A Broken Bond Read Online Free PDF Page B

atop the hood they’d just fought against.
    Blaine leaned forward, and inhaled deeply. Rylie froze. He smiled as he backed away. “Not from around here then?”
    Rylie quietly let out a fearful breath. If Layne hadn’t mated with her, she would have smelled like her father. Blaine would’ve recognized that a mile away. He would have known about Layne’s win over her father, but Blaine wouldn’t have scented him yet. He wouldn’t recognize her as an Alpha’s mate. She gave a soft smile. “Nope, I’m from Wyoming.”
    Blaine’s gaze turned curious. “May I ask why you have come here in request of help and not to your own Alpha?”
    “I hadn’t thought of it,” Rylie replied. “After my parents...” She gulped, then found some strength. “After they died, and after our mating ceremony, the second he left, so did I.”
    Blaine’s eyes darkened. Apparently, Cash had told him the whole truth. He cleared his throat before he said, “Edwin, your Alpha, would have dealt with this wolf appropriately. If you wish, I can contact him.”
    “No!” she shouted. Both men’s gazes swept with confusion. She laughed and quieted her tone. “No, I mean, I don’t wish to go back there.”
    “You want to renounce the Wyoming pack?” Blaine asked.
    She chortled as if that was even a question. “Very much so.”
    Blaine gave her a look, which she only guessed was inquisitive. He was an Alpha, smart¯worldly. There were holes in her story and she could see as he tried to piece it all together¯the same look she’d seen come from Cash. Blessedly, instead of asking more, he said, “This mate of yours, do you think he will come after you?”
    “From his past behavior,” Cash chimed in, “if he finds her, he’ll kill her.”
    Rylie noticed that his voice held an air of protectiveness, and it raised strength within her. She glanced over to him. His gaze focused on hers and determination shined through his eyes as his lips set firmly. An urge to reach up, run her hand along his cheek to loosen those muscles, to lay her lips against his and kiss her gratitude, stole her thoughts. Warmth and wetness grew between her thighs as she imagined his lips, his breath, along her skin. Her body ached for him.
    “This is a problem then,” Blaine commented, drawing Rylie away from her cravings.
    She gave her head a shake and sat on her hands to ensure she didn’t act on those feelings. Her reaction to him was beyond shocking. Never had she met a man that stirred such emotions in her, or made her body so needy of him, and she hoped neither of the men had smelled her arousal. “A big problem,” she said, forcing her gaze back to Blaine.
    He rubbed his hand across his jaw as he examined her. “You are welcome to join the Montana pack, and I would see to you finding employment to maintain yourself. That is not a concern. What concerns me is that this mate of yours has rights to you. If he came looking for you, I could not stop him.”
    The truth of that sank her into a bottomless pit of despair. “I know...but...there has to be something.” She came very close to begging.
    Blaine cocked his head, his brows furrowed in thought, then suddenly, those brows rose as if he’d latched onto a solution. “Cash,” he said.
    “What?” Cash responded with a raised brow.
    Blaine answered, “You have lost your mate. She doesn’t want hers¯”
    Cash raised his hand to stop him. “You cannot possibly mean?”
    Apparently, he knew what Blaine hinted about, but Rylie hadn’t a clue. “Mean what?”
     “Wolf bonds are not always created by a destined mate,” Blaine replied.
    Yes, she knew this. Some mates came together out of true love, not from the soul bond. If a wolf longed for a mate long enough, and she never came, he would seek out one that suited him and the ceremony would be completed just the same. It would never be as strong as a soul bond. But it still held some of the same rules, to feel each other deeper, long for each other