Page 75 of Pack Kasen: Part 1

“I make the decisions which keep my pack safe. The responsibility for a feral getting loose and causing harm would be on me, as it should be. I am the leader here.”

My appetite destroyed for the second time, I push myself up from the table, leaving the food behind to do what I often do when I need time to think over a problem. Sometimes, it’s easier to think on four feet than on two.

“A test,” Joy calls after me. “That’s what I was going to suggest.”

I pause, feet from the door.

I’m the leader, but I respect my enforcers' opinions. They have, through hard work, blood, sweat, and dedication, earned the right to advise me, so I’m open to ideas. “Go on.”

“You think she’s a feral, and I do not. Set up a test. We clear the surrounding area so no one will get hurt. Have us form a perimeter to stop her getting away if the test reveals you’re right. We can create an opportunity for her to prove herself a feral or a shifter, like us.”

“No.”

I’m open to all ideas except that one.

No way in hell am I letting a feral loose here.

Why Joy thought I would ever agree to that after everything a feral took from me…

No.

Not a fucking chance in hell.

“Then kill her. Problem dealt with once and for all,” Joy says.

Funny thing is, a part of me recoils even harder at that second option.

I leave my office.

Outside, I strip out of my clothes, let my beast free, and bolt for the forest.

I’m fast as a wolf. One of the fastest in the pack.

But some things you cannot outrun. This is one of them.

Joy’s words pursue me. Dogged. Persistent.

Un-fucking-relenting.

24

KAT

“Here.”

I hadn’t been expecting any visitors as I lay on the floor in the middle of my cage and tried not to think about how each minute I passed here my wolf was dying.

Gregor had wandered right in, whistling, and I could barely lift my head off the ground.

This cage isn’t just killing my wolf. It’s making me weak and lethargic.

Pushing myself into an upright position, I eye the small glass container Gregor slides under the bars of my cage. “What is it?”

“Aloe vera gel. I like to make ointments from plants, and this will be cooling and healing on your throat.”

“You don’t happen to have the key to unlock this cage instead?” I ask, already knowing the answer.

“Unfortunately not,” he says, actually sounding like he means it. “Only Aren keeps the key. After what happened here, he only trusts himself with it.”