Page 23 of Alpha's Fated Flame

"Okay now, what should we get started with?" he chuckled to himself as he surveyed his tools.

I dry heaved in my mouth. I knew what was coming, and I was so damn scared, remembering the horrific state of the remains of the wolves I saw. My eyes rolled in panic, and I could feel myself losing my grip on reality. My body shuddered, flashing first hot, then cold, a clammy sweat breaking out. I felt like a cornered, wounded animal. The air was not coming fast enough through my nostrils. The panic and fear was consuming me.

I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die.

Wait, something was happening…

I looked down at my body and saw my bones crack and break apart. My skin bubbled at the surface as the skeleton underneath tore apart. I screamed and screamed through the now-damp tape. Long, coarse red hair started sprouting from my pores.

The world dimmed as my eyes lost focus and turned blurry. Then, crystalline clarity appeared as my eyes slammed back into focus, sharper and clearer than before. My body hunched over as my spine reformed itself into an elongated curve.

I opened my widened mouth, the tape long gone. Out came a long tongue, panting and framed with a pair of sharp, knifelike fangs.

But the most startling change of all, I noticed a voice in my head, a sweet, pure consciousness besides my own.

What is holding us? We need to run; we need to be free!She whined.

My wolf!

My heart swelled with unbridled joy. I was finally whole! The other half of my soul finally merged as one.

I looked down and saw pure red fur, blazing and fiery like a flame. I threw back my head and howled to the rafters, shouting to the world my happiness. A happiness that was short-lived.

Suddenly, my head was slammed to the side, hitting the ground. My wolf whined out in confused pain. The human stood above us, that bat in his hand and a crazed grin on his face.

"Iknewyou were a wolf, you freak of nature, bitch!" He spat out gleefully, "I'm going to show you what your kind deserves."

He lifted the bat again and rained down blow after blow upon my wolf's delicate new body. I felt bones crunch as we howled in horror and pain.

Then everything went mercifully black again.

Chapter 10

Kayden

Weracedbacktothe house, abandoning the pack business, after receiving Duncan's urgent text message he sent out to all of us repeatedly:

She's gone! Adrianna left! Come quick, I can't find her.

I burst into the front door and found Duncan pacing back and forth. He clutched at his hair and looked at me with guilty, panicked eyes.

"What did you do?!" I roared out. "Where is she?"

"She must've gotten the wrong idea! We were talking about babies and shit," he blurted out.

"And?" I said impatiently, not seeing the point.

"I must've scared her off or something. I thought she was taking a nap, but when I checked the room, she was gone," he replied frantically.

"And how long did it take you to pry yourself away from your precious books to check on our lovely omega?" I hissed at him with narrowed eyes.

He shifted his weight from foot to foot and opened his mouth. "I may have lost track of time while doing my research. But I had assumed…"

"So we already lost precious hours to track her down," I snapped, cutting him off.

"It's all my fault," Duncan muttered, shamefaced.

"None of us marked her, so we have no way of tracing her," I growled in frustration.

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