Lycan King's Savior

Chapter 1: "I will run you down without a second's hesitation." Ash The fluorescent lights flickered overhead as I huddled behind the antique sofa, El tucked against my side. My heart thrummed with barely contained excitement, the glittery confetti clenched in my sweaty palm. "Ready?" I mouthed the words to my three-year-old son, who nodded vigorously, his cherubic face split by an impish grin. Heavy footfalls sounded from the patio, signaling King's arrival. This was it. I drew in a fortifying breath, steeling myself. The door creaked open and the lights flared to life, casting the opulent living room in a warm amber glow. That was our cue. "Surprise!" El and I leapt out in unison, tiny hands flinging shimmering sparkles in an iridescent storm. For an endless heartbeat, my gaze drank in the magnificent sight of my husband - my Alpha. Despite being bound to this man for nearly five years, he never ceased to steal the very breath from my lungs. King stood a towering 6'4", his broad, muscular frame barely contained by the crisp white dress shirt straining against his upper body. Judging by the missing tie and suit jacket draped over his arm, the pack meeting mustn't have gone smoothly. Anger rolled off him in waves, yet that only served to amplify his rugged appeal. Inky black strands were cropped close at the sides, styled in an artfully tousled disarray that framed his chiseled features to utter perfection. A wicked fang glinted from one earlobe, somehow managing to make him look both dangerous and utterly delectable. And those eyes - a scorching silvered gray that always seemed to blaze right through to my core. As El bounded over, all childish glee, my heart stuttered against my ribcage. Any moment now, those smoldering irises would light upon me with the same ravenous hunger I had come to crave more than oxygen itself. But King simply scooped El into his powerful embrace, not even sparing me a passing glance. An uneasy knot formed in the pit of my stomach as he brushed past, the lingering traces of his cologne and earthy musk dizzying in their intensity. "Aren't you forgetting something?" The tremulous words slipped out before I could swallow them back. King paused, his movement stilling to stillness as those molten mercuries finally met my gaze head on. I shrank beneath the weight of his withering stare, warmth flooding my cheeks as I registered the undisguised contempt radiating from him in palpable waves. "Am I?" His tone felt like shards of ice piercing my skin as the words carried no inflection, no hint of warmth. Only frigid indifference. My throat constricted as I fought to get out the cheerful words I had practiced in my head a hundred times over. "Well, you must have had a rough day..." I swallowed hard, forcing a coy smile. "But guess what? I have a surprise of my own for you." King simply stared at me, expression blank and unreadable. For a fleeting moment, I allowed my gaze to dip below his waistline to the insistent ridge tenting his slacks. A delicious frisson of heat licked through my veins, momentarily stoking my courage. Surely once I revealed my joyous news, King's black mood would vanish like a bad dream. I wet my lips in anticipation, stomach fluttering with a heady swirl of desire and unadulterated hope. "Mama have a surprise for you!" El piped up gleefully from where he bounced on the sofa, momentarily breaking the tension. One dark brow arched almost imperceptibly as King turned towards his son. "Good," he rumbled in that sinfully deep baritone. "Because I have a surprise for her as well." His silvery stare sliced back towards me, the muscle in his stubbled jaw ticking almost imperceptibly. "El, honey, why don't you go find Lily?" He addressed the little boy, tone remarkably gentle despite the storm brewing in those molten depths. "I need to speak to your mother alone." As the maid collected El, King pivoted to fully face me, his imposing figure seeming to blot out all the light and air. I shrank back infinitesimally, that uneasy knot in my belly blossoming into full-blown trepidation. "So?" The single syllable cracked like a whip, seeming to reverberate through every fiber of my being. "Oh!" I started, momentarily jarred from my whirling thoughts. Shaking my head to clear the growing sense of dread, I summoned what I hoped was a brilliant smile. "Why don't we have dinner first? I'm sure everything will seem better once you've had a chance to unwind." I took a step closer, my hand outstretched to run soothing caresses through those silken ebony strands. Physical touch was one of the few things that could quell his mercurial temper - that, and my unwavering support no matter the storm that raged. But King recoiled from my advance as if I were a leper, turning his back on me to sink onto the plush sofa with a low growl of impatience. "Get to the point, Ashley," he ground out, using my formal name in a way that made me flinch. "I don't have all night for your games." My hand fell uselessly to my side as I gaped at him, utterly lost. This wasn't like the fleeting temper flare-ups I had weathered time and again. King's entire demeanor was radiating an icy disdain that had me questioning whether he was even the same man I had fallen so desperately in love with. "Well?" He prompted again, each clipped syllable slicing through me like shards of razored glass. I shuffled my weight from one foot to the other, tongue suddenly thick and useless in my mouth. With a trembling hand, I instinctively cupped the slight swell of my lower abdomen, the news I had been so elated to share mere moments ago now seeming like a cruel cosmic joke. "Fine. I'll start then." King's tone brooked no argument as he reached into his suit jacket to withdraw a file folder. With a casual flick of his wrist, he tossed it onto the coffee table between us. It landed with a dull thud, the stark white documents seeming to glare up at me accusingly. "I want a divorce," he stated in that same flat timbre. The words detonated like a bomb in the silence, the ringing in my ears drowning out everything else as my world imploded around me. I must have misheard him, right? This had to be some kind of twisted joke. "What?" The hoarse whisper was all I could manage as every scrap of oxygen fled my lungs in a dizzying rush. King's silvery irises turned to molten steel, absolutely no trace of warmth or levity in those mercurial depths. "Divorce, Ashley," he enunciated slowly, as if speaking to a particularly dense child. "You heard me correctly. Are you deaf... or simply dumb?" The brutal slur landed like a physical blow, pain bright and searing flaring behind my breastbone. Angry tears blurred my vision as I recoiled, nails biting crescents into my palms. "I under-understand," I choked out around the massive lump constricting my airway. "But... why?" A ghost of a cruel smile curved those sinful lips. "Because I said so. That's all the reason you need." He arched a challenging brow. "Now sign the papers, willingly or not. Your choice." "Please, King!" The impassioned plea tumbled from my lips before I could bite it back. Fat tears streaked down my flushed cheeks, searing trails of shame and heartbreak carved into my flesh. "Please don't do this to us! To our family!" My pleas seemed to roll off him in waves, King only shaking his head in blatant exasperation at my theatrics. The heavy footfalls of the approaching maid heralded my final humiliation. "You summoned me, Alpha?" Lily murmured softly, bobbing a deferential curtsy that made me want to vomit. "Yes," King dismissed my presence utterly. "Pack El's belongings. He'll be staying with me from now on." "Right away, Alpha," the maid acquiesced with a gracious incline of her head before spinning on her heel to do his bidding. White noise roared in my ears as I gaped, utterly stupid ...My thoughts scattered in a million fractured directions as the full implications crashed over me like a tidal wave of icy dread. Not only was King irreparably shattering our marriage, but he was taking my son - my entire world - and handing him over to some insipid maid on a silver platter. "Wait!" The anguished cry tore from my raw throat as I scrambled after King's retreating form. "Where are you taking El? He's my child!" But the Alpha didn't so much as break stride, cradling our son with one arm as he flung open the front door with the other. The night air washed over me, amplifying the bone-deep chill seizing my limbs. "To his new mother," King tossed the words over his shoulder with callous indifference. "I expect those divorce papers to be signed by morning. Don't make this any more difficult than it needs to be." Panic clawed at my insides with razored desperation. He couldn't be serious - he simply couldn't! Without a second thought, I launched myself after them, barreling through the open door. "No!" I screamed, throwing myself bodily in front of the idling town car as if my meager form could somehow halt this nightmare from manifesting. "You can't take him from me! Please, Alpha, I'm begging you!" For a fraction of a heartbeat, King's towering silhouette stilled, the molten silver of his irises glinting with something indecipherable in the dim glow of the parking lamps. But the moment passed in an instant as he strode forward once more, steps never faltering. His hand slammed down on the hood, the metal giving an ominous creak of protest as he leaned in close. Even with his son cradled in the crook of his other arm, the Alpha's powerful frame radiated undisguised menace. "Move, Ashley," he growled in that lethally soft tone that brooked no argument. "Or so help me, I will run you down without a second's hesitation. And we both know I have that right." Every fiber of my being rebelled against the implicit threat even as my survival instincts screamed at me to stand down. This was the man I had sworn eternal devotion to. The father of my child. Could he truly mean to bring me such harm? One look into those blazing depths, glittering with a hundred unspeakable promises, answered that question with terrible certainty. The Alpha - my Alpha - was prepared to mow me down without hesitation or remorse. Only sheer self-preservation had me flinging myself out of the path of the oncoming juggernaut, my skull bouncing off the unyielding gravel with a sickening c***k. Searing pain burst through my skull, but it paled against the anguish ravaging my heart. King had been cheating on me. Betraying me in the most deplorable way. With a guttural sob, darkness closed in, swallowing me whole. But even as unconsciousness claimed me, one thought blazed with righteous fury. I might have lost my husband, but I would be damned if I lost my son too. King could have his divorce, but he was not taking my child from me. Not without a fight.