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.

his mark, and that he doesn’t have hers, gives me a glimmer of hope. Maybe,

my request, but the words die on my tongue. Lucas’s

Clashing

to tread carefully, to find the right moment to express my desire to see Ava without igniting Lucas’s

cuts

mind, focusing on the task at

Lucas.” 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.”

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.

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

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

IT

Clayton: Clashing Alphas

equality.

remain rogue, unsworn to any alpha.

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

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

separated and under guard, for the

yet, here they are, ready to forge a new path for themselves and their young. I can only imagine the strength it takes, the

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

he speaks. “Ava

Clayton: Clashing

to talk to her in days.”

it. Guilt follows swiftly

mine.

want to kill you every time I see you.” He

The air

bonded?” Lucas asks, his

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

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

wolf surges to the

Clashing

tumble across the ground in a tangle