Filed to story: My Kidnapper Is the Wolf King
“Has it ever occurred to you that he’s not as bad as you make him out to be?”
“He is every bit as bad as I make him out to be! And I leave for a few days, and I come back, and you’re wearing his collar?”
“I had no choice.”
“I thought you said there was always a choice. And what? You chose him
?” His voice is dark, and his breathing shallow. “Did he touch you?”
Rage jolts through my body, and I straighten. “How dare you ask me that.”
“Did he?”
I jump to my feet. “You left me, Callum!”
“Take it off.” The command in his tone makes my muscles tighten.
I step toward him. The scent of the outdoors and battle clings to him; wet earth and steel and mountains. “I am not one of your pack, and you have no right to order me around.”
He closes the space between us. I’m not sure if the heat that stokes me is coming from him, or whether it’s burning inside me, but my breathing is fast and my cheeks flame.
I’m angry. So angry. There is a wilder emotion inside me too. And it wants release.
His eyes narrow. “Take. It. Off.”
He has a wolf inside him.
And it want to provoke it.
“No,” I say.
He crashes to his knees and cries out. The unlit candle sitting on his small table falls onto its side, and the floorboards splinter beneath the strain of catching him.
“Callum!”
He grabs his shoulder. “Fuck.”
All the heat drains out of me, and I drop to floor in front of him. “You’re hurt.”
“I got shot. Silver. Thought I’d got all the bullet out.” He releases a soft, pained laugh. “Obviously not.”
I lift his chin. “Let me see.”
“It’s nothing.” He shrugs me away. “Don’t worry yourself, Princess. I’ll be fine.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
He lets me undo the buttons of his damp shirt, and I push it off his shoulders to reveal his strong, muscular chest.
My breath hitches at the sight of him.
He’s dripping with sweat, and it highlights the ridges of his torso, and his large biceps.
He was shirtless the first time we met, but then, the sheer size of him was threatening. Now, a completely different feeling stirs inside me.
Until my gaze moves to his shoulder.
The veins spreading from his bullet wound are black. It’s not healing, and I catch the scent of something herbal among the blood. Something that makes my stomach turn.
“It’ll be fine.” Callum’s eyelids are drooping. “I’ve been shot with silver before. My body will push it out, eventually. It’s just. . .” He takes a deep, wheezing breath. “Just a wee bit painful in the meantime.”
“Callum.” I try to sound gentle, but my heart is pounding. “The bullet had wolfsbane on it. You’re not going to heal on your own. I need to go and get-“
“No,” he growls.
“He has the antidote.”
Callum’s eyes blaze. “I’d rather die than have him in here.”
“No you wouldn’t, you stubborn wolf!”
I stand up, and he grabs my ankle.
“No.”
He’s so weak that when I jerk away, he has to slam his hand against the ground to stop himself from toppling over.
His chambers spin around me, and fear tightens around my heart.
I shake my head. “I won’t let you die.”
He looks up at me, pale and drenched in blood and sweat. There’s a plea in his eyes.
Don’t do this.
“You’re going to be okay,” I tell him. “I need to get him.”
“Rory!” he roars after me.
I bolt out of his room, and run as fast as I can toward Blake’s chambers.
Chapter Forty-One
Iburst into Blake’s room.
He’s draped in an armchair by the window, and doesn’t look up from the book he’s reading-the blue tome with stars on the spine that he took from my chambers.
“Please, do come in, little rabbit.” He flicks to the next page. “No need to knock.”
“He’s hurt. You need to come.
Now.”
“What’s wrong with him?”
“Wolfsbane.”
His expression is unreadable, but he gets up.
He places the book on his writing desk, which has been tidied after the other night. In fact, the space is now immaculate; the bed is made, books are neatly tucked into the shelves along the wall, and the sheepskin rug by the hearth no longer glints with shards of broken glass.
He pulls a black leather case out of a drawer in his armoire, then heads to the door. I fall into step beside him.
When we enter Callum’s chambers, my stomach drops.
He’s pulled himself up onto the bed and his downy quilt is red with his blood. His breathing is raspy, and he’s barely moving.