Stolen by the Triplet Alphas: The Luna's Revenge

2. Stolen

AVERY

I didn’t know how long I was locked here.

Days? Weeks?

I fu.cking didn’t know anymore.

My body burned when I tried to move, and I felt like someone had sucked my soul. Not someone. Kylen, Jessa and Lyra.

If I ever got out of this room alive, I would find them and destroy them.

“We will, Ember.”

But it was silence again. I couldn’t even feel her properly anymore. I was afraid I had lost her permanently.

I knew he was poisoning me every day. The food… came with the scent of Wolfsbane, but I still ate it. I had to.

Jessa and Lyra wouldn’t stop until I finished my food.

Kylen came whenever he could.

“This is for your own good,” he’d say every time, like he could somehow make me believe his lies, like I could be gaslighted into obeying him again. “You made me look weak,” he’d hiss, he’d hurt me, and then go away. “You embarrassed me in front of the pack. What did you think was going to happen?”

Every time, he would say the same thing, over and over again, his voice soft, kind. Like he hadn’t almost killed me that night.

***

I was sleeping when I heard the sound of the lock clicking, which made my stomach twist. I hated that sound.

The door creaked open, and in came Lyra, smug as ever. She carried a small tray, bread spread with something violet and faintly gleaming. Wolfsbane.

She didn’t even bother hiding it anymore.

“Here’s your food,” she said with mock cheer.

I sighed, bones aching as I pushed myself up from the cot. I didn’t bother reaching for the tray.

Lyra arched a brow. “Eat.”

“f**k off.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Still got that mouth, huh?” she said, sneering at me.

I f*****g hated her with everything. I wanted to rip her from limb to limb, and I would have, had my wolf was still inside me.

“You’re just making this harder on yourself, Avery. You could’ve had everything if you had just kept quiet. You had to go and call the Alpha Council, didn’t you?”

“I had everything,” I said coldly. “Until I walked in and saw you f*****g my mate.”

Her mouth twitched. She hated that I wasn’t broken yet. That I still had venom in my veins.

“What did Kylen promise you? That you’d be the Luna of my pack? Trust me when I say this, Lyra. You won’t ever be Luna. Never. Even if I die, Kylen wouldn’t make you or Jessa his Luna. You will forever be his dirty little secret.”

I stood slowly, ignoring the scream of my joints.

“b***h,” she said, but the tremble in her voice… oh, it made me happy.

I wouldn’t die without a fight.

“You think you won?” I asked. “That if you play pretend Luna long enough, they’ll forget who I am? That he’ll forget me?”

“You’re nothing now,” she said. “Just a weak little girl locked in a room.”

I took a step toward her, my feet burning with each step I took.

“I may be weak,” I whispered, “but I’m not stupid. And I’m not done unless… he kills me.”

Lyra laughed, but it sounded a little too forced. “You’re delusional. Kylen’s moved on. He will make us his Luna.”

I smiled. “I won’t die in this room, Lyra. Kylen won’t kill me. He needs me.”

She rolled her eyes. “Well, you’re never getting out of this room. That’s enough for me.”

“Is it enough for you? You keep saying that like it makes it true, but we both know it isn’t true.”

“You’re pathetic,” she snapped, all that fake sweetness gone now. “You think someone’s coming for you? No one cares. No one even knows where you are. Your people think you have abandoned them."

I smiled, and it made her smile falter. Then she turned and stormed out, slamming the door behind her. The lock clicked again.

I stood in the silence, shaking.

I didn’t cry.

I wouldn’t.

They wanted me to be small. They wanted me to stay down.

I wouldn't.

And if there was even a flicker of my wolf left inside me, I’d find her again.

And when I did… they’d all pay.

They'd f*****g pay.

***

It was late. Or early. I didn’t know anymore. Time didn’t exist here. Only silence and the slow, gnawing ache of betrayal.

I sat curled against the corner, my back to the wall, knees to my chest, watching the darkness. And then I heard something.

It wasn't the usual sound of heels on marble. This sound was different. Wrong.

I scrambled upright, blood roaring in my ears. The walls pressed in closer, the air suddenly too thick to breathe.

Something slammed into the door from the outside. It buckled inward.

I stood up with a yelp, my eyes glued to the door as the door gave in, and then a shadow stepped through the broken door.

A man.

Did Kylen really send someone to kill me? Or maybe I had pushed Lyra, and this was her doing.

The man was tall, and he was clad in black from head to toe, like he was coming to a f*****g funeral.

Was it my funeral?

My body screamed run, but outside this door wasn’t safety.

“No,” I said, backing away. “Who the fu-f**k are you?”

He pulled something out of his jacket. A knife. The silver gleamed in the darkness as he took a step toward me. “Come with me without making a sound, and you’ll live.”

“Did he send you? To…” I trailed off when the man rubbed his chin with a growl, shaking his head.

“Come with me,” he repeated, voice cold, clipped.

I couldn’t die here. No. I wouldn’t let them win. I bolted toward the door, but he moved faster than anyone I had ever seen. His hand shot out and caught my wrist.

I twisted, yanking hard. “Let go of me!”

His grip tightened, impossible to break.

“Stop fighting,” he growled.

“And what? Let you f*****g kill me?”

“I told you. Don’t make it hard for me, and I won’t have to kill you.”

“Let go. Let go.” I kicked at him, landing a solid hit to his shin. He didn’t even flinch as he pulled away from me, pressing me against the wall.

“No, no. Somebody please help me,” I screamed. I knew this pack had long become Kylen’s, but these wolves were once loyal to my parents. Maybe someone would take pity on me and help me.

Shaking his head, he pressed a hand to my mouth.

“You’re so f*****g loud,” he grunted. “Goddess. Can’t you just shut up and come with me?” he said, his voice low and gruff.

He was too f*****g close for my comfort, and he smelled like trouble.

Not just blood and dirt, but something else that makes your stomach twist, and your heart beat too fast.

Trouble with a sharp jawline, a scar through his brow, and the coldest blue eyes I’d ever seen.

If Ember was here, she would tell me I focused on the wrong thing.

“You won’t get away with this,” I whispered as he dragged me out the door. The packhouse was unusually quiet. “Where-where is everyone?”

What was the plan? Did Kylen somehow get everyone out to allow this man to kill me?

Two guards lay on the ground, unmoving, and blood pooled beneath them. They were dead.

I froze.

My stomach turned. “Did you—?”

“They tried to stop me,” he said without an apology.

I jerked in his grasp again, heart pounding. “Who sent you? What do you-do you want from me?”

His answer was a look, his blue eyes flashing.

I struggled as he pulled me through the corridors, and then we burst into the open night.

The cool air hit my lungs like ice water… unfamiliar, fresh, unlike the suffocating air within that room. The sky above was starless. The moon was high, pale and distant.

I tried to pull away again, and this time, I got my footing. “Stop. I’m not going anywhere with you, you flea-bitten bastard.”

He halted, his eyes widening as he gave me a look, like he wanted to laugh, but he didn’t.

“Well, nobody’s asking you,” he said with a smile that rubbed me the wrong way.

But f**k… was he not handsome when he smiled like that.

It wasn’t just the curve of his lips, it was the way his entire face shifted. That deadly kind of beauty. Dangerous. Seductive. Infuriating. His cheekbones matched the sharpness of the knife gleaming from his hand, shadowed just enough to make him look like sin in the shape of a man.

And those full lips… that arrogant twitch on them… The kind of mouth that had no business being on someone who had just kicked down a door and kidnapped me.

And his eyes… gods, his eyes.

Under the moonlight, they were a sharp, unnatural blue, like glacial ice over deep water. Cold. Piercing. Alive. They burned through the darkness, landing on me like I was a puzzle he already knew how to solve.

I looked up at him, and my breath caught in my throat.

In the light… he was more handsome than I initially thought. Broad shoulders beneath a fitted black jacket, every inch of him radiating power and precision. There was something wild in the way he moved, something untamed, like he didn’t quite belong to this world—but goddess, did he wear it well.

Damn. He is hot.

That shout of thought felt wildly inappropriate under the circumstances, but maybe it was the hit of fresh air after weeks of stale, poisoned air. Or maybe it was just me. Maybe I had lost my fuck.ing mind.

“Now, Luna… be a good f*****g girl and do what I say.”

His voice dripped with a growl, a mix of mockery and command that set my teeth on edge.

“No,” I bit out, with every ounce of venom I had left in me.

He sighed like I was the biggest inconvenience of his night. “You make it extremely hard, but whatever…”

Before I could twist away, his arms wrapped around my legs and he hitched me up—like I weighed nothing—then slung me over his broad shoulder like I was a damn sack of potatoes.

I screamed, fists pounding against his back, legs kicking in defiance. “Put me down, you jackass! I will claw your face off!”

“Save the threats,” he grunted, striding through the ruined hallway. “You’ll need them later.”

The scent of blood still lingered thick in the air. Kylen’s guards—dead. Their bodies lay crumpled near the door, limbs bent wrong, blood pooling. One of them had a gash through his throat so clean it almost looked surgical. The other… his chest was caved in.

Except for those two, the entire place was eerily empty.

Where the hell was everyone?

He didn't slow down, he kept walking.

The trees loomed ahead like black sentinels, silent and swaying in the wind, and the moon glared down through broken clouds. His pace didn’t slow as we finally reached the edge of the woods. I was still on his shoulder, head impossibly closer to his ass.

I thrashed again, finally planting my elbow in his spine, as I took a bite on his ass. Hard. He jerked, his hands on me loosening, and I jumped down from him.

“f**k, woman,” he hissed. “Did you just bite me?”

“Come another step closer, and I’ll show you where else I can bite.”

He laughed. The bastard actually laughed, deep and amused like I’d just told the funniest joke in the world. “Now you’re just flirting.”

I turned and ran into the wild woods. I knew this woods better than he did. Kylen would regret this night. I would make sure of it.

Bark scraped my shoulder as I shoved through the thickest part of the trees. My breath came in ragged bursts, heart thudding in my ears. I ducked under a low branch, scrambled across moss-slicked rocks, and pushed deeper into the thicket, the kind only those born here could navigate without breaking an ankle.

Behind me, I heard footsteps. He was fast. Damn fast, but I didn’t stop.

The silver still burned in my system, my wolf too weak to surface, but I had my legs. I had my rage. I had the biting cold and the wild of the woods screaming for me to run.

“Damn it, stop running!” he shouted behind me.

“f**k off!”

I slid down a small incline, knees buckling, palms scraping against ice-cold mud. I stumbled forward, breath hitching as I launched into a sprint again, weaving through tall pines and thorns that tore at my clothes and arms.

I didn’t care. I had to get away.

If I followed the trail, I would reach the river. If I made it to the cliffs beyond that—

But then I heard it. A branch breaking.

He was getting closer. I pushed harder, lungs seizing. My foot caught on a root, and I tumbled forward, slamming into the dirt hard enough to knock the air from my chest.

Before I could stand up, a shadow loomed over me.

I tried to scramble away, but strong hands grabbed my waist, flipping me onto my back like I weighed nothing.

“Get off me!” I screamed, fists flying, legs kicking.

He caught my wrists and pinned them to the ground, his face inches from mine, his chest heaving. The moonlight filtered through the trees and lit up his features—sharp cheekbones, wild hair falling over his brow, eyes like twin shards of storm-lit ice.

He looked like he belonged in the dark.

“Are you done?” he snapped, voice tight, barely holding something in check. “Because I'll chase you again. And I'll catch you again.”

___