All Chapters of BOUGHT BY CRUELEST ALPHA: Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

Rain lashes the car windows like claws on glass. The wipers can't keep up—just smears of gray and the too-bright glare of headlights cutting through the storm. My hands won't stop shaking. The locket burns against my skin, that damned Thorne crest pressing into my palm through the fabric of my pocket. Kieran knows. Kieran has always known. Arthur's grip tightens on the wheel. His knuckles are white, the scent of his fury thick enough to choke on. Claire crouches in the backseat, her silver dagger glinting as she cleans her nails with it. A nervous habit. Garrick's voice crackles through the radio: "Found his trail. West side of the old quarry. Moving fast." Arthur exhales through his nose. "Trap?" "Probably." Claire's blade stills. "But we're out of time." The baby kicks inside me, a sharp reminder. Two months until the eclipse. Two months until they come for her. The quarry looms ahead, its jagged edges black against the storm-lit sky. We abandon the car half a mile

That's all I can think as we crest the ridge—the moon swallowing the sun whole, painting the world in bruised purples and sickly reds. My boots slide on loose scree as I scramble forward, lungs burning with every gasping breath. The altar looms ahead, black obsidian drinking in the dying light. And on it— No. No no no— The High Priest holds her over the sacrificial bowl. My daughter. My Elara. Swaddled in white linen that glows unnaturally bright against the dark stone. Her tiny fists wave at the eclipsed sky like she's trying to catch the vanishing sun. Arthur's roar shakes the earth beneath us. "Lily, stay back!" But I'm already moving, goldfire licking up my arms as I charge forward. Arthur streaks past me in full wolf form—two hundred pounds of muscle and fury—only to be intercepted mid-leap by the Priest's champion. The creature unfolds from the shadows like nightmare given form, all sinew and snapping teeth, its eyes burning the same sickly green as the runes carved

"Faster," he growls.I try. God, I try. But every step sends fire through my legs, every breath tastes like ozone and something alive. The baby kicks in protest, her tiny feet slamming against my ribs hard enough to make me stumble.Not kicks. Never just kicks.Goldfire licks up my spine in response, searing through my veins. I bite my lip to keep from screaming.Garrick brings up the rear, his massive frame hunched against the wind. He hasn't spoken since we left the safehouse. Since the storm started whispering to him."The cathedral," Arthur shouts over the gale. "Move!"The building looms ahead, its once-grand arches now crumbling, stained glass windows shattered into jagged teeth. A flash of lightning illuminates the spire—and for a heartbeat, I swear I see claws scraping against stone.Then we're inside, collapsing onto cracked marble floors. The air smells of mildew and old blood. Claire slams the heavy doors shut behind us, her hands shaking as she slides the rusted bolt."Won

Slick black stone veined with something darker, something that pulses in time with the moon’s slow suffocation above us.My child is on that stone.No. Not just my child.The thing wearing their skin.It’s been whispering to me for hours. Days. Maybe forever. A voice like roots cracking through bone, like the hush of a grave settling. "Mother," it says, but it’s not my name it wants. It’s the shape of it. The sound.Arthur’s hand grips my arm, fingers digging in hard enough to bruise. "Lily. Look at me."I do. His eyes are wildfire—desperate, furious. Alive.He’s going to die here.The thought slices through me, clean and cold. He knows it too. I see it in the set of his jaw, the way his thumb brushes my wrist once, twice—like he’s memorizing the pulse.Kieran’s voice cuts through the chanting. "They’ve started the invocation."I don’t turn. Can’t. If I look at him—my brother, the stranger with my father’s smile—I’ll scream. Or sob. Or rip his throat out.The trees around us weep crim

A monastery’s broken arches clawing at a bruised sky. The scent of wet parchment and rust. Then gone. I’m drowning. Not in water in him. The First Alpha’s presence coils through my mind like smoke, thick and choking. He lets me surface sometimes. Just enough to see. To know. A game. "Watch," he murmurs, and my eyes focus. Arthur stands over a crumbling altar, fingers digging into Kieran’s collar. His knuckles are split. Fresh blood dots Kieran’s jaw. "You knew," Arthur snarls. "This whole time, you fucking knew" Kieran doesn’t fight back. His gaze flicks to the child huddled in the corner, knees drawn to their chest. Small. Too small. "It’s not that simple," Kieran says. Arthur shakes him. "The ritual needs kin-blood. That means her. Or the kid." A pause. The air tastes like lightning. Then "Or me," Kieran says softly. The First Alpha laughs in my skull. "Pathetic," the croods. "He thinks sacrifice will save you." I lash out feeble twitch of will. The Alpha