Sleeping with the enemy Alpha

CHAPTER 4

JAX

I stare at the drip of blood on my handkerchief. Blood I had just coughed out.

This is strange. Tonight was a full moon. Blood should be everywhere by now as the curse took hold.

I should be in agony. But I wasn't.

And somehow, it all comes back to that girl. For the very first time, my wolf, buried beneath the agony of the curse, had stirred and I had felt... something the instant I laid eyes on her.

I could see her now. Those large eyes, a startling shade of green, those full coral pink lips, that mass of dark hair falling all the way down her back.

For a few minutes, I had completely forgotten myself. I had wanted her more desperately than I had wanted any woman, even the first woman I ever took to my bed.

It had almost felt like I was under a spell.

It was ridiculous.

All through the realm, women of all ages and classes , married, single were dying, plotting and scheming, to get into my bed.

Yet the girl had had dared slap me. She was cooling off now in the dungeons, of course.

She had been saved from instant death by the arrival of the envoy I had secretly sent to Frosthold pack.

The insolent girl is good as dead now. Or worse.

Still, questions about her plague my mind.

Why and how did her presence stay the curse? Or was it all just a coincidence?

"Something on your mind."

The voice, low and thin comes from behind me. My hand shoots to the silver tipped dagger at my waist. I start to bring it slicing through the air and stop.

"Aradia," I huff, releasing a slow breath without turning around.

"My king," she says.

I glance at the door. The old woman moves noisily with that cane of hers. How the hell had I missed her coming in?

I scrubbed a hand over my face, groaning inwardly.

I really needed to get that w***e off my mind.

"Something you needed?" I ask when Aradia remains silent.

Aradia's voice sinks. "Just a warning, my king." She hesitates. "I saw someone, no something, in the- the flames tonight. Your enemies, your real enemies, may be closer than they appear. Please, beware."

I raise a brow. Aradia sounds anxious, almost as if some secret is eating away at her.

"What did you see?" I ask.

"I- I cannot be certain my king."

Of course.

Aradia's days of seeing visions are long gone. Old age and senility have crept in. Still, I keep her on as the pack seer mostly out of habit.

"You haven't drunk the potion I prepared," she says suddenly.

My fingers inch towards the vial, fall back.

Aradia's potions are the only things that made the curse bearable and even they have become less effective these days.

Tonight however, I have no need of it.

My thoughts circle back to the girl again. Not that it ever left.

"Later," I say and nod towards the door.

"But Jax... My king," she exclaims. "If you don't take it-"

"Later," I say again.

Aradia hesitates, then hobbles away. She shuts the door and the silence presses in on me.

I spring to my feet, not comfortable with the turn my thoughts are taking. I leave my chambers, signal to my personal guards to stay put and head down a corridor.

My feet takes me past the east wing. Warriors and guards, celebrating another well fought war, are drinking and revelling.

As I walk past, someone is saying, "... found the girl tonight, almost naked just outside the pack, looking frightened to death." I slow. "Beautiful as a goddess..."

I stop dead. Two words leap out at me.

Found.. girl...

I send a guard for Alaric, my master of war. In less than five minutes, he is in my study.

"Tell me, Alaric," I say. "Is Theron due to spend a fresh batch of girls?"

"No, your Majesty," comes the swift reply.

"Who then is the woman brought into the pack tonight?"

As Alarci begins to talk, my fists clench hard. That fool, Alistair.

The moment he finishes, my mind begins to make a connection. A connection that would explain why the girl's presence had seemed to calm me. Why for the first time, the curse was dormant.

If I was right...

"Double the guards in the dungeon," I order Alaric. "No one is to see her. Arrest anyone who tries. Force the truth out of the girl. Use any means necessary."

Alaric hurries off to carry out my orders. I lock myself in the study, and paw through records until I find what I am looking for.

It is fortunate that I have even out-of-the-way information in my head. This time, it is to my advantage.

In thirty minutes, the records confirm what I already know.

Dawn is breaking across the sky when Alaric returns to tell me he has learnt nothing.

"Call the Beta, the council and the court to the Great hall. Then have the prisoner brought in," I say.

When I enter the Great hall they are all there. Whispers die the instant I step in. I nod at Alaric and the girl is dragged in, pale, bruised and shivering.

A hush falls over the room.

I sit on my throne, look around at them all and say, "The woman you see here was brought into the pack last night, claiming she cannot remember who she is. She should have been kept in the cells for further questioning, but Alastair here chose to do his thinking with a certain part of his anatomy..."

I let my eyes linger on his crotch.

"...and not his brain."

Someone gasps. Alastair turns deathly pale. His hand shakes.

I stare at him a moment, letting him know his punishment will be swift and severe.

To the girl grovelling at my feet, I bark, "Now last chance... tell me who you are and what you are doing here."

Her lips tremble. Tears spill down her cheeks.

"Alpha!" she cries. "I swear I'm telling the truth. I- I must have been in an accident. I cannot remember anything. I- I don't know who I am, how I got here-"

"Oh, but I do," I cut in, rising. "Several leagues from here is a pack called Stormfang, ruled over by a widowed Luna rumoured to have witch's blood. The Luna's stepdaughter is rumoured to be dead was said to possess exceptional beauty. She fits your description. Would have looked like you if she had lived. Funny that you should arrive here just a day after two of the Luna's suspected spies killed killed themselves before talking."

I stand in front of the girl, watching her breath squeeze in and out of her chest.

My voice echoes through the hall. "I put it to you, girl that you are Ravenna's step-daughter, sent her to spy on Darkwood with the goddess knows what kind of sorcery-"

"No, your majesty-" she screams. "I don't know Ravenna! I don't know Stormfang! I don't know anything!"

I feel the slightest hesitation as I remember the blood on my handkerchief, the curse, my wolf.

What if this girl somehow holds the key to breaking the curse?

No. It wasn't possible. Thinking like that was weakness. It was what the enemy would want

Somewhere in the castle, the clock strikes the hour.

"As we speak, my men are confirming this. In exactly one hour, I will have their report. In one hour, you will die."