ROGUES OR RULES??

My attitude will always be based on how you treat me~ROLEX

Bloom...

“Dean, don’t take that one. It’s calamus, not scent leaf.”

I plucked the stem out of his hand before he could drop it in the basket.

“How the hell am I supposed to know? They’re literally the same thing.” Dean flung his basket into the grass and flopped down beside it.

“Are you okay?” I asked quietly.

“Hell no. Everything’s messed up. I can’t shift, but I’m not lame. They treat us like outcasts, and it makes me so angry I want to rip their brains out.” He shouted the last part at the sky, and I winced at every curse word.

I hate your friend and his egotistical mouth, Mel muttered in my head. He annoys the living daylights out of me. If he wants to go on a killing spree, he should start with himself. Jeez. So much useless anger.

Then she blocked me out.

My wolf is a meanie.

I got her on my eighteenth birthday, two weeks ago, and so far our conversations have been mostly one-sided and full of words I don’t like. Melody doesn’t care. Melody has never cared about anything I like.

Dean sighed loudly, so I’d notice him again. He was lying on his back with his arm over his eyes, and he looked so sad that I didn’t have the heart to scold him for the basket.

I went back to picking herbs while the sun slid down behind the trees.

My stomach growled. I hadn’t eaten since lunch yesterday. I was starving, but I couldn’t stop yet. If we came back with half-empty baskets, we’d both be scolded, and I didn’t think my stomach could survive losing another dinner.

When both baskets were finally full, I set them down and went to shake Dean awake. Before I could, he grabbed my wrist and pulled me down on top of him.

“Let’s run away,” he said.

I frowned at him. “What?”

“Lie with me for a while.” He buried his face in my neck. “What duty do you have tomorrow?”

“Kitchen duty,” I said, and he hummed against my skin.

I didn’t like it. I tried to wriggle out of his hold, and that was when I felt something hard press against my thigh.

“You smell good,” Dean murmured, and his voice sent a cold chill down my back.

“We have to head back,” I said quickly. “Devin will be mad if I’m late.”

Dean went stiff. Then he shoved me off him.

I got up carefully and brushed the dirt from my dress. By the time I’d straightened, Dean had grabbed one of the baskets and was already stalking ahead of me through the trees. When I got back to camp, he was gone.

I returned my basket to the kitchen tent, ate my dinner, and went back to my own tent.

Harmony, my tent mate and best friend, was already waiting for me.

“You look sad,” she said, and handed me a fistful of blueberries she had definitely stolen from the kitchen.

I nibbled them one at a time and told her how bad I felt that Dean was angry with me.

“I see.” Har tapped her chin. “Why don’t you go to sleep early tonight? Tomorrow we’ll both go berry picking, and you can eat as many blueberries as you want.”

“I have kitchen duty tomorrow,” I reminded her sadly.

“So we’ll leave at sunrise and be back before they notice,” Har said, and I nodded, because Har’s plans were always better than mine.

I changed into my loose sleeping gown and lay down.

Except I couldn’t sleep.

I kept wondering why Dean had gotten so angry when I mentioned Devin. Was he jealous because he didn’t have a mate yet? He had nothing to be jealous of. Devin wasn’t my real mate either.

Dad had arranged an engagement between me and Devin, the leader of our rogue pack. Me. A non-shifter.

I couldn’t shift, even though I had my wolf in my head. Maybe my body was just too weak. Or maybe I was like Mom. Mom could only shift on full moons, and she died a week after I was born because she was too weak to recover.

If we had lived in a pack, maybe she’d still be alive. But Dad always said living in a pack was like living underground. Packs had too many rules, and Dad thought every single one of them was nonsense.

I was supposed to be happy being a rogue. Especially a safe rogue, like us. And I knew, deep down, that I’d never survive as a lone rogue, so I should be grateful.

But a pack sounded so much safer.

Lightning split the sky right above our tent and tore the canvas clean down the middle. The rain came pouring in so loud it drowned out the screams that started somewhere across the camp.

I was soaked before midnight. Then I felt something warm and sticky between my legs, and when I touched it, my fingers came away red.

Blood. That time of the month had arrived.

So there I was, cold, wet, and stained, in the middle of a storm.

This was the safe life of a rogue.

I’d have traded it for pack life any day..