Page 10 of Wolf Caged
Lucas loved me. He was my fated mate. Helovedme.
No matter how many times I told myself that, the broken part of me refused to believe it, and something dark stirred within me in response, held back and muted by the drugs that blurred my vision and stole strength from my limbs.
“But we’re fated.” My words were weak even to my own ears, a foolish and desperate attempt to make him change his mind or maybe to make him wake up and realise what he was doing.
Part of me wanted to tell him this wasn’t funny, that he had taken this joke too far—the part of me that couldn’t comprehend that he was serious, that he was rejecting me, and that the love he had shown me was a lie.
“We’re fated,” I whispered, my voice strained as my brow furrowed and my throat closed. Tears streamed down my face. “We’re destined for each other. I’m meant to be your mate.”
“Fuck fate. I don’t want a mate.” He scoffed and pushed to his feet, coming to tower over me. “I reject you, Saphira Harper. You are not my mate and you never will be.”
Something inside me broke and I screamed out the pain, the fiery agony that had that scream coming out as a howl as my wolf side pushed to the surface, as instinct tore me apart.
He bent down and for a moment, I thought he would open the cage, but instead he seized my arm and ripped the bracelet from it. “You won’t be needing this anymore. Not where you’re going. It’s not like you’ll be travelling much. You’ll be lucky if you even leave the bed of whoever buys you.”
Bile rose again but I swallowed it, refusing to let Lucas see my terror as that dark, malevolent thing buried deep in the layers of numbness bared fangs at him.
“You can keep this though.” He tapped the pendant he had given me.
A token of hislove.
A lie.
I wanted to rip it off, but I didn’t have the strength to lift my arms now. I didn’t have the strength to move. Numbing darkness slowly rolled up on me, and I wasn’t sure whether it was the drugs or the pain of rejection, but I welcomed it as Lucas clicked his fingers and the female approached him.
Naked.
He stood and seized hold of her by her nape and pushed her over, bending her towards me. His eyes held mine as he moved behind her, filled with hatred and anger, and so much heat as he thrust into her. The female moaned and gripped the bars of my cage as he pounded into her.
I tore my gaze away and slumped over, squeezing my eyes shut and pleading with fate to end this, to stop my suffering.
Every thrust my fated mate made into the female broke the ties that bound us a little more, stretching and snapping them, leaving me raw inside, howling in pain and clawing at my bare skin as I sobbed and rocked.
Lucas grunted and stilled, and the last thread twisted and snapped.
The female moaned and something heavy hit the dirt near me. I cracked my eyes open and stared at her as she lay on the ground, breathing heavily, her gaze glazed. Blood smeared on her trembling thighs.
Lucas crouched before me, grabbed my hair and jerked my head up, forcing my eyes to meet his as he smirked.
“Pray the male who buys you treats you half as nicely.”
Chapter 3
KAELERON
It was a dance I had executed countless times.
I slipped through the shadows, twining with them one moment and releasing them the next as I closed the distance between myself and my prey unseen. The full moon shone down on the frozen forest, glittering on patches of snow, turning them to diamonds beneath my silent feet.
The stench of the hooded males ahead of me strengthened, choking my lungs, pulling a smile onto my lips. It would be so easy, so very easy, to slip among them unnoticed.
To slip a claw across a throat or two.
To watch pandemonium erupt in a flash of fear.
And taste it on my tongue.
My grin stretched wider, the intoxicating urge to unleash on the unwitting shifters, demons, and other breeds who made their way towards the solitary barn almost pulling me under its spell. I tugged back on the reins as my claws emerged, black and sharp.
