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approves of Tom being with me. In fact, none of the wolves are in favor of our relationship.
    Werewolves are a matriarchal society, but the females are sterile. In order to maintain a healthy pack size, they use human surrogates to carry the pack’s children, which are then raised by the group. Rob’s current girlfriend, Dusty Quinn, is one of the surrogates. She’s the reason I got involved with the Thrall last time, because she was Monica’s runner-up for the queen crown and my former fiancé, Dylan Shea, was her uncle. He begged me to save her life and, sucker that I am for innocent teenagers, I agreed.
    Unfortunately, while she and Rob had been going at it like little bunnies from the strange sounds I’ve been hearing through my apartment wall for the last few months, she still wasn’t preggers. Neither was their second hope for kids, Jake’s girlfriend Ruby. Mary Connolly, the wolf pack leader, was getting nervous. She’d already warned me that only the strongest males can breed, and Tom’s one of those males. Jake not only supports the pack leader’s position that Tom is supposed to remain unattached until both Dusty and Ruby are pregnant, but he’s been actively trying to turn some of the other pack members against me.
    “We’ve got a pack meeting in a half hour.” Rob brushed a section of hair back from his face. His voice was tense, nervous. He kept shifting from foot to foot, his narrow face pinched with worry. Without even intending it, my mind brushed his, even though it shouldn’t be possible. He was afraid. I saw bits of conversations he’d had recently. The pack meeting had been called to discuss whether he and Jake would be given another month, or if both surrogates would need to choose another male from the pack for breeding. There was a good chance it would be Tom. Rob didn’t want to lose Dusty, and he was more than a little afraid of how I would react if the pack forced Tom and me to separate.
    “Haven’t you people ever heard of artificial insemination—or free will?” The words popped out of my mouth. I hadn’t meant to say them, hadn’t even realized I was thinking them.
    Tom’s eyes bugged out. Rob stepped back a pace, looking shocked. Jake gave a harsh bark of laughter that had very little humor in it. “That’s not how it works.” He gave me a long look. “The male who breeds has to be there to raise the cubs as well.”
    “So? They live right downstairs. From what I was told the whole pack raises the children. Does it really matter whether the biological parents are actually sleeping together?”
    “That’s not how it’s done.” Jake’s voice dropped into a lower register. He stepped forward, shoulders hunched aggressively. Both Tom and Rob stepped between us, and I heard a low, menacing growl come from between my sweetie’s lips. “Besides,” he glared at Tom, his eyes narrowed to mere slits. “You were ordered not to get too close to her.” He nodded in my direction. “She shouldn’t know this much about our business. She isn’t one of us.”
    Rob stepped forward, placing a restraining hand on Jake’s arm that earned him a baleful glare from the dark-haired wolf and a growl that raised the hairs on the nape of my neck.
    “She knows what our Acca has chosen to tell her. No more,” Rob assured him.
    “How would you know what he whispers in her ear in bed at night?”
    Rob snorted in derision at the same moment I did. “Somehow I don’t think pack politics interests her as pillow talk.”
    He was right about that.
    Jake pressed on. “But you don’t know. None of us know anything other than that his loyalties are in question. I’m not the only one who feels this way, either, and you know it!”
    My mouth went dry. My heart was pounding with a fear that had nothing to do with physical danger. I’d really hoped Jake was the only one working against me. If he was telling the truth, and he believed he was, then the situation might be worse for Tom than