I don’t even know why my hands were still on the knife.It was stupid — so stupid — because all it was doing was keeping Caius’s blood warm against my skin, and the longer I felt it, the harder it was to pretend I didn’t notice the way it… throbbed. Not in a heartbeat way. In a wrong way.I should’ve dropped it. Let it hit the dirt, walk away. My brain told me to. My body didn’t care.Kieran’s standing there, shoulders tense, jaw tight, eyes locked on me like I’m a bad dream he can’t shake. And yeah, he looks pissed, but not loud-pissed. Quiet-pissed. The kind that feels worse because you know it’s boiling under the surface.“You’re making a mistake,” he says. Calm. Too calm. The calm before—“Yeah, probably.” My voice comes out too flat, too quick. I want to laugh it off, but my chest is tight. “But it’s mine.”Lyra’s pacing, boots sinking into soft moss with a muted squelch. Her hand’s twitching toward the hilt at her hip. “We gotta move. They’ll come for him. And for us. Especially
A sharp gasp tore through the silence, and I froze, helpless, as Caius’s teeth sank deep into my neck. As the pain erupted, a fierce white-hot flame, but beneath it, a wild heat spread, fierce and alive, pulsing with the raw, primal power of his blood. My body arched against him, not fighting, but releasing a cry that ripped out of me, half terror, half a dark, urgent hunger. He was marking me, claiming me again, twisting every inch of me into something new. I was no longer just myself. I was his.Caius held me tight, one hand tangled in my hair like iron, the other moving with slow, deliberate cruelty. I could feel the searing burn beneath my skin, the magic slicing through me, stripping away every trace of who I had been. Colors warped and spun behind my eyes, red, black, and fire bleeding into one another like a shattered mirror.Then Kieran’s roar erupted—a guttural, raw sound ripped from his throat, full of rage and desperation. He was on us in a heartbeat, a storm of motion, but
"I don’t think I want to."The words fell from my mouth too fast, too sharp, like I’d thrown them out to hurt him, but the moment they were in the air , the silence that followed made me wish I could snatch them back.Kieran’s head snapped toward me, that storm in his eyes swelling darker, black leaking into the gold like night devouring daylight. His jaw ticked once, a sharp pulse in his temple, and I knew he heard the truth in my voice, not just defiance but temptation, and that was worse than if I’d spat pure hatred. His wolf pressed close to the surface, his scent flooding the space, wild and biting, claws scratching under his skin.But it wasn’t him I should have been watching.Caius’s hand slid up my thigh again, slow, deliberate, like every inch he claimed was his alone, like Kieran wasn’t standing right there ready to tear him apart. His thumb dragged lazy circles just shy of my hip bone, heat licking through me until my pulse jumped hard in my throat. His other hand stayed br
I stared at him. He didn’t just say that. He couldn’t have.“You’re coming?” I whispered, the words catching in my throat.He paused at the large, dark wood armoire, a slow smile spreading across his face as he turned to face me. "Of course, I am," he purred, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. "We have to greet them."And something about the way he said it sent a shiver crawling down my spine. It wasn’t a shiver of fear, not exactly. It was more like a jolt of electricity, a recognition that whatever was coming, it wouldn’t be a fair fight. Lyra, who had been standing silent and still, shifted her weight. "My Lord, with all due respect, sending the entire war party into the forest is a dangerous move. They could be baiting us into a trap."Caius simply scoffed, not even bothering to look at her. "Let them. A trap for them, perhaps. Not for us. We'll meet them on their own terms. And we'll show them what happens when they dare to challenge the new order."He said the last part with a
Chapter 29 - OLD FRIENDS~ ~ Astrid ~ ~I woke up tasting blood and pleasure.It wasn’t a dream. My body remembered every brutal detail, every agonizing stretch, every blinding wave of an orgasm that had ripped through me. Consciousness returned slowly, not like waking from sleep, but like surfacing from a deep, dark ocean.The first thing I registered was the sheets. They were silk , impossibly smooth and cool against my bruised skin. I wasn’t on the chaise lounge. I was in his bed.The second thing was the scent. His scent. Ozone, ancient stone, and him. It was everywhere, clinging to the silk, saturating the air, sinking into my pores until I couldn’t tell where he ended and I began.A low, dull ache throbbed in my neck. I lifted a trembling hand to the spot, my fingers brushing against two small, raised punctures. They weren’t bleeding. The skin around them was strangely warm, humming with a faint energy that felt both foreign and intimately familiar. It felt like him.I sat up, t
CHAPTER 28~ ~ KIERAN ~ ~The office stank of my father.Old leather and the cheap cigars he smoked when he thought no one was looking. But the scent that was missing was the one driving me up the wall. Astrid’s. That faint trace of lavender soap that always seemed to linger here, a constant reminder of what was supposed to be mine.Now, there was just stale air and the smell of a dead man.I shoved the pack ledger away from me, the heavy book sliding across the polished wood. Three days. For three fucking days, I’d been trapped in this office, listening to the panicked whispers filter through the walls.A restless energy thrummed under my skin, making it impossible to sit still. My wolf wanted to hunt, to tear something apart. Anything. The trackers had come back with their tails between their legs. Her scent, they’d said, just stopped. Vanished at the edge of the Forbidden Forest like she’d been plucked out of the sky. All they found was a scrap of her dress.Useless.A knock at the