Her Wolves: A Reverse Harem Romance

by Candace Wondrak

  Violet knew a guard stood right outside. The shifter had looked like he could break her with his fucking pinky. There would be no running right now. “I guess I don’t have a choice,” she muttered, to which Iris nodded once.

  With a shrug, Violet worked to get out of the work clothes she’d borrowed from Maia. A terrible mistake—although if she hadn’t, she supposed Brice and Everett would’ve just waited until they found Maia and taken her then. Maia was tough, but would she have been able to get out of this place?

  It was better this way. Maia had a family now, not to mention three mates. What did Violet have? An okay job with people she liked and her own little shack. That’s it. She didn’t have a family, definitely didn’t have multiple partners…

  No, if someone should be stuck here, it was her. She liked to think of herself as resourceful anyway. What better way to put it to the test?

  Sarcasm. Any other way would’ve been better.

  Violet had dropped most of the clothes; all that was left was her bra and panties. When she wrapped her arms behind her to unhook the clasp, she nearly jumped out of her skin when she felt Iris’s fingertips brushing against her skin, setting the butterflies in her stomach aflutter.

  Bad butterflies, Violet told them. This was not the time to get caught up in a pretty face.

  Iris undid the clasp with ease, allowing Violet to take it off. Violet felt a little weird reaching for her underwear, but at this point, it was all or nothing. She had a feeling Iris wouldn’t leave to get her new, Fletcher-approved clothes until she was butt-ass naked and in the bath.

  Once her panties were on the floor, Violet felt Iris move around her. Iris’s grey eyes studied her, and it took every ounce of self-control she had not to cover herself. The woman was beautiful; it was most definitely not the time to get herself caught up in crushing on any of these shifters.

  “You are so small,” Iris remarked, tilting her head as she studied her. “You are like a child.”

  So not what Violet ever wanted to hear. Considering how often she heard it, it really shouldn’t have surprised her or riled her up. But it did, and before she thought better of it, she ran her mouth, “I’m not a kid. Trust me, I’m not as innocent as I look.” She took a step closer to Iris. Her eyes were practically level with the woman’s chest, which was only covered by a flimsy, silky robe. Hardly any fabric, really.

  Iris tilted her head the other way slowly, a deliberate, calculated movement. “I can see that,” she said. Without another word, she reached around and pulled the ponytail from Violet’s hair, letting her purple locks cascade to her shoulders. Then she pulled out the bobby pins keeping the shorter hair back. Once it was all down, she ran her fingers through her hair, murmuring, “You’re pretty in your own right, Violet. Don’t let others tell you differently.”

  She wasn’t sure what she should say. Should she thank her? Should she pull herself away and go into the water? This was…well, it’d been a long time since Violet had been with anyone. Suddenly she craved it like nothing else, the desire to have soft skin against hers, full lips drowning her with passion.

  Bad Violet.

  Iris stepped back. “I will be right back.” She bent to pick up her clothes and walked out, leaving Violet alone in the giant room.

  Violet was sluggish in moving toward the bath nearest her, the largest one. She stuck a foot in first to gauge the temperature before getting in, sinking low in the clear water. These baths were much more like hot tubs than anything else, with the water at a perfect warm temperature and the slight ripple of movement in the water. It would be a bitch to the color in her hair, but at this point, keeping her purple hair vibrant was the last of her worries.

  Off to the side of the great room was a tall rack. Various soaps and shampoos sat on the stone shelves, scrubbies and sponge pads.

  It was obvious the bath was big enough for multiple people to be in the room at once. If bath time was a communal thing here, Violet couldn’t help but wonder about Ivy. This might be her best chance at seeing her, provided the women all bathed at the same time. Maybe she could ask Iris about it, when she came back.

  But then what? So what if all the women came here at once? It wasn’t like Violet could escape with Ivy and fight off Fletcher’s guards butt-naked. All it would do was let her know Ivy was okay.

  Stupid, really, because Ivy wasn’t her sister, so she owed nothing to her, just like she owed absolutely nothing to Brice and Everett.

  If that was true, why couldn’t Violet get Everett’s growl out of her mind? Why couldn’t she stop picturing the bloody wounds on his back? Why did Brice’s glare at her make her feel…sad? She didn’t know these shifters, and they’d left her here under Fletcher’s care. Their actions should’ve said enough.

  No matter how much Violet tried to convince herself she owed the siblings nothing, she still felt some unexplainable need to try to help them, to help them get their sister out of here. To help all the women out of here, because no one should live like this.

  Fuck.

  Why did she feel like this? She was human. The most of a connection humans made in a day was lust at first sight—and Brice and Everett definitely hadn’t won her over there. Women were much more her style, women like Iris. So much prettier to look at. That said though, she couldn’t get the brothers from her mind, even after Iris came back with clothes. Even as Iris shed her robe and entered the bath, helping her to bathe like some lesbian male fantasy.

  Violet wanted to scream.

  But she didn’t, she just asked softly, “Do we bathe every day?”

  Iris was busy running a sponge along her back. “We do.”

  “Together?”

  The woman paused, the sponge unmoving on her back. Violet started to wonder if she’d asked one question too many, but Iris stunned her by leaning down and whispering against her ear, “I arrange the schedule. Is there a particular woman you’d like to see?”

  Violet couldn’t help but shiver when she felt Iris’s breath on her neck. The woman practically dripped sex. Even a straight woman would be questioning her sexuality right now, if they had Iris so close to her, talking to her in that sultry voice and scrubbing her back.

  “I…” Seemed to be all Violet could say.

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” Iris murmured, resuming her work with the sponge. “I will see what I can do for you, Violet, as long as you promise to behave. Fletcher is an angry man, and when things don’t go his way, he lashes out, as you saw with your kidnappers. I would hate to see your perfect body marred with his whip.”

  Violet nodded.

  “Good. If you continue to be good, I’ll reward you.” Iris placed a single kiss upon her shoulder, causing her heart to skip a beat. Or two. Maybe three. Who was counting? “You’ll find it important to remain in my good graces. Never forget that.”

  How the hell could she? Anything Iris said was burned into her brain.

  Again, bad, bad Violet.

  Chapter Eight - Everett

  For the thousandth time, Brice said “You’re an idiot” as he helped him into their apartment. They lived a good ways away from the facility, far enough to be inside a tiny, mountain-side city that was mainly just a stop for the highway travelers. A small, dingy, cheap place, because they didn’t have much money to spare. Fletcher paid them, but not well. The bastard knew the only thing they wanted was Ivy.

  And now…now they royally screwed it up.

  For the thousandth time too, Everett muttered a pained “I’m sorry” when his brother helped him into the bathroom. He’d gotten loads of blood on the seat of the car, not to mention his outfit was completely soaked, what little of it hadn’t been shredded into pieces from the whip.

  His back was…well, it clearly hurt, but Everett was past that point now. The pain had disappeared behind the adrenaline, behind the inexplicable need he felt to go back to Fletcher and get Violet out of there.

  Strange, because he felt just as protective of Violet as he did of Ivy.
/>
  “Why the hell did you do that?” Brice demanded, not for the first time, either. “She’s just a human.” He helped Everett out of his clothes, carefully peeling his shirt off his back before he got in the tub. “You never acted like this with the others we brought to Fletcher, and they were shifters.”

  Everett knew what his brother meant. He knew he was the weak link of the duo, the one who wore his remorse on his face instead of hiding it away and burying it for later. Brice felt bad about what they did, but he tucked it away in some part of his mind and focused on Ivy. It was what Everett had tried to do time and time again, but this time…this time it felt different.

  This time he’d felt more.

  “He hit her,” Everett reminded him as he moved the shower curtain closed. He bent slowly to turn on the water, straining with the movement. The pain was a bit too much; he had to wash out the wounds and wait a while before he could shift. It was the most agony his body had ever physically felt. He had no idea how Brice had handled it so well.

  “Yeah, and?” Brice demanded from the other side of the curtain. “You know what he does. You knew the entire time we had her what we were taking her to.” He sounded so rough and callous, almost uncaring, but Everett knew his brother was better at hiding it.

  Only one of them could afford to be weak.

  Still, Everett had to do better. Had to be better. For Ivy, and now for Violet.

  “We should’ve taken her back,” Everett muttered, wincing when the water circling the drain started to turn a pinkish red.

  Silence. A whole minute of silence before Brice asked, “Why do you care about her so much? She’s human. It isn’t like—”

  Everett harshly yanked open the curtain, glaring at his older brother. Their eyes met, and it took Brice far too long to realize it, to know what Everett couldn’t put to words. For someone who was older, who supposedly had more real-world experience, his brother could be really oblivious sometimes.

  “Shit,” Brice whispered. “You don’t mean…” He trailed off when Everett closed the curtain with another quick pull. “But she’s human. There were unclaimed shifters you didn’t react half as much to. I don’t…”

  Everett rolled his eyes. Of course, when they’d come across unclaimed females, his wolf wanted them. So did he. He was a man, after all. But Violet? Violet was…different. Violet was more. His wolf craved Violet with an intensity he’d never felt before.

  “A human can’t be your mate,” Brice said, trying to, what, convince him? Way too late for that now, since his wolf was already lost in the river that was Violet. “You just…you can’t! You’ll find someone else, after we get Ivy back.”

  “I don’t want anyone else. I want Violet. And have you forgotten that shifters and humans are each other’s mates all the time? Our kind doesn’t exactly overflow with females. We both know it happens a lot.” Everett said all of this to both convince Brice and to convince himself it was alright. It wasn’t weird to feel like this toward a human.

  “Yeah, but I thought…I thought it happened as a last resort,” Brice fumbled for his words, sounding anything but the confident older brother he usually was. “I didn’t think any shifter actually chose a human.”

  Huh. His older brother was kind of a bigot, wasn’t he?

  “Apparently my wolf did,” Everett muttered, pained in more ways than one. “I did.”

  Brice let out a long, slow sigh. “Well…fuck. Are you sure she’d even like you? Did you see how she looked at the female on the couch? She might not even swing your way, Everett.” Another last push at trying to convince him against it.

  Far too late.

  “I don’t care. I just want to get her out of there. I want her safe.” Everett knew what his brother would say next, so he beat him to the punch, “Is it so insane to you that I want both Violet and Ivy safe? I can’t help what I feel, Brice. I feel what I feel. My wolf…” Right now his wolf was in a lot of pain, but he still wanted to fight Fletcher. It was why he’d growled.

  “I know. I was there, I heard the growl.”

  “We have to think of another plan,” Everett said, “because going along with Fletcher…I can’t do it anymore. I don’t want to take anyone else to him. I don’t want to be his slave catcher. I just want…” He wanted to be happy, but it was definitely something he wouldn’t be, not for a long while. Not until he had his sister and his human mate safe.

  Brice groaned. “Okay. Give me some time to think.”

  Everett heard him walk out of the bathroom, closing the door, giving him peace. As much peace as he could have, with his back torn up, in too much pain to shift, and knowing his sister and his mate were under the same slimy paw.

  There had to be a way. There had to.

  He just wished he wouldn’t have taken so long to realize it. Now that he had, it might be too late. Violet and Ivy might face Fletcher’s wrath all because he’d messed up. God, what an idiot he was. What if Fletcher gave Violet away to anyone? To everyone? What if they couldn’t get her out before they broke her?

  His fists curled at his side, and he pushed the thought away, refusing to think of it. Everett had let Brice take the lead for the last few years in the hopes it would deliver Ivy back to them; now it was his turn to make the calls, his turn to say no. No, they would not bring any more females to Fletcher. No, they would not sit back and take whatever punishment he doled out. No, they would not let him touch a single hair on either Ivy’s or Violet’s head.

  Bold words, for a shifter who was currently hours away from the facility, from both of the females he needed to save. Even bolder words, considering his back was a mess and he could barely stand straight.

  But, regardless, they were words he would live by, words he would strive to.

  He stood in the shower for a while, stumbling out of it once he turned the water off. Brice met him in his bedroom, bandages ready. His older brother had never had to do this before; it was always the other way around.

  The two brothers were silent for a while, Everett holding back his winces as Brice worked on him. The silence was heavy, pregnant, so much left unspoken. He knew Brice wouldn’t understand how he felt about Violet, couldn’t comprehend how he felt this way toward a human.

  Everett was not the first wolf to fall for a human. In the world’s history, surely it happened all the time. It wasn’t just a new thing because shifters were dying out and their females were rare. It was as natural as it was for a shifter to fall for another shifter. His wolf wanted her. It was all there was to it, all that needed to be said. No one could change what their inner wolf wanted.

  Not even an alpha.

  It was a long while before Brice whispered, “I think I have a plan, but…”

  Any plan was a better plan than nothing, and Everett felt hope swelling in his chest, even though he knew he should put a cap on it. Hope was a dangerous thing; it often led to heartbreaking disappointment and crushing reality. “But?” he prompted his brother when he said no more.

  “But it doesn’t involve you,” Brice finally said. He was finished putting the bandages on his back, which allowed Everett to turn and glare at him.

  “What the hell do you mean, it doesn’t involve me? What kind of plan doesn’t involve me?” Violet was his, after all. His. Ivy was their sister, but it was clear Brice felt nothing for the human. If anyone should be a part of the plan to get her back, it was Everett.

  “You growled when you saw Fletcher hit her,” Brice reminded him. “If someone has a better chance at making this plan work, it’s me. Not you. You’ll have to stay here.”

  “And what will you be doing, hmm? Going undercover? Acting like a dick to join Fletcher’s crew and get closer to him?” His older brother’s silence was all he needed. What a terrible plan. What a— “You’re kidding, right? How many times has Fletcher whipped you for whatever fucking reason? You think he would ever accept you into his house, with his females?”

  Brice let out a low rumble from his chest. “I can be
convincing.”

  “Oh, yeah. We both know how much of an asshole you usually are,” Everett said dryly. It was true—Brice could be an asshole, but it was only because he squirreled away his happy feelings and thoughts. Years ago, he’d once said the world took away anything he found joy in, so it was easier to not let it show. What kind of a life was that? Totally depressing.

  “Listen, it’s the only fucking thing I could think of. We don’t have the wolf power to storm his land and his house—”

  “He’ll never let you close to him like that. You’re insane if you think this’ll work!”

  Brice glared. “And what, little brother, is your grand idea? Did you come up with something while you were in the shower? What’s your idea? Lay it on me, and we’ll go with yours instead.”

  Everett frowned, staring hard at the wall before them, at the cracks in the plaster. This place was a dump, but it was their dump. They’d leave it as soon as they had Ivy—and now Violet—back. “I just don’t think it’s going to work. I think you’ll come home with a back like mine. Fletcher is smart.”

  “He also has an ego the size of this whole country. I’ll make it work, little brother. For you and your…human mate. For Ivy.” Brice said the last part to himself, making it clear he felt nothing toward Violet.

  Which was just fine. Everett didn’t need to share, as wolves often did. Violet could be his and his alone, provided she got over her hatred for him. They’d cross that hurdle when they got to it. The first step was getting her and Ivy out.

  Chapter Nine - Violet

  The females in Fletcher’s little operation were apparently kept in their own rooms, if the room Iris had brought Violet to after the bath meant anything. Kind of like high-roller hotel rooms, all decked out with extravagant furniture pieces she would never be able to name. Half of the items in the large room looked like decorations, useless accessories only here to add to the lushness of the space. A small room with a toilet and a sink was in the room’s corner. The women were not allowed to bathe by themselves, clearly.