Page 63 of Wolf's Claimed Mate
Three more faces grinned around him. Hands reached for me. Distantly, I heardjust put the fucking cloth over his face,and then I was being pulled up. I screamed and kicked, spitting and gnashing my teeth at any of them who came near me. They all carried me away from the car and I bucked, hard.
“You smell of him,” Jackson said, spitting. “No matter. We’ll fuck his seed right out of you soon enough so he doesn’t mess with our experiments.”
My throat tore as I yelled to be let go of, trying to fight my way out of their grasp.
“Don’t fight, Sasha, you’ll only hurt yourself more,” Jackson drawled. “And I want you looking pretty at my side when I take over Silverlake Valley.”
Chapter 26 - Conall
The stench of chemicals made me gag as I bolted upright, gasping.
What had happened?
I dug through the brain fog in my head, frantic as I stood up, enduring the dizziness. Pain lanced through my shoulder, and I groaned, reaching around to press a hand to the pain site. My palm came away with blood on it.Fuck.
The gunshot, the broken window—Sasha’s screams. Fuck. Sasha. Where was Sasha?
Whatever I’d been drugged with left a thick taste in my throat, and I gagged, clutching my stomach as the pain and drugs sent my vision into a swirling abyss of darkness. I stumbled forward before my legs buckled. I caught myself, reaching out for the nearest thing. I expected to be met with the office building, but I was dumped on the dock behind an old cargo container. I gasped for breath, trying to regain my breath.
Sweat slicked my body, and I groaned as the world spun.
“Sasha,” I mumbled, trying to find her scent on the wind. They’d taken her. Drugged me to get me out of the equation, and they’dtaken her. Every part of me understood the frantic urgency Fenrys had had that day when Thalia had been taken from the Mating Ceremony. I finally understood Aidan’s need to attack me when I wouldn’t let him see Dakota.
Sasha was not my mate—couldn’tever be—and I felt this level of panic and distress. How had they done it? How had they endured it? My mind whirled with every possibility, especially knowing their plan for her, but I had to force myself to stop.
I couldn’t go in there raging, as much as I wanted to. No, Fenrys had done that once and nearly got himself killed without the backup the pack had.
But Sasha was with them now. Her scent would lead back to the office building, where they’d likely have a trap set up for me to lure Fenrys to them. I couldn’t let them. God, I’d promised Sasha nobody would hurt her ever again, least of all Jackson Trent.
I let out a roar of anger before I shifted, howling at the pain in my shoulder. I wouldn’t be able to keep up my wolf form for long, but it would do to put some distance between me and the office. Being smart would be the best option. Every instinct in me raged to go in there and slaughter the pack that was there and then hunt down the rest, torch the place, and take Sasha away. But I couldn’t be one man against them all. That would be the surefire way to get her and myself killed.
As much as it killed me to put distance between us, I knew I had to trust Sasha’s insistence of protecting herself. Of all the times she needed to believe in that statement about her abilities, it was now.
Stay strong,I willed to her in my head.
I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if anything happened to her while I chose to get my pack. I reminded myself that I wasn’t choosing them over her. I was getting them because we needed to fight together to save her.
I pounded through the forest adjacent to the highway. I had a long fucking journey ahead of me, and no way to get my phone. I didn’t even know if it still worked. They’d blown my car to bits. I returned to my base instincts for this one. Halfway back to Silverlake Valley, I howled, deep and urgent, into the air.
I raced for my town, for my pack, waiting, waiting, waiting—
An answering howl came back. Fenrys.
I tracked their scents on the wind. Soon, another answering howl went up. Aidan.
I howled back to them. Fenrys knew where I’d gone today; I could only hope he was heading towards me prepared. We couldn’t wait any longer for Jackson’s pack to bring the fight to us; we needed to bring it to them and get Sasha back.
The sound of paws thundering my way had me on high alert, and when I looked for the source, Fenrys’s and Thalia’s scents hit me, the two of them intertwined. One black, one white, the two of them leading the rest of the pack. And then Aidan’s pack filed in, the gray wolf leading with the smaller russet wolf alongside him.
The sight brought a pang and I almost whined in need. They had their mates, their wolves. I needed to go save a shifter who was neither my mate nor wolf but mattered to me just as much.
I lowered my head in submission to Fenrys and Thalia. I spotted my brother’s form among Aidan’s pack. Soon, the two packs merged, and I huffed in the direction I’d just come from. Fenrys nodded, his hulking form pausing. He nosed Thalia’s ruff and then launched forward. Thalia followed, then I did. Next to us, Aidan and Dakota kept pace with Fenrys and Thalia, Jason keeping pace with me.
Thalia whined, knowing it was Sasha in trouble. My shoulder healed with every pound of my paws through the woods as we all raced to face our enemies once again, stronger together.
Chapter 27 - Sasha
My tears had dried sticky on my face. They’d gone from fearful tears to one of pure hatred and anger as I’d been shoved into a chair and tied up.
