7

The door shut behind him and Kiara collapsed on the bed, catching her breath. All those while she stood toe to toe with Devon caught up with her fast because she had overexerted her struggling body. 

Her body felt stiff and her throat was dry and burning up – it was the wolfsbane – reaching out, she tried to touch her neck and massage it, but her fingers caught on the locket she took from her mother’s corpse and her body momentarily shut down.

She ran her fingers on it before she raised it to her face and her parents’ faces came to view. Tears formed and pulled in her eyes at the sight, and she immediately threw her head back to wedge the tears from falling.

Tucking the locket back into her shirt, Kiara stood up with a disgruntled groan and went in search of the man that was with her a while ago. She needed him to either agree to her proposal or let her go – she was hoping he’d let her go, she did not want the whole mate thing they had with each other.

The hallways and the paths she took were oddly lonely and quiet, so she assumed it was a small pack, and that made her even more determined to get him to let her go. However, when she spent over 30 minutes walking – the wolfsbane made it difficult to tap into and use her wolf abilities - in search of the pack borders, she got even more suspicious about the emptiness of such a vast pack. 

Relief flooded her veins when she finally picked up on people talking, but the relief was withheld when she heard a wolf growling. Her relief turned to fear when she finally got to the scene, and what looked like over 30 wolves had their red predatory gaze fixed on her.

Before she could turn her heels and attempt a run – despite knowing it was impossible to escape them with the wolfsbane still in her blood – the wolves jumped on her, knocking her off her feet and knocking the breath out of her lungs. She tried to fight back, believing Gaytor and Kristen might have sent them after her, but then she heard a whine and a long ticklish lick across her face, and her eyes widened.

The wolves all started licking her, forcing a laugh out of her and making her even more breathless.

“What the hell is going on?” she asked as she managed to pull her head out of the crowd, but Devon and Luka looked just as confused as her.

Devon watched the scene with a mixture of confusion and an overwhelming rage at the wolves licking his mate, but that was not the end of it. Growls erupted from behind them, and when they turned, more rogues had gathered and their gazes were latched onto Kiara, who now looked terrified.

“Get more soldiers,” he said to Luka, then turned to the soldiers, “make sure they don’t get any closer to her.” He walked to the licking wolves and began prying them off her body and flinging them to the side one after the other, but they kept finding their way back to her.

“Enough!” his voice boomed, rattling the leaves on the trees, and the wolves froze, “get off her, right now!” the wolves whined and tried to disobey, but he was halfway into changing, and they knew an encounter with his wolf would leave them dead, so with reluctance, they slowly backed away from Kiara.

Her eyes were a minute away from shutting because of how breathless she had gotten from the ticklish licking. In a quick swoop, Devon scooped her into his arms.

“Do not puke on me,” he warned before he dashed off,

Kiara felt light headed, and a bile rose to her throat when he finally got to his destination and dropped her on a chair. “I am sick, couldn’t you have been slower?!” she glared hard at him, but Devon was unfazed.

He leaned against the table, his arms crossed against his chest as he studied her. The scene back then had raised tons of question in his mind, and the most prominent was whether she was his mate, or that was just a reaction because of her alleged unique scent.

“I will kill you,” he said, and Kiara’s heart dropped. “I am going to ask you some questions, and if you lie to me even once, I am going to kill you without missing a beat.” 

She wanted to call his bluff and tell him that he possibly couldn’t kill her, they were mated to each other, but then she remembered Kristen and she breathed out a humorless laugh.

“Fine,” Devon angled his head slightly to the side, surprised. “I will make it easier for you to carry out your threat.”

“And how exactly do you propose that?”

“Tell me your name and your pack’s name.”

His eyes narrowed when he figured out what her plan was, and he stood up straighter, “and what do you plan to do with it?”

“As an alpha, why are you so scared of the unknown?”

His hand immediately latched around her throat, pressing her further into the chair and making it extremely difficult for her to breath. “Do not test my patience, I am not a very patient man”

“Not a very courageous one either.”

Releasing his grip on her neck, Devon backed away and smiled. Two can play these games. “You wanted to know my name and that of my pack?”

“Do you finally have enough balls to tell me?” she asked, knowing he already caught on her intentions.

He swallowed his retort and nodded, “My name is Alex Black, and this pack is bloodhound pack. any more questions?”

“That’s all,” she whispered, unsure of her decision now that he willingly gave up his name. The chances of her finding someone or a pack to help her were close to zero, he was the closest shot she had but she did not want the mating bond – she despised it now.

The thought of the rogues outside who were latching onto her earlier came to mind and suddenly her mind was made up again.

“I, Kiara Sorde, reject you, Alex Black, as my mate.” She said, bracing herself for the pain to come but nothing came.

Instead, Devon stood up with a knowing smile on his face. “So, your name is Kiara Sorde… sounds quite familiar.”

“You lying bitch!” she yelled and sprang up in an attempt to hurt him, but both the wolfsbane in her blood and his hand around her neck pushed her back to the seat.