The Alpha Who Rejected Me Is Begging at My Door

Chapter 10 – Lockdown

The alarm shrieked through the clinic like a knife.

Red strobes flashed in the corners of the ceiling, turning the white walls into a pulsing wound. Somewhere down the hall, a metal door slammed. Someone shouted my name.

Rian didn’t flinch.

He watched the lights with lazy curiosity, as if I’d just turned on background music. The bitter-chemical reek rolling off him seemed to thicken in the heat of the small room.

“Efficient,” he said. “I approve.”

“Good,” I snapped. “You’ll have plenty of time to admire our safety protocols from a holding cell.”

My wolf paced, pressing against my ribcage. The bond burned under my skin—Coren a bright, furious pressure, punching against whatever interference sat on our connection. He knew something was wrong. He just couldn’t get through.

“You should tell him to slow down,” Rian murmured. “Running in half-blind tends to get people killed.”

“You’d know,” I said. “You smell like recycled failure.”

His mouth curved. “You’re fun.”

With my hand still on the counter, I slid my fingers lower, feeling for the slim metal case taped beneath. The tranquilizer syringes were for aggressive animals, not chemical-scented sociopaths, but at the right dose they’d drop a bull.

“Look,” I said, voice cool. “This is how it’s going to go. You’re going to sit on that table. You’re going to answer some questions. And you’re going to stay very, very still until people who know more creative ways to hurt you arrive.”

He tilted his head. “And if I decline your charming invitation?”

I smiled, all teeth. “Then I test exactly how much wolf you have in you.”

I moved.

Faster than a human could track, my hand darted under the counter, closing around the metal case. I snapped it open, fingers finding a pre-loaded dart by muscle memory.

Rian was already between me and the door.

One second he’d been three strides away; the next, he was close enough that I could see the thin, swirling lines etched at the base of his throat—ink or scar, I couldn’t tell. His eyes had gone wrong, pupils stretched and feral, but not like a wolf’s. Too bright. Too hungry.

“Careful,” he murmured. “You’re not the only one with fast reflexes.”

I didn’t let myself think. I ducked, twisted, slammed my shoulder into his ribs. He grunted, surprised, stumbling back just enough.

The dart hissed as I slammed it into his thigh and hit the plunger.

“Consider this my copay,” I said.

For a heartbeat, satisfaction burned hot and sharp. Then that satisfaction turned to ice.

The tranquilizer hit something under his skin—and fizzled. Not like a missed vein. Like hitting a barrier. The chemical scent around him flared, then settled.

He looked down at his leg, then back up at me.

“That was adorable,” he said softly.

Fear tried to claw up my throat. I shoved it down.

“Cheap stuff,” I said. “Next time I’ll use the good drugs.”

“That won’t help,” he replied, almost regretful. “They’ve been working on us for years, you know. Trial and error. Pain and failure. Your little darts are barely a tickle.”

He stepped forward. I stepped back, in perfect mirror.

“Stay where you are,” I warned.

“You called for lockdown,” he said. “Doors sealed. Your human friend is busy keeping everyone else from panicking. Your alpha is pounding at a wall he can’t see. It’s just us for the moment, Lyris.”

He reached out, not quite touching my arm, fingers hovering centimeters from my skin. My wolf roared silently.

“Don’t,” I said, voice dropping.

He stopped. “If I wanted to take you,” he said quietly, “you’d already be on the floor. This isn’t a kidnapping. It’s a… conversation.”

“Oh, is that what we’re calling this?” I shot back. “You walking in here smelling like my nightmares and talking about owning my pack?”

“Your pack is already owned,” he said. “By fear, by old decisions, by a story that was never the whole truth. We’re just… offering a different leash.”

“I chewed through the last one,” I said. “Ask Varik how that went.”

Something hard flickered in his gaze. “Varik is ash,” he said. “The people who paid him are not. They’re smarter this time. Less theatrical. More patient.”

“Then they should know,” I said, “that coming after me didn’t end well for him.”

He smiled thinly. “He didn’t know the real leverage he had. We do.”

“Enlighten me,” I said, because stalling was better than letting panic set its teeth in. I could feel Elian on the other side of the door, could hear his voice over the intercom: “Lyris? You okay?” The door handle rattled uselessly against the lock.

Rian’s gaze held mine. “Your alpha thinks severing the bond saved you both,” he said. “And in a way, he’s right. It closed one door.” He leaned in, voice dropping to a purr. “But it opened a window. Do you really not feel it?”

I almost said no on reflex.

Then I paused.

Underneath my own anger, beneath the adrenaline and the clinical focus, something else shivered along the edge of my awareness. Not Coren. Not pack.

A thin, cold thread, tugging at the place where the old bond had been severed. Faint, but there. Like fishing line hooked into scar tissue.

My skin crawled.

Rian watched my face and smiled. “There it is.”

“Get out,” I said, voice rough.

He ignored that. “They thought erasing your memory would erase your imprint on him,” he went on. “They were wrong. Trauma leaves marks. And marks can be used.”

“You’re talking too much for someone who allegedly has all the leverage,” I said, nails biting into my palms. “What’s your actual point?”

“My point is simple.” He stepped back finally, giving me space to breathe. “We don’t have to drag you anywhere. As long as that scar exists, we can reach him. Through you. Through the gap he left inside you.”

The room seemed to tilt.

“You’re lying,” I said. It came out thin.

“Ask your shaman,” he said mildly. “Ask your own dreams.”

The bond flared again, jolting like someone had slammed into it from the other side. Coren’s presence crashed through, suddenly clear, bright with terror and rage.

Lyris.

I sucked in a breath. “I’m here,” I sent back, fierce. “I’m fine.”

Rian’s head c****d, as if listening to music I couldn’t hear. “He’s fast,” he noted. “He’ll be at your door in thirty seconds. So let’s be quick.”

“Oh, now we’re in a hurry?” I said. “You picked a bad time to pitch your evil MLM.”

His smile flashed, sharp and humorless. “We’re going to make this offer once,” he said. “You help us. Quietly. You keep your city, your clinic, your little bridge between worlds. In return, we don’t turn that old wound in your chest into a leash that snaps your alpha’s mind in half.”

My heart hammered. “And if I tell you to shove your offer and leave my clinic?”

Something cold glinted behind his eyes. “Then we test exactly how much strain that old scar can take,” he said. “On him. On you. On anyone within reach when it breaks.”

Footsteps pounded down the hall. The lock beeped as someone overrode it from the outside.

Rian stepped back toward the far wall, raising his hands as if he were just another client about to be questioned by annoyed staff.

“Think about it, healer,” he said quietly. “You’ve already sacrificed one bond to save your pack. Are you ready to watch what happens when someone else pulls on the pieces left behind?”

The door burst open.

Coren filled the frame, eyes wild, chest heaving, Jarek and Elian behind him. His gaze swept the room, landing on me first, then on Rian.

The bond between us throbbed, hot and fierce. Underneath it, faint and wrong, that cold thread twitched.

For the first time in a very long time, I saw real fear in my alpha’s eyes.

Not of the stranger.

Of what might already be sitting inside me, waiting.