Filed to story: Owned by the Alphas Novel
“Thanks for sticking up for Rye. She’s one of the good ones. Although I was under the impression she didn’t have the right…equipment for your tastes?” I asked, not caring if I was being a little forward.
He chuckled and nodded. “True, but her older brother does, and we’ve been fucking for years. She’s like another sister to me and said she’s happy to play wife, have my children so I can have her brother,” he said, and I smiled.
“And what of her needs?” I asked, prying when I had no right, but I wanted to know.
He grinned. “We made a pact when we were younger and learned of the offerings, right before she hit puberty and I wasn’t allowed to see her. That I would pick her so her brother and I could be together.
“The guy she likes is older, hangs out in the widow’s hut, and I will help them meet.
We’re both happy with it.” He shrugged.
I laughed at that and nodded. As long as he was happy.
“So is that what you wanted to talk to me about?” I asked, and he shook his head.
“No, we didn’t get to talk before about the shadows and now that you’re going with the wolves, we need to.”
I shuddered at the mention of them, red eyes flashing in my mind.
“You see them too?” I whispered, and he nodded.
“Yeah. See them, hear them. They’re powerful.” He grinned and I shrugged. They could keep their power if it came with the dead feeling I got whenever they were there.
“You talk with them? Like the red eyes?” I asked, and he nodded.
“You see the red eyes at first, but the more you listen to them and interact with them, the more they grow.”
“I don’t want them to grow,” I bit, and he narrowed his eyes.
“You’re going to need them, sister. You’re literally going into the wolves’ den. They may have acted like they give a shit on offerings night, but you are going to be living there, as theirs. Their property, their pet.
“But you are still human, and you will never be anything more than that to them.
Unless you show them you’re not to be fucked with,” he explained.
It contradicted the way they had behaved with me. They hadn’t cared that I was human–well, they had, but they had broken the rules for me, treated me differently than the other humans.
That meant more, right? He had me doubting it, and I didn’t like where he was going with it.
“You want me to trust the shadows, not the wolves? The red eyes?” I asked to clarify, and he nodded with a sly grin.
“Yes. The more you listen, the more power you are rewarded with. It’s a gift after being cursed with our birth,” he promised, but I wasn’t sure.
It didn’t feel like a gift when I saw the eyes. They made me curious, and it sometimes felt like they were pulling me in, luring me, but they still felt heavy and cold.
Like deadweight. Like danger.
It didn’t feel like something I should trust.
“Lucas–” I tried.
“Trust them, sister. It is how you’ll make it through your new life with them.” He smiled. “I trusted them and now I have a wife who accepts me for my sinful attractions and I am the strongest warrior in our army. They reward us if we listen,” he said.
He really believed they were good, but how could I?
“And if I don’t?”
He frowned at that. “Why wouldn’t you?”
I shrugged. “I’m not–“
“Lorelai, the wolves are demanding you back or they are coming after you,” Father interrupted.
I sighed and went to hug Lucas. I wasn’t convinced on the shadows, but I hated having to say goodbye to him again.
“Don’t tell the wolves about your shadows. The Water one can sense the ones inside you, but they are different to the ones we see. If you let the red eyes in, everything gets clearer, stronger,” he promised, then kissed the top of my head and let me go.
I nodded and left the room, not promising anything back. Braxton sensed my shadows, and he didn’t seem comfortable with anything about the ones I could see
–and neither was I.
Mom came back in then and hugged me tightly as Lucas slipped out. She started sobbing, then sniffled and held my face.
“I’ll walk you down,” she said, then let me go and pulled her shawl tighter.
I nodded as my dad grabbed my things. I walked with my parents back to the center of town, which was dead quiet and humming with tension.
The offerings had already dispersed, but the others? They were watching with wide eyes as I approached the three alphas, all three of them dominating and intentionally pouring out fear and don’t-fuck-with-me vibes.
I stepped toward them, but my mother grabbed my wrist.
She looked to Nikolai. “I have a condition that I know I have no right to make, but I wouldn’t be her mother if I didn’t,” she said as boldly as me, and I smiled.
She lifted her jaw as Nikolai nodded at her to continue.
“Don’t keep her to yourselves. She is still my daughter, and I want to see her regularly,” she said, and I held her hand.
She squeezed it as my father stepped behind her, watching with wary eyes.
Nikolai’s eyes softened at the sides, but I was pretty sure I was the only one who noticed.
He stepped forward and leaned down to my mother, who didn’t flinch as she held the alpha’s gaze.
“Every fortnight she may visit. Sundays, midday to midnight,” he said. He went to walk away, then frowned and turned back. “And every full moon, you will have her for the night,” he added, before his eyes glanced at me.
I knew that look, and I knew my brother was wrong. I was different to them.
Nikolai wanted me out of harm’s way for full moons. That meant he cared, and I had to believe that meant something.
“Thank you.” My mother trembled, then stepped back against me.
I caught her and wrapped my arms around her one last time. “I love you. I’ll be okay, and I’ll be back,” I promised.
She nodded before looking at Braxton, who came forward with Derik. D took my bag to the carriage that Nikolai had already climbed in as Braxton’s soft grip took my hand from my mother’s.
“Don’t hurt her,” she whispered.
Braxton leaned in so only we could hear. “She is ours now. And we will not let anyone or anything hurt what’s ours,” he promised.
My mother’s hand left mine, handing me over as she turned to Father and sobbed against him. He just narrowed his eyes as I waved and got in the carriage, Braxton closing the door behind me, closing me in behind the tinted glass.
I let out a breath as I went to sit down just as Nikolai yanked me onto his lap. I landed with a huff and looked at him with a raised brow.
“So, what now, wolves?”
13. The Claim
“So, what now, wolves?”
Nikolai smirked, lifting up the skirts of my dress, his finger sliding up my thigh, finding his bite, caressing it as I sighed, leaning back into him, my legs spreading for his touch.
He kissed my ear, then down my neck as my body warmed, my eyes almost closed as the carriage moved toward the city.
Derik and Braxton knelt down in front of me then, and I tried to sit up to see what they were doing, but Kai pinned me against him, his fingers still on the bite.
“They need to claim you too,” he breathed against me, and I sucked in a breath as Derik and Braxton extended their fangs.
My body erupted in flames, not sure I could handle both their bites, but I didn’t have a choice.
Brax kissed along my thigh as Derik held up my dress, kissing along the waistband of my black panties.
He ran his clawed finger over the material covering my pussy, making me tremble at the delicious threat, before he tore up and ripped them off.
I sucked in a breath. The claw had barely scraped me but that single touch stirred my core to the point I clutched Nikolai’s thigh that I sat on.
New Book: Veiled Desires of the Alpha King Novel
Dayson was the alpha of the largest pack in North America. Powerful figures from other packs sought to offer gorgeous girls as potential mates for Dayson. He steadfastly rejected these advances, he was not a pawn to be manipulated. But eventually there came a mysterious girl he could hardly say No. Who was she?