Page 10 of The Alpha's Arranged Bride

Chapter 5

Prairie Rose

“Do you think she really cut that guy’s arm off?”

“She doesn’t look strong enough.”

“She looks kind of like a flower. She’s pretty, I guess.”

“She’s too dainty to protect us. Like a lady from that book all those years ago. We’ll probably be the ones protecting her.”

“She saved Dad. We have to be nice to her now.”

“Dad didn’t say that.”

“He didn’t have to. It’s obvious.”

Prairie Rose had been listening to the conversation, carried in childish voices, for quite some time. It wasn’t that she didn’t want the kids to know she was awake. She couldn’t get her head sorted out and her eyes unglued. She tried one more time to free herself from the sucking sea of darkness, and actually succeeded in getting her lashes to twitch. Her eyes felt gummy and glued together. Her mouth tasted foul, a little bit like the bitterness left after puking. Her belly heaved when she finally cracked her eyes open, and the light hit.

Two faces hovered over her. Chestnut hair and soft gray eyes, their expressions a mix of childish wonder and older-than-their-years understanding, from the way they talked, they had a heck of a personality each. They were obviously incredibly smart. Both of them looked like miniature versions of Agnar in a way. The older and slightly taller boy had the same jawline and hooded brow. The other boy’s face was more oval shaped, his eyes slightly darker than his brother’s. More like his mother, then?

“You’re awake.” The older boy grabbed a glass of water off the nightstand and thrust it literally into her face.

The glass shoved past her lips and clinked against her teeth. She winced, but he didn’t pay that any attention before he tipped it up, way too far up. She coughed and spluttered, water cascading down her chin and neck, soaking her and the pillows. She was in someone’s room. The walls were either tan or a light orange. Sun floated in from a large window, but letting her eyes go there was a straight up no go if she didn’t want her brain to crack in half. It looked like a sort of cave, but she knew Agnar lived in an Earthship. Castor told her that. Or was it Agnar himself when they’d met that one time? In the SUV?

It all blended together and twisted painfully in her skull. It felt like she needed to drill a hole in it to relieve the mounting pressure.

“Drink.” The cup was shoved in her face and upended again. She managed to get her hand up and take it from the well-meaning boy.

“Thanks,” she croaked. She sipped it gently. The water was cold and sweet.

“That’s pee water,” the younger boy leaned in and announced proudly.

Prairie Rose nearly spat it out.

“He means that our house recycles all the water, but we have a good purification system, obviously. There’s something to be said about completing the cycle, but no one wants to drink their own pee, Levi.”

Levi, the younger one, swiped at his brother and would have succeeded in giving him a clean uppercut, but the older one danced back, grinning ferally.

“You’ll have to be faster next time, little brother.”

“Where’s Agnar?” Her throat didn’t feel inflamed, but it sure sounded like it. The water didn’t help the bitter taste back there either.

“Probably kicking ass,” Levi stated.

The older one crossed his arms. “Seeing to pack business after the challenge last night.”

She had to shut her eyes again when the images rushed up at her, one after another. Had she really shamefully basically humped Agnar’s leg? All those wolves jumped him at once. He’d barely survived the fight. And then… the blood.”

“Oh my god!” She shot upright, spilling the cup of water all over the floor. She frantically looked from one boy to the other. Their words over her while they thought she was sleeping made sense. “Tell me I didn’t—that I didn’t cut that guy’s arm off.”

“We don’t know yet. Dad left early and he hasn’t come back. Either way, he deserved it. He was going to kill dad and then they would have come and killed us.”

“What the fuck? I mean, no!” Jesus, when did she ever say that word? Almost never. And in front of children. She slapped a hand over her mouth. They stared back at her gravely with those striking gray eyes. Castor’s were blue, which was rare among wolves, but gray? She’d never seen that either. Everyone she knew had brown or golden eyes or a mix of both.

“It’s what happens when there’s a new alpha. They don’t want the old alpha’s family around. They get rid of anyone who might fester with resentment or have the means to attract enough supporters to get revenge and unseat them. Think about it. It’s happened lots of times in history.”

She’d heard of it, and definitely in the northern packs where she lived, but that hadn’t been done for a long time that she knew of. “Yes, but that history was before, in a different era.”

---