Page 20 of Pack Kasen: Part 1

It’s a strange response to have, and it’s not one I like, so I ignore it as I push myself to my feet, setting aside the issue with the chain until I’ve convinced this Viking—whoever the fuck he is—to let me go. "I am not?—”

"Why isn't it on the floor?" He continues flipping through the thin black file.

A gasp tears from my throat as pain explodes at the backs of my legs and I crash to the floor, landing heavily on my hands and knees.

There was someone behind me. My wolf should have warned me, but my wolf’s voice—and her presence—is muted, and I don’t know why.

"Now. There was another body?" the Viking calmly asks.

I move to get up.

He looks directly at me for the first time, amber eyes framed with dark blond lashes piercing me into place. "The next time my beta puts you where you belong, your legs will no longer be attached to your body."

As threats go, that one does the trick.

I stay where I am.

"Cruz. The body?" the Viking repeats.

Another man, wearing all black, steps from the shadows at the right side of the black throne. His head is down, arms tucked behind his back. I can’t see his face, but he will have hazel eyes more green than brown.

I listen in mounting horror as the man reels off details about me he could only know if he had been watching me. My classschedule, where my dorm room is, and about how only I could be the feral.

The creep driving the black Corvette wasn’t a creep; he wasstalkingme.

The Viking snaps the folder shut, passes it off to the man who handed it to him, and yawns as he sits back in his seat. "Put it in the cage."

It doesn't hit me whatitis until someone grabs my shoulder and yanks me upright.

I struggle.

An unfamiliar scent moves closer. Warm amber and clean lemon.

A mouth brushes my ear. "The Wolf King does not care what happens to you. Easy or hard is the only thing that matters to me. How will you make me do my job?"

The metal chain chinks against the hardwood floor, and I can easily envision it being the thing they use to hang me from the chandelier above my head.

I’m not stupid.

I’m graduating top of my class, summa cum laude, the class valedictorian elected to give a speech I might not survive long enough to give. I know how to pick my battles. “Easy.”

“Then you might surprisehimby living through this.” He breathes the words into my ear.

I swivel my head, surprised.

Pain shatters my skull, turning everything black.

Just before I slam into the ground, it hits me that maybe I’m not as smart as I think I am.

7

AREN

Iexpected an animal.

Instead, I gother.

A petite woman with long chestnut brown hair, a slightly upturned nose dusted with freckles, and icy pale blue eyes flecked with hazel.

---