Semua Bab The Alpha Heir Who Put a Baby in His Enemy: Bab 11 - Bab 20

The second message remained on my screen long after the words stopped feeling real.PREPARE THE SECOND EXPOSURE.Ronan read it beside me, close enough that his shoulder brushed mine.“What does second exposure mean?” I asked.“I was about to ask you.”“That answer is becoming irritating.”“So is being included in a biological experiment I apparently never agreed to.”My father reached for the phone.“Give me that.”I pulled it away.“You have had twenty-seven years to explain things to me. You can wait another thirty seconds.”Theodore’s expression hardened, but he said nothing.Ronan’s scent still filled the stairwell, thick enough to cover mine completely. It should have been reassuring.Instead, my body had begun responding to it in ways I did not want to acknowledge.Every breath seemed to pull him deeper into my bloodstream.The heat inside me remained painful, but when Ronan stood close, the panic receded.That frightened me.I looked at the photograph attached to the message ag

The silence after the call ended felt heavier than the threat itself.I stared at the burner phone in my hand.Stop taking suppressants. And stay close to your Alpha.My Alpha.The phrase made something inside me tighten.Ronan looked at me.“Give me the phone.”I handed it over.He checked the number, then the call log.“Blocked.”“Of course.”Marcus stepped into the office.“Can it be traced?”“Maybe,” Ronan said. “Not from here.”I looked at the empty suppressant case on the examination table.Twelve missing injectors.My physician gone.Blood in his car.And someone on the other end of a disposable phone talking about me as though my body were part of a schedule.“This was never about exposing me.”Ronan’s eyes lifted.“No.”“They want the heat.”“Yes.”“Why?”“That is what we need to find out.”I laughed softly.“You say that as though we have not spent the last several hours finding out that everyone around me has been lying.”Marcus looked away.Ronan did not.“You still have o

The speaker went silent.For one second, nobody moved.Then Elias whispered, “Run.”The word barely left his mouth before something heavy slammed against the clinic’s front entrance.Marcus turned toward the sound.Ronan raised his weapon.Another impact followed.Then a third.The glass beside reception cracked.“They’re coming through,” Marcus said.Elias grabbed my sleeve.“There’s another exit.”“Where?”“The lower level.”Ronan looked at him.“You just said they found us there.”“They know we are in the building. They do not know which access route we will use.”“That is not reassuring.”“It is the only option.”Another impact shattered part of the front door.Ronan made the decision for all of us.“Move.”Elias led us toward the treatment room.He shoved aside a metal cabinet, revealing a narrow panel in the wall.Marcus stared.“That was not on any construction plan.”Elias pressed his thumb against an old scanner.Nothing happened.He swore.“Power’s been cut.”Ronan looked at

The message on my phone should have frightened me more than it did.THE NEXT PHASE REQUIRES PHYSICAL UNION.Instead, anger came first.Cold, clear, and almost welcome.Someone had spent years tracking my cycles, manipulating my medication, measuring my response to Ronan, and reducing every private thing about my body to a sequence of phases.I was done being treated like a subject.Ronan took the phone from my hand and read the message again.His jaw hardened.“This ends now.”Elias gave a bitter laugh.“That is what people always say when Cradle notices them.”Ronan looked at him.“Then tell me how to stop it.”The wounded attacker groaned near the wall.Marcus had tied his wrists with a strip torn from a medical restraint, but the man was still conscious.Barely.Ronan’s blood continued to run from the cut along his forearm.I tried not to look at it.My body had other ideas.His scent had changed after the injury.Sharper.Warmer.The blood on my wrist seemed to pulse against my sk

I stared at the boy in the photograph until every feature became familiar enough to frighten me.Dark hair.Gray eyes.The same narrow line between the brows that appeared on my face whenever I was trying not to show anger.Lucian Vale.My brother.Alive.At least, he had been alive twelve years ago.My mother stood across from me with both hands pressed tightly together, as though she were afraid they might shake apart if she let go.“You knew his name.”She closed her eyes.“Yes.”“And you told me you did not know what happened to him.”“I did not know where he was.”“That is not the same thing.”“No.”Ronan said nothing.He had moved closer, but not close enough to touch me.For once, I appreciated the distance.My body had already been manipulated enough tonight.I turned the photograph over again.THE FIRST CHILD SURVIVED.The words should have brought relief.Instead, they made something inside me ache.If Lucian survived, then someone had raised him.Someone had watched him gro