Was the voice talking to her?
Celine moved before she could think. One second, she was gripping the rag in her hands, the scent of soap and filth clinging to her skin.
The next, she was shoving through the small circle of warriors, stepping between a girl and the male looming over her like a predator playing with its food.
The girl on the ground couldn’t have been older than fifteen—thin, trembling, her tear-streaked face turned toward Celine in silent desperation.
Celine’s vision narrowed.
Not again.
The man—the bastard who had dragged her before Leon, who had held her down like he enjoyed it—had his boot poised just inches from the girl’s face.
“Lick my boot!” he yelled again.
The redheaded she-wolf at his side let out a high, amused laugh. “Reese, you’re an animal.”
Reese. His name was Reese.
Celine committed it to memory. Not because she intended to use it—because she wanted to remember exactly whose throat she’d slit if she got the chance.
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Reese mused, not even glancing at the girl.
Instead, his gaze locked onto Celine.
He smiled—slow, recognizing. Wicked.
“Ah,” he said, tilting his head. “Sweetheart, we meet again.”
The world sharpened. His packmates chuckled. The girl whimpered behind her. The scent of dirt and sweat and something bitterly wrong curled in Celine’s nose.
And Celine’s wolf—the part of her that had been caged for too long, the part that had been forced down again and again—let out a low, silent growl in her chest.
Reese’s boot remained where it was, hovering above the girl’s skin, as if waiting for Celine’s next move.
A taunt. A challenge.
She would give him one.
Her voice came out steady, cold. “Get away from her.”
Reese’s grin widened.
And he stepped closer.