Chapter 14

Asher choked out a rough, violent breath, his hand cupping Lydia’s bloodied cheek with infinite gentleness. “Liam,” he rasped, his voice trembling with an overwhelming blend of wild panic and sacred realization. “She’s my mate.”

Liam’s dark eyes widened in sharp disbelief before settling into grim, unyielding determination. Without a word, the Gamma drew his heavy blade and struck the iron wall mount, shattering the stone to free her chains. Asher wrapped his heavy leather jacket around her small, shattered body, lifting her into his arms as if she were made of fragile glass. Lydia let out a faint whimpering moan, her head rolling back against his chest as her weak heart fluttered weakly under his touch.

“Get the vehicle running!” Asher roared, turning and sprinting up the damp stone stairs toward the cold mountain air. “Clear the surgical wing! If she dies, I will tear this territory to the ground!”

As Asher barrelled out into the rain and threw himself into the back seat of the lead SUV, clutching Lydia close to his heartbeat, Liam whipped out his tactical radio. His tone dropped to a freezing death sentence for anyone listening on the secure channel.

“Command to Packhouse Guards,” Liam barked as the SUV’s tires shrieked against the gravel, speeding full-throttle toward the pack hospital. “Detain Cindy Torelli immediately. Use any force necessary. Lock her in the deepest cells beneath the main house. Do not let Cassius anywhere near her.”

At the main packhouse, Cindy was lounging comfortably in the grand parlour, sipping red wine and awaiting confirmation that the Caldwell girl’s body had been dumped off the cliff. When the double doors were thrown open and four broad-shouldered elite guards marched inside, she merely set her glass down with a condescending sneer.

“What is the meaning of this?” she demanded, standing up and smoothing her dress.

“Cindy Torelli, by order of Gamma Liam and Alpha Asher, you are under arrest for high treason,” the lead guard growled, stepping forward with heavy silver cuffs hanging from his belt.

Cindy’s face twisted in sudden outrage. “Treason? Are you out of your minds?!” she shrieked, backing away as two guards lunged for her arms. She fought like a cornered animal, scratching, kicking, and slapping at their faces with wild desperation. “Don’t touch me, you worthless mutts! I am Asher’s chosen! When he gets back, he will execute every single one of you for laying a hand on me!”

A guard caught her swinging wrist in an iron grip, snapping the burning silver cuff into place with a sharp metallic click. Cindy let out a piercing scream as the metal bit into her skin, her wolf suffocating instantly.

“Alpha Asher isn’t coming to save you, Cindy,” the guard whispered coldly, dragging her kicking and screeching down the long, dark corridor toward the stairs of the packhouse dungeons. “He’s at the hospital with his real Luna.”

The heavy glass doors of the Frostwell medical centre shattered off their sensors as Asher kicked them open, bursting into the pristine white lobby with Lydia cradled tightly against his chest.

“I need trauma staff now!” Asher’s roar echoed off the sterile tile walls, laced with an agonizing desperation that brought every doctor and nurse in the facility sprinting into the main corridor.

Head Doctor Vance took one look at the bloody, trembling woman in the Alpha’s arms and gestured frantically toward an open emergency bay. “Get a gurney! Prepare silver-neutralizing saline, high-grade wolfsbane antivenom, and set up blood transfusions immediately!”

Asher laid Lydia down on the medical bed with agonizing care, but when the nurses tried to push him back to work on her, his golden wolf eyes flashed with lethal threat. A low, warning growl rumbled deep in his throat. The newly forged mate bond burned like a white-hot thread between their souls, screaming at him to tear apart anyone who dared step between them.

“Alpha, please!” Dr. Vance urged, keeping his hands visible and non-threatening. “She has severe silver toxicity, internal bleeding, and crushed tissue. I need room to save her!”

Breathing heavily, Asher forced his feral instincts down just enough to step to the head of the bed, his large, trembling hand instantly clasping Lydia’s ice-cold fingers. The moment their skin met, tiny golden sparks of mate energy rippled over her pale skin, instantly soothing her shallow, ragged breaths.

Under the glaring surgical lights, the true extent of her injuries was laid bare. Deep purple bruises mottled her ribs, raw chemical burns from the silver cuffs ringed her wrists, and her petite frame shook violently from sheer physical trauma and wolfsbane exhaustion. Every jagged mark on her body felt like a blade twisting directly into Asher’s chest, a brutal reminder of where his neglect and his Beta’s treachery had led.

For two torturous hours, Asher stood immovable at her side, pouring his own vitality through the bond into her weak pulse while the medical team worked frantically around them. He cleaned the blood from her brow with a warm cloth himself, refusing to release her hand for even a second.

Finally, Dr. Vance stepped back, removing his blood-stained gloves with a weary sigh. “The silver is out of her system, Alpha, and her wolf is slowly beginning to repair her internal trauma. She is stable, but...” The doctor hesitated, his eyes full of solemn sympathy. “Her body has endured terrible cruelty, and the emotional scars will run deep. She needs rest, safety, and time.”

Asher leaned down, pressing a soft, lingering kiss against Lydia’s bruised forehead, his heart breaking as a single quiet tear slipped past his lashes. “She has all the time in the world,” he whispered into her brown hair, his dark tone promising absolute ruin to anyone who had brought her to this state. “And she will never be unsafe again.”