Page 39 of Wolf Claimed
“What are you talking about? It was just sex.”
It wasn’t just sex. She’d felt a connection to both, stronger even than when she’d only been with Tiernan, but apparently being with more than one male at a time was as taboo in shifter culture as it was in human society.
“Tiernan needs to blood-bond, or we’ll have to put him down. We all discussed it last night, and we voted. Saving a shifter, a good shifter like Tiernan, is more important than killing you for your father’s sins. But you clearly don’t plan to blood-bond him, so that makes you fair game.”
“Do you even hear yourself? You just admitted that the SEV virus was my father’s doing. His crime, not mine. And now you’re assuming I won’t blood-bond Tiernan, so you can justify using me to get your revenge.”
“No assuming on our part. If you planned to blood-bond him, you wouldn’t have gone near Rafe, and Tiernan wouldn’t have let you. Shifters don’t share females.”
Was he right? Is that why she’d let Rafe touch her? Because she’d subconsciously made up her mind to not blood-bond Tiernan?
“You’re as dangerous as your father.”
There was no reasoning with a shifter hell-bent on revenge. She needed a plan and intel if possible. And that meant steering the conversation away from her and Tiernan.
“You killed Graves, didn’t you?” she said. “You don’t want this treaty to succeed. You want to destroy the WSSO on your own without having to wait around for the DSA to get its act together.”
“I have no idea who killed Graves,” Barrett said. “I was willing to give this program a chance, but you are too good an opportunity to pass up. You’re bait, female. And nothing you can do will change that. I have three shifters guarding you. So even if Rafe and Tiernan decide you’re worth pursuing, which I doubt they will, they won’t get through.”
Barrett left the cave. A moment later, most of the light disappeared as he and the other shifters blocked the entrance with a large piece of sheet metal they wedged into the rock. She pushed with all her strength. The metal was wedged in there as strong as bars on a cell. The brute strength it had taken to be pushed the metal into the rock amazed and worried her. What if Tiernan and Rafe showed up?
Pinpricks of light wove their way through the gaps. Not enough for her to see how far back the cave went or if there was another way out, but she suspected the shifters had already checked it to make sure she couldn’t escape.
Alyssa laid down, trying to puzzle through who had killed Graves. Someone didn’t want this program to succeed. When she had left him, he was bruised but breathing.
Before the trainees had arrived at the program, the DSA had received intel from an undercover agent inside the WSSO. He’d reported that the anti-shifters had inserted a mole into the program to ensure it failed, but he had no additional info. She’d been assigned to the program to find the mole, but he’d proved rather efficient. Too efficient. He’d pinned the murder on her. Was that random luck, or did he know she’d been sent in undercover? Fuck, now she couldn’t even trust the DSA agents who had recruited her.
Rafe. Tiernan. Maddox. Everything in her said she could trust them. Except she’d lied to them. Would they abandon her once they learned the full truth about her?
Alyssa drew her legs up against her body, trying to conserve body heat in the dank cave. This had become a waiting game. Either her shifters would come to find her, or her enemies would use her to ferret out her father.
Her shifters. She liked the sound of that, but Barrett had a point about her relationship with Tiernan. In being with Rafe, she might have effectively, if not unintentionally, abandoned Tiernan. She didn’t know what she was doing when it came to this relationship, even without the complication of shifter genetics aside, but she cared about Tiernan. And Rafe.
She closed her eyes, trying not to think of Tiernan going feral. The thought of losing him scared the hell out of her. She couldn’t lose him, any of them, and that was another puzzle she had yet to solve. How could she possibly be involved with three shifters at the same time?
She couldn’t. Maddox had said as much. Once she blood-bonded Tiernan, she wouldn’t be able to be with Rafe. Or Maddox, not that he wanted her. She’d fucked up that friendship already. But if she didn’t blood-bond Tiernan, he’d go feral. Damn it! Everything led back to that damn blood-bond. No matter what she decided, someone would get hurt.
Chapter Ten
MADDOX
Maddox’s wolf lost Alyssa’s scent two miles from the training center. A skunk had sprayed the area, throwing off his ability to track. That couldn’t be coincidental. Whoever had taken her knew he’d follow. And Rafe and Tiernan, too, except they were nowhere near. He hadn’t seen or scented them in the wind.
Where the hell were they? They’d been listening from her dorm room when she’d ventured into the hallway to talk to him. He’d heard them, heard Rafe order Tiernan to let her go, to let her say what she needed to Maddox. He had appreciated that at the time, that the alpha hadn’t tried to control Alyssa. Rafe had proved to be fairer than any alpha he’d ever known, certainly more reasonable than Drake, Maddox’s crazy cousin and alpha back home.
The very fact that Rafe and Tiernan weren’t here searching for Alyssa and that they hadn’t pursued her when she left the dorm meant they were in trouble. Eighteen shifters who all wanted to use Alyssa. More than enough to restrain or kill Rafe and Tiernan and take her.
This entire situation was fucked up. He wanted to return to the training center to find Rafe and Tiernan, but he couldn’t go in two directions at once. Returning for them would be the smartest move, to ensure he had backup when he went against whoever had taken Alyssa, but if Rafe and Tiernan had been captured or killed, then he was all Alyssa had left. Rafe would order him to go after her. That much he knew about the alpha.
So be it. Rafe and Tiernan were on their own.
* * *
Two hours later,after conducting a grid search, Maddox caught Barrett’s scent miles from the training center. The shifter had no reason to be that far from the compound, not even for a run.
Maddox’s wolf followed the scent trail to a cave where he found Barrett’s team, Harris, Pierce, and Fulton, standing guard. The mouth of the cave had been sealed with a sheet of metal that looked like the door from one of the maintenance sheds at the training center. He could take three shifters, depending on their skills. Most of the shifters who’d been sent here were the best fighters from their packs, guards like him.
A faint breeze carrying her scent reached him. That confirmed his fears. They’d taken her. He inhaled deeply, taking in the sweet honey infused with bitterness. . . and a hint of blood.
