Page 47 of Bullied By the Alpha Wolf

The scent of lilacs was so muddled with the others in this hall, and I closed my eyes for a moment, stretching my senses to hear more of what lay ahead. It was quiet, distant scuffling behind me, the only indication that something was going on, and the subtle sounds of hurried footsteps and whining from deeper within the house.

“Ahh!”

The scream hit me like a gunshot. I knew that voice. I would always know it.

“Kit.” My eyes flared wide, the noise coming from up ahead. “Kit!”

I took off at a dead run. It only took me a few seconds to reach the end of the hall, where I saw a door open on the left-hand side. It revealed a sliver of a brightly lit room, and I rushed forward just as I heard a deep growl reverberate through the stone walls.

Bursting into the room, I growled—low and furious—before I even comprehended what I was seeing. Eli held Kit pinned down to the ground, snapping at her as she tried to keep him at bay.

The noise emanating from me was enough to draw his attention, and I immediately pegged the bloodshot, frenzied stare he was sporting. He’d taken those fucking drugs, and the gas hadn’t reached down here yet.

“Get your fucking hands off her,” I snapped, extending my claws through my fingers.

Kit’s eyes landed on me, but I couldn’t look down at her. Eli was too hopped-up on his goddamn drugs, and I didn’t trust glancing at her. He was focused on me. I needed to keep it that way.

Still, I could see out of my peripheral vision that Kit’s eyes were wide. She was bleeding from a cut on her head, and the smell of charred lilacs drifted toward me. My blood boiled, and it was everything I could do to avoid shifting.

I didn’t want that—not yet.

“Kaiden.” Kit’s voice was small and terrified, and my chest may as well have cracked right open.

My eyes flicked down to her, unable to resist for a second longer. We locked eyes, and it was everything. She was right there, the human woman that meant so much to me, and my stomach clenched looking at her.

She looked exhausted, roughed up and bleeding. A fury I’d never known before coursed through my veins, and I knew that even if it meant moving the earth itself, I was getting her back home with me.

For good.

Eli noticed the move, of course. And he snarled low as he turned back to Kit and raised his clawed hand in the air. Drool dripped from his fanged mouth, and I could see the intent in his body.

He was going to tear Kit to shreds.

“I said—!”

I launched myself across the room, tackling Eli away from Kit. It sent him flying into the far wall, and I popped back up onto my feet in front of her, offering a protective stance as I let more of the half-shift take me.

“Don’t fucking touch her.”

“He’s not,” Kit heaved in a breath behind me, “right. The drug. He took…so much.”

Concern bit at me as I watched Eli stand up. His eyes were unfocused and rabid as he laughed and glared in my direction. The sound was unhinged, a hyena in place of a wolf.

Body shifting, Eli let the wolf tear through him, and the same horrible, grotesque shift took him over like it had the others. He thrashed out, knocking into the metal table closest to him and sending beakers and glass vials filled with blue-green liquid crashing to the floor.

It had to be the drug, and I prayed desperately for the antidote gas to push through the compound's air system faster.

This was far from over, but I silently swore on whatever power I had in me—as a wolf, as alpha, as a believer in that V?lva magic—that I was going to keep anything from happening to Kit, even if it was the last thing I ever did.

Which unfortunately seemed increasingly likely.

Chapter 22 - Kit

My heart was in my throat. Eli had found me snooping in his little lab, and the first thing he’d done was to pick me up and throw me into the nearest table of supplies. The move had given his fucked brain an idea, and I watched—my vision spinning as my head throbbed—as he injected himself with the syringe that I’d dropped.

And then another and another.

I knew nothing about this shit, but taking that much of the stuff seemed like a terrible fucking idea. I mean, I knew the basics of drug overdoses, and Eli looked like he was barreling toward one fast.

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