair next to the bed, and Ryan breathes softly as he sleeps. Alongside my relief at his recovery, a swell of satisfaction blooms in my chest. He is going to be okay. And I helped.

Still, a dark shadow hangs over me.

“What are we going to do about Sebastian?” I ask.

“Don’t worry about that.”

“Not all of your people have returned. He hurt Ryan because of me. And if he has more of your men. . .”

Callum runs a hand over his mouth. “It’s not your fault. We’ll get him back for this, I promise you.”

Something twists in my gut. Now, more than ever, I do not want to go back to Sebastian. And, after spending time with Callum, my initial plan of giving my father information about the Wolf King is getting less appealing.

Yet, if I stay, people will be tortured and die because of me.

I’m not sure if I can stomach it.

“I should go back,” I say.

“No.” Callum’s eyes blaze into mine.

“You’re going to trade me for the Heart of the Moon, anyway. Why not do it now?”

“No.” This time his tone is final. “We’ll find another way.”

***

I’m not sure how much longer we sit there, but it feels late by the time that Callum walks me back to my chambers.

“Thank you for earlier,” he says. “What you did for Ryan. . . I appreciate it.”

“It was nothing,” I say, embarrassed by the emotion blazing in his eyes.

“No. It wasn’t.”

Callum follows me into my room. Someone has been here in my absence, and lit the candles on the desk and the bedside table. They emit a soft glow, and flick shadows over the books and the small bed. They do nothing to fight the cold, though. My breath plumes in front of my face.

It has been a long day, and the adrenaline that was pumping through my body earlier has desisted—leaving me with aching limbs and heavy eyelids.

“Let me help,” says Callum.

“What?”

He stands awkwardly beside the bookshelf. His height and broad shoulders seem too big for the small room. His head almost touches the ceiling.

When he drags his teeth over his bottom lip, an uncharacteristic vulnerability flashes behind his eyes.

“Blake said you were still aching. And the way you were walking up the stairs. . .”

“It’s unsettling that you know these things, you know?”

He offers me a lopsided grin. “Aye. Not much is private around here. Imagine being a young pup, up to no good, and your mother being able to hear your racing pulse as you lie to her about your whereabouts.”

“Were you often up to no good?”

“Oh, always.”

I let loose a soft laugh, and his eyes brighten.

I shift from one foot to the other, suddenly very aware that we are alone in my chambers after nightfall. I swallow.

“It’s not bad, the aching. Blake said if I went to his chambers, he would give me something for the pain.”

Callum’s expression darkens. “Blake was trying to provoke me. I doubt he has anything that could help. The wolf inside us fights off most pain relief. And if he did have something, it’d be in the infirmary, not his bedchambers.” A sheepish look crosses his face. “But I can help you, if you’d like?”

“How?”

He nods at the bed. “Lie down. On your front.”

“I will do no such thing!”

He laughs, softly. “I mean no harm, Princess. Nothing improper, I swear it. I promised you no one would touch you, and that extends to me.”

I eye him suspiciously. “Well, what are you going to do?”

“Just massage some of the tension out of your muscles.”

“That seems like you’d be touching me.”

“Aye, I know. . . but it’s not. . . I mean. . . it’s not like I’d be. . .” He shakes his head. “Ghealach! You’ve got me tongue-tied.”

He looks down at his feet. When he runs his hand over the back of his neck, there’s a ghost of a smile on his lips.

“What I mean to say, Princess, is that I’m offering a massage purely for its medicinal properties. Just as a healer might offer a soldier treatment after battle. If you want it, that is?”

He shifts his weight from one foot to another. If I didn’t know better, I’d think this arrogant, powerful alpha was nervous.

I suppress my smile. Why does that give me so much satisfaction?

I glance at his hands, by his sides, and my amusement disappears as I imagine them on me. They’re so big and strong, I can’t help but wonder what they would feel like. It would be wrong for me to let him touch me like that. I’m not supposed to let anyone touch me.

But it’s not as if anyone would ever know. And if it’s for medicinal purposes. . .

Heart racing, I lie down on my front on the bed. “Okay,” I whisper.

He sucks in a deep breath before approaching. The mattress dips as he sits down beside me, and a wave of his heat washes over me. He smells like the outdoors and the mountains.

Tentatively, he brushes my hair off my neck and I tense.

He unfastens the collar, and places it on the bedside table.

“You don’t need to wear that when it’s just us,” he says.

“Fiona said you don’t like it. As a tradition.”

“No. I don’t.”

He puts his hands on my shoulders and all my nerves come alive. His skin is hot, and his fingers are strong as he kneads my muscles. I breathe out slowly, my body softening under his touch.

“Why?” I whisper.

His hands move down, and his palms stretch across my back and make me feel tiny in comparison to him.

“My father was a. . . difficult male.” His fingers are on either side of my waist as he runs his thumbs in gentle circles down my spine. I have to suppress a moan. “He was the alpha of Highfell before me, and he believed that leadership was all about dominance and bending others to your will. If you’re not a wolf, you’re a sheep, he would say. He did not treat his people well. Nor did he treat my mother well.”

His hands move back up to my shoulders.

“He was possessive. Jealous. Angry. When he’d lose his temper, he’d say it was the wolf that made him do it. It wasn’t. It was him.”

He swallows.

“I don’t want to be like him. I wanted to be alpha to look after my people, to protect them. Not to dominate them. But I feel it sometimes—that flicker of anger, or that twinge of jealousy. I wanted to hurt Blake earlier, when he invited you to his chambers.” He laughs darkly. “When does protectiveness become possessiveness? Can you even be an alpha if a part of you doesn’t like to be in charge?”

He runs his thumb over the back of my neck, leaving a trail of heat in his wake. I fight back a whimper.

“The collar, it’s a symbol of dominance. And I don’t like it. When I am with a female, I want it to be because we are equal. I do not want to become my father. I do not want my people to think that is who I am. And I don’t want you to think that’s who I am, Princess.” He trails his hands over my upper arms, and sighs. “So no, I do not like you wearing that thing. It is a reminder of everything I do not want to be.”

“What do you want to be?”

He pauses, and for a moment, all I can hear is his breathing and the soft flicker of the candle by the bed. “A good man.”

I swallow. “I think you’re a good man.”

I probably shouldn’t think that about a wolf who stole me from my bed, but I do. I have met monsters, and Callum is not one of them.

“That means a lot, Princess.” Callum’s voice is rough, and I know he’s being sincere. “It really does.”

Candlelight casts shadows across the wall beside me, and despite the heaviness of the conversation, my body is weightless beneath Callum’s hands. He moves them over my shoulders, kneading and pressing his fingers into my aching muscles.

“Is this okay?” he asks.

“Yes.”

My blood is heating in my veins. Even though the chambers are cold, I’m hot.

He may be relieving tension from my muscles, but it seems to be building up in a different way. I want more. I want him harder, firmer, lower.

My breathing quickens. There’s another ache building between my legs. As his fingers lightly brush my waist, all the heat in my body seems to pool at my core.

Callum stills.

Cold disappointment floods me.

“What’s the matter?” I glance over my shoulder.

Panic surges through my body when my gaze lands on Callum’s face.

I scramble forward, reaching for the silver letter opener on my bedside table, as I push my back against the headboard.

Every muscle in Callum’s body is tense. He shuts his eyes. But not before I see what is behind his eyelids.

His pupils are dilated. His irises are a different shape, and brighter, somehow.

They are not Callum’s eyes. They are not the eyes of a man. They have changed.

They’re the eyes of a wolf.