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.

mark, and that he doesn’t have hers, gives

words die on my tongue. Lucas’s posture is rigid, his

Clashing

I need to tread carefully, to find the right moment to express my desire

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

mind, focusing on the task at hand. “We’ve been over this a

My voice is steady despite the turmoil within. “We don’t know anything. Our best bet is that Renard is going to try to come back,

wolves back.”

embraced the change, seeking a fresh start and a more stable future, there are those who cling to their

division seems to fall along gender lines. The men, proud and stubborn, struggle to let go of their ties to Renard Blackwood. I can

new reality. Men were superior in the Blackwood pack. That is not true of Westwood,

IT

Clashing

equality.

men remain rogue, unsworn to

above all else, these she–wolves are breaking the mold.

female, leaving her mate behind to join a new pack? It goes against

several of their mates separated and under guard, for the safety of

new path for themselves and their young. I can only imagine the strength it takes,

as he runs his hands through his hair. The silence stretches between us,

out of nowhere he speaks. “Ava

Clayton: Clashing Alphas

haven’t been able to talk to

before I can quash it. Guilt follows swiftly on

mine.

kill you every time I see you.” He meets my gaze, eyes flashing with barely restrained anger.

unsure how to respond. The air between us is charged,

truly not bonded?” Lucas asks, his voice low and

about this. “I

from his throat as his wolf takes over. I barely have time/to brace myself before he collides. with me mid–shift, all fury and feral

the

Clayton Clashing

as we tumble across the ground in a tangle