A Tainted Love

Chapter Thirteen

Lily's POV

"Where is he?" I yelled in frustration. My brother, Amos, had been gone for over a week now. When he told me that he was leaving for a while I hadn't taken him seriously. He had said this many times before, but this time he had meant it. I wish I could go back and stop him.

The pack was in disarray. Derrick had tried to take over the pack twice now and it was only getting worse. His voice was being heard. Amos has supposedly left the pack to fend for itself. He knew that with Amos gone he could take control. He had tried, but the ones that were still loyal to Amos always fought him down.

We had been attacked once by a bordering pack as soon as they heard Amos was gone. We fended them off, but once word got around we were screwed. We had already scented strange wolves on all sides of the border. The border was over 500 acres, there was just too much land for us to patrol, even when we were going at full speed.

Amos needed to get back soon. He was the best leader this pack had seen, even if he did have a temper. He put this pack above everything… well almost everything.

Lately Amos had been complaining about our lack of woman he could mate with. Our pack had six women, not including me. Three of those women were mated. One was even mated to Derrick. I felt sorry for the poor girl. She hadn't really agreed to the arrangement, but Amos in a heat of rage had ordered Derrick to take a mate and thrown Amanda at him. She was always sporting bruises and was expecting his first litter in a day or so.

According to Amos it wasn't fair that he didn't have a mate. He felt sorry for giving Amanda up. He could have mated with her if he hadn't had been so mad. He saw her every day and felt sorrow for his decision. After that he tried to rein in his fury, but sometimes if got released.

The other three females were too young. One was ten, another seven and the eldest at a small amount of fifteen. The fifteen year old was already caught the eyes of many of our young males. Amos was going to have to keep an eye on her; she was our cousin after all. Our aunt and uncle had both passed and she was left in our care. The males would have to come to Amos to ask permission to mate with her. If I were them I would be scared, but that's the point. They need to prove themselves brave enough and strong enough to fend for her as his mate. That's what Amos believed anyway.

I believe that Amos left to get a mate. He had been sent over the edge when Derrick had announced that Amanda was pregnant. Amos kept telling me that those should have been his pups. He was furious with himself and rarely left the house. I came the next morning after the day of the news only to find him gone and note saying he would return shortly.

I hated him for it. Why did he need a mate anyway? I knew that they could provide him with strong pups who might take over the pack one day, but what about me? I was his sister, his confidant. He had told me everything and killed any man who would come after me. I had, had many suitors in the past, but Amos had always scared them away. I had actually been in love with one of them, but they were killed in a fight with a neighboring pack. I found out later that Amos had purposely put him up front. I was furious at my brother for the first couple of weeks after that. He had been furious for my silence and had threatened me that if I didn't get over it, he would give me to Derrick. This was before Amanda was his mate and it had scared me enough to reconsider being mad at my brother and act like it hadn't affected me.

If Amos brought back a girl, she would only get in the way of our friendship. I would get pushed out of the way and all his attention would be doted to his new mate. The female would probably be a real monster and be quick to act like she was boss. I hated woman like that, and it seemed like my brother would do the unthinkable for me and find a woman exactly like that. I could only hope he didn't.