A King Kneels No One

KieranHer body felt too light in my arms, lighter than it should. The ice-water chill on her skin bled straight through my shirt. That wasn't what set my wolf howling.The scent of her blood, throat, wrist, hit me first. Sharp, immediate. It demanded something my instincts recognized on sight: a slaughter, owed and overdue.Against me she felt fragile, her heartbeat thin and uneven behind her ribs. She'd torn her own body apart to save a child who belonged to the man who'd thrown her away."Mate?" Cain's voice caught, like the word refused to leave his throat. "What nonsense is this, Kieran? She's crippled. She has no wolf. You're insane if you think I'll let you take the woman who tried to kill..."I turned toward him slowly. My eyes found Cain Hargrove, still puffing his chest out, still clinging to the illusion that this room answered to him.The man was pitiful. Eight years he held the rarest thing he would ever own, and threw it into the mud for a piece of dirt now cowering behi

Hanging By a Thread

Kieran The heart monitor in the Vorreth base ICU kept time like something hammering against my skull. Steady, mechanical, indifferent to what it measured. I stood rigid beside the steel bed, watching Leah under a mess of tubes and wire. Her skin had gone past pale, closer to ash. Black veins crept out from the injection site on her neck, spreading toward her chest like roots. Each time those veins pulsed, her breath caught. "Explain it to me," I said, low, without looking away from her face. "Why is she getting worse after we neutralized the poison?" Dr. Vance stood across the bed, tense, cold sweat at his temples. "Alpha, the chemical those men used wasn't an ordinary poison. It's a synthetic neurotoxin, built to destroy blood cells." Vance's voice shook. "If Miss Leah had a wolf, regeneration would have burned through it already. But she's human. Fully. Her immune system can't fight this. Her organs are failing in sequence. Her kidneys stopped five minutes ago." My jaw locked

Pure Hatred

KieranMy father didn't waste time. In one clean motion, he set the Obsidian Chalice on the bedside table and tipped a single drop of black liquid into it. The chalice began to shudder, radiating cold that cut straight to bone."Do it now, Kieran," he said. "Your blood. Through the chalice, into her."My hand shook as I drew the silver blade from my belt. I didn't hesitate. I cut across my own palm and let the blood run into the chalice, hot and red. My blood — pure Alpha King blood — met the old energy inside and turned the liquid molten gold.This was the most honest thing I had ever given anyone. My strength, my future, everything I had, traded for one working heartbeat.I leaned over the bed and lifted Leah's head with care. Her face, calm in sleep, was an accusation I couldn't answer. I drew one long breath and pressed my mouth to her throat, over the fading mark the poison had left there.I bit down.Not to hurt her. A bond, not a wound. My teeth broke skin, and I fed the gold

Mark Of Betrayal

LEAHThe first thing that greeted my consciousness wasn't the sharp smell of hospital medicine, but cold air, cold enough that my breath came out in thin clouds.I forced my eyes open. My eyelids felt like lead. Instead of the blinding hospital ceiling lights, I found rough wooden beams above me, lit by the dim glow of a fireplace. Wind howled outside, slamming against the wooden walls hard enough to rattle them.Where am I?I tried to sit up. Strangely, the pain that should have been crushing my whole body was gone. The bruises on my face no longer throbbed. When my eyes landed on my wrist, the rope wound had closed completely, leaving only a thin red line behind.But one spot on my body burned.My neck. Right above my pulse, a strange, hot pulse ran through the skin, beating in rhythm with my heart. I touched it with a shaking hand. The texture was uneven. Two puncture wounds, already scarred over.My breath caught in my throat. I threw off the heavy blanket covering me and forced m

Finally Done, Ex. I Am Mate, Not Maid のすべてのチャプター: チャプター 41 - チャプター 44

A King Kneels No One

Hanging By a Thread

Pure Hatred

Mark Of Betrayal