"Just look at it, Thomas! 15 years old and she's yet to shift!""It's not the shifting we need to be concerned about, Helen, the poor girl is the weight of a full-grown male wolf. Its an embarrassment. Not a single wolf has even looked in her direction! We'll never be able to mate her off and get her out of our hair at this rate!""Even the Alpha has started laughing at our bad fortune. I swear on the hand of the great Goddess, we would have fared better had we remained childless. She'll never pass as a beta, she can barely pass through a doorway!""Helen" Thomas said with a laugh and a playful shake of his head"Oh come now, Tom, you know it to be true! Poor Duke is mortified after you revealed her little secret! At least his future mate doesn't have to worry about any competition! Who could possibly be threatened by a plain Jane like our daughter? Just get her out of my site! She's an abomination!"I shook my head to clear the ghosts of my past.

I was going to get myself killed. I could barely see what was in front of me as the tears streamed down my face but I couldn’t afford to stop the car and take a break. I had to get out of here!Fuck Duke and fuck the mating bond. I had offered myself to him so many years ago and it hadn’t been good enough for him then. I refused to be accepted by him because of some feeling that a Goddess I had never met had forced upon me.I tried not to think of that night. I tried not to let the memories wash over me but it was no good. The floodgates were open and they rushed to the front of my mind like a tsunami, allowing me to relive every painful, heartwrenching moment in stunning clarity. Of course I had never forgotten a moment of it...****************************5 years earlierGrace's POVI was hiding in the kitchens again, the only place I seemed to be able to find refuge lately. I wanted desperately to go to Duke, as I had so many

You need to start talking, Grace, and do it fucking quickly before I lose what little patience I have left” I growled, shoving her hand away from me.I thought I had been dreaming when I first felt the soft body press against mine, it was only when my wolf roared at me over and over that I needed to wake up that I tuned into my senses and inhaled the scent of the last person who should be climbing into my bed in the middle of the nightAs soon as my eyes had opened and bored into hers, I saw the sheer terror, the rapid pulse throbbing at the base of her neck. She knew she shouldn’t be here, so why the fuck had she cuddled close to me, wearing nothing but underwear that was far too old for her? Where had she even got that lacy piece of nothing? I hadn’t looked for more than a second but it was enough.“Grace...” all she could do was open and close her mouth as she struggled to find the words. “I need you to tell me what the fuc

I had to pull over as the memories overwhelmed me. It was all I could do to catch my breath, remembering all the techniques I had learned over the years to slow down my breathing and concentrate on letting go of the anger and resentment.It wasn’t easy though. All I could think about was the way that I had been betrayed, the way that I had felt when Duke had looked at me with such disgust, anger and worst of all, disappointment.I had pinned so many of my hopes on him, had seen him as a lifeline, a way out of a shitty household that had wished nothing but pain and misery on me and in my darkest hour, Duke had abandoned me, leaving me as a shell of my former myself.I had left that night, not thinking about what I was throwing into a suitcase, I just grabbed the things that were closest and I walked out. No one tried to stop me. Noone came looking for me. I think that’s what hurt the most.I had genuinely thought that when the anger died down a

I sensed the change in Grace the minute I saw her enter the kitchen. Gone was the playful look in her eye that had been so full of lust and wonder at what we had just done and what remained was so cold and full of ice that it was almost like a slap in the face. She had shut down on me, closed the shutters so that I couldn't enter any further.I don't know why, but it pissed me off. I had thought we had been making progress, I had felt the way her wolf had been reaching out to mine the entire time and yet she had slammed the door shut for any further progress.A feeling of shame and guilt washed over me as soon as I thought that. I was being unfair. I had also felt the way she had reacted to me. The sheer amazement and innocence that revealed far more than any of her words could have done. It didn't take a genius to work out that she hadn't been touched like that before. I didn't know whether or not she was a virgin or just had a string of bad lovers but something told