Chapter 4 - Caged

Eli

Jace doesn’t say a word as he marches me through the lodge and out into the cold night.

I don’t resist. I know better than to struggle with a Beta, especially when my wolf is still tangled up in Ronan’s scent.

The bond pulses at the side of my neck with every heartbeat. A dull ache that won’t ease no matter how many times I rub at it.

Outside, the pack camp hums like a living thing.

Voices low, firelight flickering over scarred wooden cabins, the occasional shadow of a wolf moving between trees.

Eyes track me as we pass. Some are curious, some hostile, a few hold expressions I know too well. Amusement at a trapped and helpless thing.

Jace shoves me toward a cabin near the edge of camp. “In,” he says, voice gravelly, no patience in it.

Inside, it’s sparse. Holding a cot, a table and a single chair. There are bars on the window.

My throat tightens. I’ve been in rooms like this before. Rooms that smell of old blood and sweat and hopelessness.

Jace lingers in the doorway, arms folded.

He’s big, but not like Ronan. His bulk is rough, scarred, less predator and more soldier.

“Word of advice,” he rumbles. “Don’t make him chase you.”

I glare at him. “I’m not your problem.”

“It’ll be my problem if he tears your throat out in a rut.”

His eyes flick to the mark on my neck, then back to my face.

“You’ve got no idea what you’ve stumbled into, do you?”

“I didn’t stumble,” I snap. “I was running.”

He huffs a dry laugh. “Not anymore, you’re not.”

He steps back and pulls the door shut with a heavy clang. I hear the bolt slide home from the outside and silence drops around me like a weight.

I stand in the middle of the room, fists tight at my sides, breathing hard.

My skin itches with the memory of Ronan’s hand on my chest, his voice in my ear.

I want to scrub the sensation away. I want to tear the bite out of my neck.

Instead I pace, back and forth, back and forth, until the moonlight through the barred window shifts and exhaustion drags me down onto the cot.

I close my eyes. Try not to smell him on me. Try not to hear him in my head.

It doesn’t work.

You’re mine now.

I jolt awake hours later to the sound of the bolt sliding back. I sit up fast, heart in my throat, as the door creaks open.

Ronan fills the doorway, shadowed and silent. He steps inside, closing the door behind him with a click that feels too final.

“What do you want?” My voice is sharper than I mean it to be. It’s the only weapon I have.

He doesn’t answer. He prowls closer, unhurried, until he’s standing over me.

I’m still on the cot, looking up at him, and the position makes my skin crawl.

He smells stronger now, sharp and wild, like smoke caught in pine needles.

My body reacts before my mind can catch up. Something hot unfurls in my core, betraying me as it spreads, alive and insistent.

He notices the way my skin flushes and his mouth curves in that slow, knowing way that makes my heart stutter.

“I should leave you here,” he says in a low voice, crouching down until his eyes are level with mine.

“Let you stew. Let the bond eat at you until you’re begging me to take you.”

“Go to hell,” I whisper.

Ronan chuckles. A low, dark sound that makes the hairs on my neck stand on end.

He reaches out, his fingers brushing the inside of my wrist.

Just a touch. Barely there. But the bond flares like a live wire, and I can’t bite back the shiver that rakes down my spine.

His eyes darken. “You feel that,” he murmurs. “You can’t fight it. Not forever.”

I yank my hand back. “Stop touching me.”

He leans in, so close his breath grazes my lips, and I can’t move, can’t think.

His hand comes up, slow, almost gentle, and cups my jaw.

His thumb strokes the corner of my mouth, and I swear he feels the way my lips part on a ragged inhale.

“You should be thanking me,” he whispers, voice rough and dangerous.

“If I weren’t fighting my own rut, I’d have you on your knees already.”

My pulse trips hard, a spark shooting low through my belly.

I hate that a sound almost escapes my throat. Half whimper, half something else.

His grin sharpens, then he releases me abruptly and stands.

“Sleep,” he says, tone suddenly flat and commanding. “You’ll need your strength.”

And then he’s gone, door closing behind him, leaving me alone with the scent of him still thick in the air and my own heart pounding like it’s going to break.

I press my forehead into my knees and whisper into the dark, to no one but myself.

“I’m not yours. I’m not. I’ll never be.”