Tangled

100 Clayton: Clashing Alphas

CLAYTON

Lucas’s voice booms through the room, frustration palpable in every syllable. The scouts cower under his scrutiny, and I can’t blame them. The Blackwood

leaders have proven more elusive than any of us anticipated.

I should be focused on the task at hand, strategizing our next move, but my mind drifts to Ava. Is she healing well? Has she found any measure of peace. after the trauma she’s endured?

Even though the mating bond didn’t take, my wolf and I feel bonded toward her. It’s one–sided and fragile, -but it consumes my thoughts. I long to see her, to offer comfort and support. But Lucas guards any

information about her whereabouts with a

possessiveness that borders on obsession.

I don’t blame him, but after a week of knowing nothing, the frustration is getting to me.

As the meeting concludes, Lucas and I make our way back to the alpha’s house. The promise of paperwork

100 Clayton: Clashing Alphas

and hacked computer files looms ahead, a necessary evil in our quest for answers. Yet, even as I try to

center my thoughts on the investigation, Ava’s face flickers through my mind.

I glance at Lucas, wondering how to broach the subject of contacting her. His jaw is set, eyes hard with determination. I know he sees me as a threat, a rival for Ava’s affections. And perhaps I am. Everything I feel toward her is undeniable, something I’ve never felt toward a woman before. It’s like a whisper of fate that I

can’t ignore.

And yet I’m not the one she’s fated for.

I don’t want to come between them, not if Ava has truly chosen Lucas. I respect her choices, her

autonomy.

he doesn’t have hers, gives me a glimmer

request, but the words die on my

Clashing

the time. I need to tread carefully, to find the right moment to

move?” Lucas’s voice cuts through my reverie, his gaze piercing.

the back of my mind, focusing on the task at hand. “We’ve been

within. “We don’t know anything. Our best bet is that

wolves back.”

pack into Westwood has been a tumultuous process, to say the least. While many have embraced the change, seeking a fresh start and a more stable future, there are those who cling to their old loyalties.

along gender lines. The men, proud and stubborn, struggle to

new reality. Men were superior in the Blackwood pack. That is not true of Westwood, Aspen, or any of the surrounding large packs, where male and female live with relative

IT

Clashing Alphas

equality.

men remain rogue, unsworn to

In a society where a female’s loyalty is expected to lie with her mate above all else, these she–wolves are breaking the mold.

sight that would be unthinkable in most shifter communities. A female, leaving her mate behind to join a new pack? It goes against every tradition, every deeply ingrained expectation.

several of their mates separated and under guard, for

young. I can

his hands through his hair. The silence stretches between us, heavy with unspoken tension.

nowhere he speaks. “Ava asked for

Clayton: Clashing

able to talk to

heart stutters in my chest, a flicker of hope igniting before I can quash it. Guilt follows swiftly on its heels. I

mine.

barely audible. “I want to kill you every time I see you.” He meets my gaze, eyes flashing with barely restrained anger. “But I don’t want

to respond. The air

truly not bonded?” Lucas asks, his voice low

the spark that ignites the powder keg. But I can’t lie, not about this. “I tried to mark her,” I admit, my voice barely above a whisper. “But

his throat as his wolf takes over. I barely have time/to brace myself before he collides. with

the surface forcing a

Clayton Clashing Alphas

we tumble across the ground in