All Chapters of Alpha Maddox's Mortal Temptation : Chapter 181 - Chapter 190

I shift higher on my knees to gain a few inches. It brings our noses in touching range. “Zane, you know it’s a good idea.”“If by good idea you mean bullshit. The problem with your plan, and I’m using that word generously, is that you do not have the resources to pull it off.”“Then help me.” I try to wrap my hand around his wrist, but my fingers don’t meet. “You care about Daisy just as much as I do. What if— what if I stay in the Northwest? Where’s your Den? Olympia? Take me there. Parade me around. We’ll make it so easy for the Vampyres to find me, they won’t even investigate Daisy’s whereabouts. They’ll come for me, your patrols will capture them, and Owen will gain control of the council. Please. At least consider it.”He straightens abruptly, freeing himself from my grip with no effort. A small shudder licks up my spine, and the way he looked at me earlier, the weight of his eyes on my bared body, it all flashes through me like a bolt. For a moment I am— I don’t know. Eager. Une

He shrugs, one shouldered. Truly, he does not give a shit about the stuff I spend my nights overthinking. “Everyone does.”“You didn’t . . . It’s not a secret?”“We made sure every Were knew, Anna.”“Oh. Why?”“No sane Were will touch you if they think you’re important to me.”If they think.I scratch the back of my head. “Do they think we . . . ?”“No. We made that clear, too.”“So they know that I’m your mate but we’re not together?”“Correct.”“And doesn’t it bother you?"“Why would it?”“I don’t know. Just . . . big bad Alpha. Everyone’s boss. I thought you might want to . . .”“Spare myself the humiliation of having been rejected?” He huffs a laugh. “Anna, there are much worse things than that.”Are there? I’m not so sure. The good and the bad of my life correlate strongly with feelings of being wanted— or not. But Zane is not a Human orphan, let alone one whose claim to fame is being useless in therapy because of an overgrown case of infantile amnesia.Like me, or don’t. I real

I grin at him, wondering when it will sink in that I’m about to die. The atoms that make me will be eaten by worms and turn into fungi and undergo redistribution within the universe. Why do I feel so little? “My medical records through the years, the ones I gave you. You still have them?”He nods.“After I . . . Feel free to make copies and share them with whoever you want— they’ll come in handy as Daisy grows up and— ” My voice cracks.For the past decade, I’ve refused to let my circumstances define me. Fuck being an orphan, or poor, or the Collateral’s lady- in- waiting. Fuck being a victim. Fuck navel-gazing and wallowing in my wretchedness.And then I met Daisy. Who’s an orphan and a hybrid. She’s every thing that I used to be. And the compassion I’ve never been able to extend to myself overflows whenever I think about her.Whoever intends to hurt her will have to crawl over my cold, rotting corpse. Literally, perhaps.“Mine is a Were illness and likely has nothing to do with me b

“Is there any strife?” I ask Amanda now. “Between Zane and the huddle leaders?”“No. Or, no more so than usual. Zane does thrive on pissing people off— it’s his main pastime.”“Is it okay to say that about your Alpha?”“If it’s true. Which it totally is.” She grins and rotates her shoulders, arching up in a stretch. I can’t quite swallow a gasp when my eyes stumble on her nails, elongated into sharp, lethal weapons. When she yawns, her canines are no longer blunt. “Oh, shit.” She laughs and immediately backtracks her shift. “It’s been months since I last was in human form for over a day. Not used to it, I guess.”Daisy told me something similar. When I was in the north, Uncle Zane spent four days in wolf form and never changed back, she said, sounding the same mix of titillated and scandalized as when I’d explained to her that no, Sparkles was not going to have kittens, because his testicles resided somewhere at the bottom of a vet’s composting bin. RIP, Sparkles Jr. and Sparklette.

“YOU NEED TO EAT,” HE SAYS ONCE THE CAR IS OUT OF THE driveway.I stare up at the hemlock-spruces that line the road, nose pressed against the cool glass, and murmur, “I’m good.”The thing about this place is: the farther north we push, the more beautiful it gets. Dramatic. A little mysterious. Lush and rich. I spot a million shades of green. Everything towers. Endless jutting trees, spongy moss, water flowing always, everywhere, vibrant and otherworldly and so alive, it makes me feel alive, too.“You’re lots of things, and good is not one of them.”I glance at Zade, who’s not unlike the landscape: outdoorsy and remote and moody. Wild and overcast. “Must be nice,” I muse.“What?”“Being you. Knowing everything.”“It is, yeah,” he agrees.“Any other unfulfilled strata in my pyramid of need that I should know about?”“You’re sleep deprived. A little dehydrated. But the hunger is what concerns me the most.”“I told you. My appetite has been— ”“Low. That’s fine. We’ll find something you