My name is Garnet, and I got one night in the attic. Now every wolf in Tallowridge is staring at me in the kennel yard like I'm a stain on the feed bucket.
Marn: Keep moving. Alpha wants you up front.
Hedda is at the front with her arms crossed. Her red tank is bright as a warning sign.
Hedda: Look who crawled out of the attic. Thought the stray would run in the night.
I don't answer, and my hands stay locked around the bucket handle.
Then Rhett comes out of the feed shed, and the whole yard shuts up.
He doesn't look at me at all, just through me, like I'm already gone.
Rhett: We got one extra pair of hands. She cleans pens. That's all she does.
The pack turns to me at once, and every eye lands on my face like a slap.
Hedda: She smells like you, Rhett. You sure she's just a pair of hands and not your bitch?
Rhett: She smells like a barn and bad luck. Temporary help. Nothing else.
Rhett: Temporary help. No mate. No claim.
The word hits me in the stomach, because I didn't know I had a name for the pull until he threw it away.
Fuck him, and fuck me too, because my face burns red anyway while the whole yard watches.
Hedda: Who'd mate a thing like that? Busted face. No pack. No name worth saying.
I keep my chin up, because if I cry in this yard they'll smell it on me and then I'm fucked.
Rhett clamps his hand around my arm and pulls me out of the mud, and his grip burns through my sleeve.
Rhett: Attic. You sleep there. Work before sunup. Don't talk unless they talk first.
His thumb drags along my sleeve before he lets go, and I hate how much I feel that.
It isn't a rescue at all, it's a sentence, and we both know it.
But I want to hit him and lean in at the same time, and both feelings are so strong my hands shake.
Garnet: I understand.
Hedda: You understand you're nothing here, right? Temporary. Shit on my boot.
She shoulders past me hard, my boot catches the pail, and cold water slaps my jeans while the pack laughs.
Rhett: Hedda. Touch her again and you'll clean the pens with your teeth.
The yard goes dead quiet around us, and my heartbeat goes so loud I can hear it in my ears.
He didn't raise his voice once, and somehow that makes it worse than shouting.
Hedda: Are you fucking serious? Over the stray?
Rhett: I'm always serious.
Then he looks at me for a second, gold-brown eyes hot and mean, and I feel it low in my belly and hate it.
Rhett: Marn. Attic. Lock the stair door at night.
Lock it, like I'm a wolf that might bite someone, or a thing that might run in the dark.
Marn: Yes, Alpha.
The meeting breaks and people drift back to the kennels, but they keep looking at me, and every stare feels like a hand.
Cobb: You okay? Here. Water.
Cobb has a ruddy face and a dented cap, and he doesn't laugh at me, which is something.
Rhett: You stay in the attic. If he comes looking, you come to me. Not the gate. Not the road. Me.
He says it like a threat, or maybe a promise, and I honestly can't tell which one it is.
I nod, and he watches me a beat too long before he turns and goes.
I stand in the mud with my arm still warm where his hand was.
The whole pack knows I'm temporary, but they also saw him bare his teeth over me, so that has to mean something.