Wolves could scent a lie. They could hear your heart beating in your chest. Mitch would know I wasn’t completely dead, but hopefully—especially since he was fueled by a hefty dose of male arrogance—he would assume I was well on my way. Fortunately for me, the bias all macho wolves shared was: Females were weak. It should work in my favor. Killing me in cold blood should be next to impossible for him, his instinct demanding a chase and a fight, though he was so riled at this point I couldn’t exactly rule it out. But I had no choice. I needed more time.

“Get up,” Mitch spat. The floor bounced as he stalked toward me. “I know you’re not dead. Stop playing with me. I’ve had enough of your bullshit to last me multiple lifetimes.”

I didn’t move. My heartbeat slowed considerably with each breath.

“I said get up.” He kicked me in the side. Hard.

Air whooshed out of my lungs, but my eyelids didn’t waver. My body rolled like a rag doll. I knew I’d have only a millisecond to react once I decided to make a move, and I had to time it just right.

“I mean it.” Mitch pressed his heel into my abdomen and jerked my body. “Get the hell up and—”

I sprang, wrapping one arm tightly around the foot prodding me, using it as a pendulum to swing myself around, bringing the palm of my other hand forward as hard as I could straight into his kneecap. Several small bones in my hand snapped on contact, but there was a satisfying crunch as Mitch’s patella shattered under the force of the blow. He went down on his injured knee with a yowl. I used my other hand, the unbroken one, to grab his other ankle. I jumped up and dropped my weight onto it until I heard another snap. “This up enough for you?” I panted as I staggered back a few steps, trying to find my equilibrium. My head rang as I impatiently swiped at the blood still leaking down my face.

He would heal quickly again, but if I was lucky, I’d get a minute or two before the next round.

Mitch snarled, clasping on to my leg in the next breath.

I’d stayed too damn close. He whipped his arm out and I landed flat on my back, the pain of my wounds blinding me as I hit the mat. His nails embedded deeply in my flesh. He pulled me closer, ripping my skin as he went. He wasn’t letting his prey go this time. “I don’t care if they kill me for this. It’s worth it,” he spat. “I will die knowing I put an end to you.”

“That doesn’t sound good to me. How about I kill you instead?” I arched myself up, bending at the waist and twisting my fist like a sledgehammer, pounding it into his trachea.

Mitch sputtered, but didn’t let go. Rage fueled him, which was so not in my favor. Instead, he rolled on me from the side, crushing the air from my lungs, his ankle and knee already fully healed. Without letting up, he sank his teeth into my thigh. Pain exploded behind my eyelids. “You are not…going to…win.” He lifted his head, blood dripping from his teeth, his voice ragged through his injured windpipe. “I’m a fucking wolf…and you’re nothing.”

The pain in my leg blinded me to almost everything else. It burned like a terrible, hissing fire, threatening to derail me. For the first time since I’d entered the ring, a twinge of regret raced through me. I wasn’t a wolf. I wasn’t as strong as a wolf. And I’d never engaged one on this level. It was foolhardy in every way, but dammit, I had to change things. I had no other choice. No wolf had ever challenged me, because if they had, my father would’ve killed them. Before today, it had kept the balance on the Compound in check. Fighting Mitch in the arena was a defiant move—a move to mark myself, to prove to Pack I was ready to defend myself and stop living in the shadows. It hadn’t taken much to convince Mitch to come here, his fear and anger clouding his judgment—if he’d had any to start with. But if I died at Mitch’s hands right now, then it would defeat everything I was trying to achieve, and all would be for nothing.

Pack would win and I would be gone.

I couldn’t let that happen.

I wriggled one of my arms out from under him and grabbed the thing closest to me, which was a wad of his blond locks, twisting them around my fist once for good measure. I yanked as hard as I could, wrenching his head away from me. Vanity’s clearly a bitch for any sex.

He snarled, snapping his body back, ripping his hair out of my grasp right as his fist collided with the side of my head.

For a split second, everything flashed to black. When I opened my eyes, Mitch was gone. But before I could register anything more than foggy shapes, hands grasped me around the middle and I was tossed against the ropes. I bounced once, but snared myself with the cuff of my wrist. I stood on both feet, my head bowed, my ears ringing.

“Fight me, bitch!” Mitch shouted. “Or are you too weak, you human freak?”

“Weakness has nothing to do with it,” I panted, leaning forward, unhooking my arms and locking them on my thighs to keep me upright. I had to keep talking; it was either that or have him kill me and be done with it. An enraged wolf was a sloppy wolf. “If you haven’t noticed, you just let a human female break your bones—repeatedly. How does that feel, big, strong werewolf?” I tilted my head up and met his eyes for the first time. It was a defiant gesture meant to enrage. Direct eye contact and wolves didn’t mix. It sent them to their crazy place. “I can’t wait until word of your pansy-assness spreads to all your cronies. I’m sure they’ll only razz you for a few years—”

He had me by the neck, his breath foul and nasty against my cheek. “Bye-bye, Jessica.” My blood stained the edges of his mouth. “So sorry to see you go.”

“I’m not”—I took a sharp breath in, forcing my jaw open so air could reach my windpipe—“ready to go…yet.” My fingers found what they’d been seeking. Not hard, since it was a big target. They usually were. I gave a fierce squeeze, locking my entire hand around it, nails and all. Mitch yelped, his eyes widening. “How does this feel, you piece of shi—”

“WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE?” The double doors into the arena exploded off their hinges, clattering loudly against the walls.

Mitch leapt away from me at the sound of his Alpha’s voice, but I still had a tight hold on Mitch’s jewels. There was an accompanying loud rip of fabric, followed by a strangled howl of pain. My hand came away bloody, strips of material caught between my fingers. Served the asshole right. I smiled, which, given my state, must’ve made me look like a madwoman. “That’s what you get when you mess with me,” I slurred.

“Jessica! Explain yourself!” My father stormed in, followed closely by my twin brother, Tyler, and my father’s second-in-command, James Graham. Then he turned his gaze fully on Mitch. “And what the hell do you think you’re doing in here with my daughter?”

I’d chosen this particular day because the Pack Alpha, my father, was supposed to be off Compound. It was likely the only reason Mitch had accepted.

James vaulted into the ring with us and grabbed Mitch by the throat, putting him into a tight choke hold. Instead of answering his Alpha, he gurgled like a child.

My father switched his focus to me, crossed his arms, and waited for a response. “Well,” I mumbled, dashing more blood from my eyes with the back of my wrist. I scanned the ring slowly. “It seems pretty obvious from here. Mitch”—I gestured absentmindedly toward him—“and I were just in the middle of a little pissing contest. And, unfortunately, because of the interruption, a winner has yet to be declared. But quite honestly, I was on my way to sealing the deal. I had my fist wrapped around his Johnson, so things were looking pretty bleak for poor Mitchy. He would’ve had to sing like a girl or lose his manhood completely, which I know for a fact you guys can’t grow back—”

“Jessica!” My father stood on the ground in front of me, angrier than I’d seen him in a long time. “Get the hell out of there.” He slashed his hand from the ring to the bleachers in a quick, precise gesture. His voice held massive power and it flowed over me, testing my skin, pressing against it. And even though his Alpha mojo didn’t work on me because I wasn’t a wolf, I skedaddled. I was extremely good at pushing the envelope, but I also knew when said envelope was about to explode in my face. My father turned to James and flicked his head toward the doors. “Take him away. Now.”

I climbed out of the ring gingerly, picking my way through the ropes and down the small flight of steps in the corner. My whole body pulsed with pain now that my fighting high had come to an abrupt halt. Once on the ground, I limped past my father and took a seat on the nearest bleacher, closest to my bag of supplies. Across the room, my brother had his fists wrapped up in Josh’s shirt. It seemed Josh had his greatest fears realized once my father had arrived on the scene. Tyler shook him, forcing his neck back and forth like a puppet on a string, snarling, “Did you guys think you were tough shit beating up a female? Huh?”

I could feel Josh’s quivering from where I sat. For a beta, there was nothing worse than coming up against a strong alpha. Betas, the absolute followers of Pack, shied away from confrontation. Less than a third of the wolves born were beta; all the rest were alpha, constantly fighting and jostling for their place in line.

Much to my chagrin, I’d been alpha-born too. I’d just drawn the extremely shitty straw of being a girl and a human, instead of a boy and a wolf. The fact I’d been born at all equated me to being one big, scary genetic freak. Werewolves didn’t possess the DNA to create a female, so there was no rational explanation for my existence. I’d been labeled a witch, a freak—something the wolves had the right to punish. Couple that with a myth declaring me evil, and my life on the Compound had been set from birth.

Wolves were pain-in-the-ass superstitious, which meant my very existence threatened them. By walking around, I reminded them of that daily.

“Explain yourself.” My father stood in front of me, legs splayed. “What exactly did you think you were going to accomplish here tonight? Death? Challenging wolves is the quickest way to get yourself killed. This behavior won’t be tolerated, and it will stop tonight.”