“Like you could hurt her, she’s fierce! Oh my God, Aria, you took down the alpha!” Kinvara cheered, and I swallowed down bile at the reminder.
“Yes, and now he’s dead,” I said in a deadpan tone.
She paused, staring at me with a deep furrow marring her forehead. “I’d see him dead a thousand times over before ever watching them throw you onto that floor and rape you. Do you understand me? He chose to fight you, and you gave him time to change his mind—he chose badly. That isn’t on you.”
“I know. But whatever I am becoming, I enjoyed emasculating Fallon for daring to think he could claim me without my permission, and I wanted to kill them all.”
“You had fangs…or whatever they are, and your nails became claws. You kept your mind this time. You’ve got to see that’s progress. But don’t dare ask me to not celebrate you. You’re my sister, and you just fucking mopped the floor with the alpha wolf, Aria. I don’t care what you are because that doesn’t change dick between us. We’re here with you, always.”
“I know,” I repeated, and the water started to boil again. “But what if I am a monster? What if Amara realized what she was, and she left to protect us from what she was becoming?”
“Then she made a poor choice,” Aurora stated. “We’re Hecate witches, we don’t fear our own. We don’t reject them either. I have raised you from the moment you inhaled your first breath into your tiny lungs. I have raised you all to accept whatever comes, and whatever you become. You’re my family, Aria. If Amara abandoned us, that’s on her, not us. Now, everyone inside, right this minute. You don’t hurt my girl, Knox.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” he said, smiling as he watched her shake her head and move into the house.
I turned, staring at him, and he smirked devilishly, shoving me beneath the water without warning, holding me down as I screamed and gasped for air. I scratched his hands, feeling my fingers transform into claws as I wrapped my hands around his wrists to remove them. I stared up at him, feeling the burn in my teeth, yet my fangs didn’t come. The rattle within me grew, turning into a dangerous purr that sounded wrong.
“Come on, I’m right fucking here, Aria. Show me who you are. Fight me! You don’t have the fucking balls to take me on, do you?” His gurgled words infuriated me.
Water began to boil faster, and he smiled, watching me closely. My mouth opened, and darkness blinked into my vision. My hands dropped from his, and he jerked me up.
“Bloody hell, breathe, woman! You’re not fucking dying today.”
“Bastard,” I said, choking and spitting out copious amounts of water. Knox pulled me close, staring at my teeth, and then at my hands.
“Anger isn’t the trigger to bring her beast out, nor is mortal danger.”
“Oh, I assure you I am triggered, dick. Get your fucking hands off of me.” I shoved him away from me, fixing my dress as he silently watched, soaked in his tux and expensive shoes.
“Leave us,” he said over his shoulder, turning his eyes back to mine. He waited for the men to be out of hearing distance before he spoke again. “You kissed another male with my name on your flesh.”
“And, so fucking what. I’m not yours, so what the hell does it matter if I kiss someone else?” I demanded, watching him with a challenge burning in my depths.
“He’ll be dead before the full moon next week.”
“So…What? If I kiss someone else, they die? You don’t even like me, remember? What was it you said I was…? Oh, yeah. I’m just a nasty whore who happens to be a witch. Or has that escaped your mind, Knox? I will fuck whoever the hell I want to fuck, and you can’t say otherwise,” I warned coldly, and he smirked, grabbing me and pushing me against the rock as his mouth brushed against mine, causing me to moan against him.
“I am the strongest asshole here, and my men and I are the only ones you cannot dominate, emasculate, or fucking devour. Do you understand that? I won’t kill Dimitri, you will. That creature slumbering inside of you that terrifies you so much? It should. I went toe-to-toe with her, Aria. I didn’t fucking lose, you did, but you fucking fought me so gloriously. That bite on your shoulder was me marking your creature, that way; your beast didn’t forget who had been dominated between us, because it sure in the fuck wasn’t me. That little boy wouldn’t stand a chance against you. Your beast is bred to test men, and if she smells weakness in them, she will slaughter them without blinking or any hesitation. She chooses a mate based on three things. If he is strong enough to subdue her, the way he fucks her after he’s managed to subdue, and his scent he oozes for her, marking him alpha enough to breed her needy cunt. You want that alpha puppy, little girl, go fucking get him.” He released me, leaving the water as I watched him walking toward the shore.
I had to get out of here before I ended up killing everyone I loved. “Knox?” I whispered, following behind him as I hiked through the water in my ripped dress. My heels caught on a rock, and as I reached down to grab my shoe, I was yanked from the water and thrown back onto the ground. Knox grabbed the air, slicing through a creature effortlessly before he ripped the head from its body. I stared at it, slowly moving my eyes to the blackened claws that Knox’s hands had become.
“Get inside, you’re being hunted.”
“What the hell was it?” I asked.
“A bounty hound from the Nine Realms,” he said, crouching down to grab the note attached to the collar before standing back up. I struggled to my feet, fixing my gown again as he watched me. “They’re given a scent to trace, and once they have it, they don’t stop until they find it. Once they find it, they either attack to weaken their mark, leaving behind enough poison to render it too weak to hide, or they kill it.”
“Which one would it have done to me?” I asked, and he stared at me crossly.
“I don’t know. I didn’t want to wait to see which one it chose before killing it.”
I lifted my gaze to his and nodded slowly. I mean, I didn’t want to be doggie chow either. I didn’t move my gaze from his and still hadn’t when he stepped closer, pinching my chin to lift my mouth to his. I pushed up on my toes, kissing him gently before he could change his mind. His mouth was soft, and yet he didn’t kiss me back. He’d closed off, and now I looked needy.
“Thank you for not waiting to see if it killed me.” I turned away, heading toward the house. He grabbed me, lifting me abruptly, threading his fingers through my hair to hold me still as his mouth crushed against mine. His tongue pushed against my lips, and I let him in, capturing his to duel against it. It was demanding, controlling, and all-consuming as he ravaged my mouth until my lungs burned for air.
He kissed me like he was waging war. A war neither of us would survive. His erection pushed against my apex, and I rocked my hips as my legs lifted to wrap around his waist. The purr started low in my chest, and he mirrored it, pulling away when it sounded from his chest in answer to mine. His eyes burned into mine and narrowed with confusion as he inhaled, fighting to get his breathing under control again.
“Don’t piss me off again,” he warned, letting me slide down his body slowly, feeling his erection, which started a need burning within me. “And the next time you dance like that, it better be for me, and you better not be wearing anything when you are. Go inside, Aria,” he growled, pressing his forehead against mine briefly. “Stay the fuck away from the mutt, or he will die, either by your teeth or mine.” He stepped back, turning on his heel as he left the property.
Chapter 43
It was days before I left the house, and when I did, it was only to the store and home. I would clean the store, polishing the crystals before decorating the shelves. I bundled sage, preparing smudge sticks and other herbs for use and spells. Everything was slowly moving on without Amara. She’d vanished without a trace, and there was nothing we could do to change it. I was walking back to my car when I noticed a note on my windshield, tucked beneath the wiper blade. I picked it up, looking around me before unfolding it.
I know you d
on’t understand what is happening, Aria. The realms aren’t what you think they are. You don’t belong in the Human Realm; we’re so much more than anything it could ever contain. I have taken steps to ensure your future is…fulfilled in every way you deserve it to be. Remember the old oak tree we used to pretend was white oak stolen from Norvalla? Meet me there on Sunday, and I will tell you everything. Time isn’t something we have the luxury of waiting on, as your new life here awaits you. I promise it is everything you deserve in life, prickly twin. ~A
I folded the note and looked around, narrowing my gaze on the area. I exhaled, watching as Kinvara skipped toward the car while staring at her phone. One of these days, she’d end up hit by a car for not paying attention.
“Kinvara, look around before you walk into the parking lot. People actually want to hit you.”
“It was one guy who said he was single. He lied about his situation.” She shrugged. “She’s better off without the cheating prick.”
“Still, if you looked up, you may see her car coming before she hits you. I got a note,” I announced, slipping behind the wheel before I checked the mirror while I waited for her to climb into the passenger seat.
“Love letter?”
I rolled my eyes. “Did you hear that? It’s my eyeballs ringing that bell at the way back in my head, jerk. It’s from Amara.”
She gasped as I handed it to her and waited for her to read it. I waited and waited, and she had to have read the damn thing several times before she handed it back to me. I pushed the note into the center console and gazed into the mirror.
“That truck’s been following us since we left the shop,” I muttered, turning onto a random street, and watching as it turned with us.
I turned several more times, and Kinvara called the house to inform them of the situation as I started toward it with my foot on the gas. She chuckled, and I didn’t look away from the road.
“What the hell is so funny?”
“It’s Tamryn,” she said, and I slowed down, peering at the driver before pulling off of the road. “That asshole, whose truck is she driving?” I questioned, watching my sister peel her tiny frame from the oversized truck.
Tamryn was ethereal and beautiful. She had platinum-colored hair that shined like diamonds in the sun’s early morning light, and I wasn’t jealous at all. Big, perky breasts bounced as she made her way to the car while her tiny hips swayed. Tamryn was full of fire, but it hid the pain she had been through. Losing the love of her life to cancer was brutal. We’d all watched his decline with sadness since he refused to allow us to help him.
He’d refused to be changed into an undead creature, or use the potions that would hold off the inevitable. He’d been brave and strong during his fight. Tamryn had been falling apart, but she never cried or broke down, not until he’d taken his last breath on this earth. Now she was reborn through the fire and pain she’d endured, and was still beautiful, maybe even more so because of what she’d been through.
“You trying to lose me?” She leaned against the window, glaring at us as her full lips twisted into a naughty grin.
“Are you trying to scare us to death?” Kinvara flipped her off before she leaned over me, squishing me to hug Tamryn over my lap.
“Get off of me, you asshat. Are you home for a while this time, or just passing through?” I watched as she stepped back and allowed me to open the door to exit the car to hug her properly.
“You bet your pretty titties I’m back. God damn, I have missed you girls something fierce, that and I heard we got trouble brewing. I also wouldn’t miss being here for Luna and her new little ones for the world. Besides, I will be the best aunt they’ve ever known.” Tamryn shrugged, smirking at me, and I stepped back.
“She has a lot of aunts, and most of us assume we will be the favorite.” I shrugged as I held my hands up, leaning back against the car as she joined me. “I think that will be one fight where we will have to actually try to win. I’m glad you’re home, Tamryn, you’ve been horribly missed around here.”
“I missed you too, asshole.”
“Try not to create too much of a scene, there’s chaos playing out.”
“Reign told me some badass bitch took down the alpha wolf this week. You wouldn’t know where I could find her? I hear she’s a beautiful badass who is about to set the world on fire, maybe even literally.” She smiled, leaning against my shoulder before lifting her gaze to look at me with pride shining in her eyes.
“Fallon was slaughtered because of me.”
“Fuck Fallon, he chose his death by choosing to hurt one of our bloodline. He tried to dominate you by force, he lost, and it is as simple as that. I’d say the prick got what he was asking for.”
“Yeah, well, the entire House of Alpha is being rebuilt from the inside out. They’d been keeping us up all night while celebrating their crowning of a new king of the pack. Fallon’s head has been placed on a spike outside the main house. There are screams that never end coming from within that mansion, and they don’t ever seem to stop.”
“Interesting, but it doesn’t change the facts, sister mine, and you seem to think that if you hadn’t taken him down, he’d still have that head on his shoulders? He grew sloppy, Aria. He was also very aware that you were an alpha by nature, which was apparent even before shit started getting twisted. He made a choice, and that choice cost him his head. That isn’t something you can take the blame for. You want to feel guilty, fine, but even if it hadn’t been you, he’d have died eventually. Now, I seem to be unable to remember the way home, so I’ll follow you unless it’s going to freak you out again.”
I shook my head, uncertain I bought her reasoning. Fallon was brutal in his reign. He didn’t fuck around, and if an alpha started acting out, he was sent back into the Nine Realms. He’d ruled for the last fifty years with an iron fist. While I shouldn’t be upset about them murdering him for being taken down by me, I wasn’t particularly normal. I’d enjoyed pinning him, the motion his hips made when I’d subdued him by force had something inside of me aching to do it again. It terrified me and left me numb. Knox had said that I could go get Dimitri if I wanted him, but the idea of doing that to him horrified me.
“Hey, you still with us, asshole?” Tamryn asked, snorting as she snapped her finger in front of my face.
“Get in the truck, Tamryn. I’ll race you home.”
“I don’t know the way!”
“I’m aware and okay with cheating.”
“Jerk.”
“Bitch,” I smirked.
“Fuckers, get in!” Kinvara snorted as her eyes rolled.
I watched her climb back into the truck before I slipped into the car and started toward home. The moment we got to the long winding hills that took us deep into the original family’s mansions, I slowed as children became visible on the sidewalks. It was a rare sight to see the little ones outside, even when everything was right in the world, and right now, it wasn’t right. It was all wrong.
“You know Tamryn came home because you need her, but also because Amara is missing. We gather when one of our own is in need, we always have since we were children.”
“I know, and I love her for it, but she’s also not fully healed from her husband dying.”
“Technically, they were only married as humans and not mates.”
“It’s the same thing, Kinvara. The only difference is that our people wouldn’t acknowledge the union. I don’t think Tamryn cared since he was mortal. Love is love, and who are we to say differently? It broke her when he died, and she’s finally coming back, and the end result is a new woman, born of chaos and remade from the ashes. Let’s hope that if we ever live through that, we’re half the woman she has become.”
I pulled up into the driveway and moved to the trunk, pulling out a box of crystals that Aurora had asked me to bring home. Screaming sounded from across the block where Dimitri had been throwing one hell of a party for days now.
I hadn’t seen more than a few glimpses
of him since he’d checked on me. Knox had been radio silent. His house was dark, and little to no activity had come from it since the night of the party.
It had been days, and everyone had held their breath as the alphas returned some resemblance of normalcy to their house. I exhaled and moved to the front door, shutting the world out.
Later that night, I stood on the balcony, watching the House of Alphas as women were being escorted out. Car engines revved up as they’d pulled up to line the street. It was an endless stream of women, some in their early thirties, others younger. Each of them looked abused and exhausted. Some were half-naked, their bodies bearing claw marks or bite marks on their thighs and arms, still bleeding. I could smell the sex covering their flesh from the porch, and it made my stomach recoil with bile. Some hadn’t even put more than a shirt on before being pushed out of the house.
Shinedown’s Monster played quietly from inside my room while I watched the horror unfolding in front of our house. I’d turned it up to block out the endless screams that offered little relief to the debauchery coming from their house.
Women had screamed in pleasure or pain, sometimes both. Men had howled endlessly, sending chills racing down my spine as more had joined in as if it was one long orgy they shared in together. They celebrated in tradition, giving the alpha a sense of victory while they moved pieces around for the newly crowned king to take his throne.
I watched as Dimitri followed behind the women, hanging close to one of the cleaner females, shoving her to her knees in the dirty street. My heart raced as she looked up at Dimitri, watching him with hunger in her eyes. He moved his body until she became obscured by his larger frame. His hips pumped, and my body flushed with need. His hand rested against the car as he fucked her mouth, her moans loud enough that I could hear them from where I stood. It was horrifying, and yet my libido didn’t seem to care, responding even though I was disgusted by the action.
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