Page 120 of Blade's Battle
Anna tried to block out that voice, the image of the large alpha standing at the edge of the dais, arguing with Damien and Blade, trying to convince them that she belonged to him. The second he’d halted the ceremony, she’d begun to retreat into herself. It wasn’t a choice, not really. More of a self-preservation mechanism that kicked into gear every time he came near her. She didn’t need to feel his hot breath on her skin with threats of what he’d do to her. His voice—that deep, arrogant, sadistic voice of his—was more than enough to send her mind into hiding.
Her poor Blade. The one glance she’d had of him showed his confusion, his pain. He probably thought she’d used him, betrayed him,liedto him. She hadn’t told him everything because it was the part of her past she hadn’t quite learned how to deal with. Talking about it, well, that wasn’t even an option.
Anna pulled her hood down lower over her face, trying to hide, but the world wouldn’t let her. They kept talking about her as if she were property. She belonged to Blade, the pack, Drake. . . She belonged to everyone except herself.
Then Blade tried to charge Drake. Frank pinned Blade’s arms behind him, but Blade broke free. Hayden had to body-slam him, destroy his momentum and bring him down before he reached Drake. What if this pushed Blade over the edge and his wolf took over? He wouldn’t survive it. Neither would she.
“You’re lying, Drake,” Blade said, his voice full of rage—a rage that she’d seen at Liam’s camp and then at the bottom of the zip line. “You can’t stand the fact that I took her from you.”
“I’m not lying, Damien,” Drake said, his voice uncharacteristically calm. “Look at her palm. She bears my mark. A straight line with a second smaller line bisecting at the bottom. The traitor will recognize it.”
“Anna, your hand,” Damien demanded with a severity she wasn’t used to from him. Behind her, a hiss from Tess filled the air. She didn’t like Damien’s tone either.
Drake had that effect on people. He was a poison that contaminated the land, the air, the very people around him. He’d poisoned her too, but she’d locked it away to keep it from Blade. Blade deserved better than to have to deal with her trauma.
“Anna.” Damien again.
She didn’t know why her feet moved at that point, but they did. So did her hand. As she drew near Damien, holding her hand out, palm up, Blade stopped struggling against Frank and Hayden. He wouldn’t believe Drake, but still, she owed him an explanation. Except the words lodged deep in her throat, and all the energy she’d had this morning had long since drained away. One step at a time, Anna forced herself forward with her eyes averted. She couldn’t face any of them, least of all Blade. Seeing his disappointment would crush her beyond repair.
“Anna?” Blade called, his voice riddled with confusion. She could hear the desperation there and the unvoiced request to tell him that Drake was lying, that she’d never blood-bonded him.
If only she could say that. But that too would be a lie.
She chanced a glance at Damien as he inspected her palm, the scar of the blood-bonding three months ago. Stunned. The alpha was stunned.
Now Hayden, the shifter who resembled Drake so much that she often found it hard to stand near let alone talk to him. He leaned over, inspected her palm, but never looked at her. Instead, he glared at Drake. “What have you done, Drake? She’s not Reina.”
Reina. That was the name Drake had called her time and time again, yelling at her when she’d insisted her name was Anna. She’d finally given in, answering to Reina, hoping it would calm Drake, but it had only made captivity worse. He spoke of her betrayal, of how she wouldn’t leave her this time, how he wouldensureit. That’s when he’d held her down and drawn his knife.
“You recognize the mark, don’t you, traitor?” Drake asked.
“My family blood-bonds with a unique curve, Damien,” Hayden confirmed. “Exactly like this. It signifies the Novak line.”
“Dismiss the pack, Hayden,” Damien ordered.
While Hayden asked everyone to leave, Anna pulled away from Damien and everyone on the dais, backing up until she bumped into someone. A hand steadied her, then pulled her into an embrace. Tess. She wished it were Blade holding her because then she’d truly feel safe, but he was on the other side of Damien, restrained by Frank. They didn’t trust him not to shift, and she dared not cry out to him for that same reason. For him to shift now would be a death sentence. There were two alphas present. Blade wouldn’t survive a takedown, certainly not at Drake’s hands.
Blade began fighting Frank’s hold until Damien barked an order at him to settle. “Anna, please, look at me,” Blade pleaded. The ten feet between them could have been ten miles given how far away he seemed.
“I’m taking her and leaving,” Drake said as he strode toward Anna.
Her blood turned to ice and her knees buckled. Fortunately, Tess kept her upright. Anna buried her head against Tess, not sure what else to do.
Damien and Hayden blocked Drake before he could draw any closer to Anna. “She’s mine,” Drake repeated. “You can’t keep her from me.”
Those two words ‘she’s mine’ broke that fragile tightrope she’d been teetering on inside for a long time. Or maybe it was hearing Blade swearing at Frank to let him go. Her Blade was trying to reach her. He was fighting to save her, unlike the monster who would not give up until he had her for his own personal pleasure.
She rotated the gold ring on her finger. ‘You will always be with me’ Blade had said.
On shaky legs, Anna pushed away from Tess. One step at a time, she advanced on the alpha that had degraded her, abused her, made her want to die.
With each step, she straightened her back, then her neck, and then pitched her shoulders back. The hood fell to her shoulders, and she caught sight of Blade. He stilled, his rage set aside as a new fire burned in him. He’d always believed in her. He’d been her strength when she couldn’t find her own, and he would always fight to protect her. Now it was her turn to fight for herself, for him, for them.
Anna steeled her fist and punched Drake in the nose. He stumbled back a step, but it was enough. After all, it’s not like she expected to take down a shifter, let alone an alpha. The pain in her hand kept her laser-focused on Drake. All those times she’d scurried away from him, begged him to stop beating her. No more. She would take no more from him. “I’m not your possession, Drake, and I never will be.”
He held up his hand, though no scar remained there as shifters rarely scarred from such a shallow cut. “We bonded. Our blood mixed.”
“There is no blood-bond between us! You want proof, Drake? Here, look at my wounds.” She spit in her hand and rubbed away the make-up concealing her bruises on her face. “My broken nose and the bruises are a week old. They would have healed by now and you would have lost most of your shifter skills had we blood-bonded.”
