Chapter 2: The lycan king

Chapter 2:

I swallowed as the darkness cleared away, terror freezing my bones.

The sentinels and servants, every one of them was lying in a pool of their own blood, their hearts ripped out of their chests.

Something cold amd hard settled in my stomach.

"That was easy," a deep voice purred and I froze as a man's hand touched my hair, stroking it absentmindedly. "Almost too easy."

I started trembling and tears spilled out of my eyes as he roped my hair around his fists once, twice, thrice, and then he pushed me into the chair I had been sitting in.

He released a breath and strolled to the end of the table, darkness curdling around him like smoke. "I must say, I am very unimpressed with your pack's security, Darius. I was expecting more of a challenge."

My heart hung in my throat as I looked at the dark, handsome man that was smiling at my father with the most evil intent and muder on his mind.

There was nothing good about that smile.

He sat at the end of the table and gestured at my parents to take their seats. "Go on. Sit down. I just want to chat," he said, taking the opportunity to serve himself as if this was just another dinner party he had been invited to. As if there weren't dead bodies lying all around us.

Alpha Atlas looked like sin. Like every wrong but tempting thing you have been told to stay away from but you couldn't because they were just so damn attractive and appealing to that fucked up side of you.

He was handsome in a dark, terrifying way. Thick black hair rested gently on his shoulders, his eyes shined bright with the intent to hurt and kill. He had a face that belonged in a museum for greek gods. His arms were ballistic missiles. He looked like he could crush my skull with his bare hands. 

There was blood splattered on his face, hands and clothes but he acted like it was nothing as he leaned back against the seat and casted my father a chilling gaze and frigid grin.

"I knew you were foolish, Darius. Incredibly foolish..." He chuckled, zero warmth in those black eyes of his, "but the level of foolishness you exhibited today," he clicked his tongue, shaking his head, "I must admit, I don't find it funny. Not. One. Bit."

He wasn't smiling anymore and he held my father's gaze in his cold black orbs. "You see, I'm familiar with the saying, 'all is fair in love and war. But going after my daughter is where I draw the FUCKING line."

My father's jaw ticked but he said nothing, fear and submission oozing out of his pores.

He released my father's gaze to look around, glossing over the dead bodies scattered on the ground as he took in the lavish interior of our home. 

"You have a nice home, a lovely family..." he commended, his eyes glossing over the table, my parents... Until they landed on me. "A lovely daughter too."

My breathing hitched. Fear siezed my throat but I held the brute's gaze because I couldn't let him know how much he intimidates me.

He grinned when I didn't back down, a dark, roguish stretching of his lips, and rose from his seat. Every step he took in my direction had me shrinking back little by little inside, until he was in front of me.

Unable to hold his gaze anymore, I looked back down at my food, my heart thumping in my chest.

This seemed to enrage him because he forcefully grabbed my chin, his hands digging into my skin and forced me to look up at him. He traced the countours of my face, a distracted gaze in his eyes. His hands left my face and traced my neck, going lower and lower and dipping into the neckline of my dress. 

I gasped when he squeezed my breasts in his large calloused hand, hating the shiver of desire that suddenly rolled over me.

I flinched and rose to my feet, my hand raised to slap him for daring to touch me but he easily grabbed my hand and squeezed it hard enough to break my wrist, whirled me around and pushed my head down on the table, pinning my hand behind my back.

I wriggled and struggled under his hold but let out a shocked gasp when a loud smack came down hard on my butt. And another. And another. 

He was spanking me... Right here, in front of my parents. It was hard. Painful. Humiliating.

He didn't stop until my butt was throbbing and felt like it was on fire.

"You don't want to play with me, Mia cara." He whispered into my ear but I growled, pissed, hurt, scared and embarrassed. "Go cry about it."

He let out a dark, humourless laugh and just when I thought he was going to leave me alone, he grabbed my hair, so tight in his grasp that I felt my extensions come loose. He jerked my head off the table roughly. 

"You want to play? Let's keep playing."

He pulled harder on my hair until my head was whipped all the way back and I cried from the pain of my strands pulling out of their roots. 

He brought his nose to the side of my neck and inhaled deeply while my body fought against desire and revulsion.

He jerked me around to face my parents and I gasped as he pulled me flat against his front.

"I'll tell you what," he declared, his deep voice rumbling in his chest and reverberating against my back. I hated how much I was trembling in his rough hold but the more I struggled against him, the tighter he held me. 

Prick.

"I have an offer for you, Darius. I think you'll love this." 

My father bowed his head and nodded, trembling before Alpha Atlas... My father, who commanded the most elite pack in the entire world was bowing to this rogue brute like a common errand boy.

I nearly spat at him in disgust.

"A- anything t- to make up for my mistakes, A- Alpha Atlas," he whispered, tripping over his words.

"It is nice to see you so cooperative." I could feel Atlas's smile on the skin of my neck. "Very well!" He declared. "I am willing to let bygones be bygones on one condition." 

Finally. 

My heart heaved a tired breath and even my parents' shoulders sagged in relief.

He could ask for anything now. A million dollars. Our fleet of yachts. A sprawling estate. The best healers our pack has to offer.

Sure he had killed off most of the useless sentinels and pack dwellers but I had every reason to believe that some must have hidden for their lives when the alpha came. With our influence and resources, it would be a breeze building the pack back up to its former glory.

He would let bygones be bygones and my father won't be stupid enough to step on his toes again. All will be well.

"Your daughter."

...

What?!

My heart stopped for one terrifying second as his words wrapped itself around my heart and squeezed.

Even my parent, who had been watching us with bated breaths, now looked at him, frozen in shock.

My father licked his lips, considering this.

"A- as a wife? That can be arranged-"

My eyes bulged in shock and disbelief.

No way in hell was he offering me to this mad man to be his wife! How could he throw me under the bus like this?!

"No," Alpha Atlas cut him off but before I could even let out a relieved breath, it was seized from me again with his next words. "Not as a wife. As my personal toy. I want the beautiful Nyx to be my sex slave. You owe me for the crimes you committed against me Darius. And your daughter will pay the price. In full."

"Over my dead. Fucking. Body!" I screamed, thrashing hard until he let me go.

Just when I thought I had one upped him, he back handed me so hard across my face, sending me sprawling against the table. 

My ears were ringing. My head was spinning. I tasted blood in my mouth as I struggled to stand back up.

I looked at my father for help but he was just sitting there, frozen in shock and trembling before us.

Disgust and revulsion for him welled up in my stomach and burned my blood.

"Can't you do anything, father?" I screamed at him. "This mad man just hit me!" 

My father stood up, his head bowed in fear, the perfect picture of submission. "I am sorry, I deeply apologize in any way my daughter has shown you disrespect."

I choked on a dry, humourless laugh. You have GOT to be kidding me! "What are you doing? I'm the one being offended here." 

My mother, who didn't know when to shut up around my father, who would bow to no man, also joined and bowed her head low. "Please, accept our apologies for my husband's stupidity and my daughter's insolence. I take full responsibility."

"Responsibility," Atlas purred in an amused voice. He finally let me go and stalked up to my parents. They bowed even lower as he stood before them. "Yes, let's talk about taking responsibility for our actions, shall we?"

Quick as lightening, he grabbed my father by his neck and lifted him up with just one hand.

My father was the strongest, proudest man I knew, but here he was with fear in his eyes, choking to death by a man half his age.

"Please," he begged. "Mercy. Have mercy."

"Mercy? You mistake me for the goddess, Darius," he said, squeezing harder.

My father's face turned purple. Sweat dribbled down his brows. His legs flayed and he was uselessly clawing at Atlas' hand.

Even though I was disgusted by my father's pathetic true nature, I couldn't just let him die at the hands of a deranged mad man.

I removed my shoe and chucked it at Atlas, who easily dodged and turned around to look at me, murder and amusement swirling in those bottomless black orbs.

"Let him go!" I tried to effuse as much courage as I could into my voice, refusing to let him see how shaken and scared for my father I was.

He threw his head back in laughter and grinned at me. "Fine. I'll let him go... If," he walked over to me, my father still struggling in his hold and my resolve trembled a little more with each step he took in my direction.

Finally he was upon me.

I held my breath, awaiting his obscene condition.

His eyes were cold, dark, empty. "On your knees."

"W-what?" I hated the tremble in my voice.

"Get on your knees, Nyx, and apologize for disrespecting me. I won't have my whore saying such crass things to me."

My temper flared up at that. "I'm not your fucking whor-"

I hadn't even finished my sentence before I heard the crunch of bones breaking. Blood splayed all over my face and I looked in horror as my father hung limp and lifeless in Atlas' hand.

He proceeded to toss him away like he was nothing and crouched in front of me.

His eyes darkened at the look of terror on my face and I flinched from him when he licked a trickle of blood off my neck. He licked his lips and grinned at me, his eyes dark with the intent to consume me, own me. Break me. There was no escaping it. No matter what I did, no matter the conditions he makes, he wasn't going to leave without taking me along.

So when he walked over to my mother and asked me to apologize once more, I knew I had no cards left in this game he was playing and I wouldn't stoop low and apologize to a man like him that was bent on taking vengeance.

He looked at me, bottomless black seas in his eyes. "Beg me. Beg me for your mother's life, Nyx."

If my mother's fate was in my hands, she was as good as dead. I will rather die than beg any man.

My mother seemed to accept her fate. She was quiet and composed at her impending death, like a queen.

He must have seen the fiery conviction in my eyes because he nodded and turned to my mother.

It only took a swipe of his hands and my mother's head was disconnected from her neck and rolled on the ground, stopping right in front of me. Mocking me.

I hadn't apologized. Hadn't stoop low to feed this psychopath's hunger for my humiliation... But at what cost?

The little dinner I had eaten suddenly started working up my throat and I threw up all over the floor, wretching and wheezing.

The floor started to tilt. Everything around me started spinning. The last thing I remember was Atlas catching me as I fell into the black.