Bite First, Ask Questions Never
1401 Words
CHAPTER 3
LEILA'S POV
“Leila! Wake up! Mamma needs help in the kitchen!”
I groaned and turned to the other side.
“Leila!!!” I heard my five-year-old sister scream loudly in my ears. I grabbed my pillow and placed it over my head.
“Go away, Brit,” I murmured, settling back into my much-needed sleep.
“If you don't get up, I'll drop you in the lake.”
The threat that rolled off his lips had my eyelids snapping open right away, and I jerked up into a sitting position, breathing hard.
My gaze roamed the room I was in, my eyebrows lowering in confusion as I stared at the plain white walls.
“This isn't my room,” I whispered to myself.
“No, it's a hospital.”
My head snapped to the left and I came face to face with Alpha Alaric, dressed in a white polo and ankle-length jeans trousers.
One look at this man was all it took for my memories to flood back in like a broken dam.
Instinctively, I scooted away from him, grabbing whatever my hands could find—which turned out to be a small pair of scissors—and aimed it right at him.
“Are you really going to repeat that same mistake again?” His voice was low and annoyingly calm.
“Don't underestimate me, Alpha. I may look fragile, but I can drive these scissors straight into your heart faster than you can blink,” I threatened, even though my armed hand shook violently.
“I never did. This was you anyway, so I'm sure you can.” His right hand tapped at his left shoulder, tugging the top a little lower to expose a nasty knife wound, partially closed up, still looking raw. “Although, you'd definitely end up dead if you try it again.”
I blinked, realizing that the final moment—right before I collapsed—hadn’t been a dream after all. It actually happened.
“I…did that?”
“Yeah. I opened the door to save you, and the next thing I know, a crazy woman’s using my own dagger to stab me, threatening to kill me, then collapsing unconscious.”
I chuckled. “You came to save me? How ironic. Weren’t you the one who put me in this mess to begin with? You held me captive, raided my home, arrested my family, and locked us all up in your dungeon—for absolutely no reason!”
“Drop the act. And watch the way you speak to me, unless you want to go back there.” He scowled, and right on cue, the tears spilled from my eyes.
“Just let me be with my family. You can't separate me from them.”
“I don’t enjoy it, but my beast won’t leave me alone.” He huffed like it was a burden he had to carry.
“The bond... you feel it too, don’t you?”
“Don’t sound so shocked. I’m sure you felt the same way, especially seeing as you practically melted into a puddle of need the moment I laid a finger on you.”
I didn’t know what it was exactly, but something about the way he spoke made me feel cheap and dirty.
My cheeks flushed with a mix of embarrassment and anger. “There’s no way you’re my mate. I refuse to accept it. I, Leila Whitney, reject—”
Suddenly, I was slammed down onto the bed, a huge hand clamping over my mouth as its owner loomed above me, eyes blazing.
“What do you think you're doing?”
My eyebrows pulled together as I tried to speak, but nothing came out. I growled in frustration and twisted my head, biting down hard on his palm.
He yanked his hand back, and I exploded, “Rejecting this stupid bond! I refuse to be mated to a monster like you! You ruined my life! I hate you!”
“You do realize this bond is the only thing keeping you alive,” he said coolly, but his eyes told a different story, one much angrier.
“Better dead than bound to a man like you!” I slammed my fist into the bed. It had been easier thinking he didn’t know we were mates—easier to believe that, if he did, he wouldn’t have destroyed everything I loved.
“You think I want to be mated to one of the worst scums of the earth? Think again. I would gladly tear you and your entire family apart, from limb to limb,” he moved closer with each word that came out of his mouth and I buried myself deeper into the bed until I completely laid down flat beneath him with nowhere else to go, “But I have no choice than to accept you.”
“Why?”
“Because the goddess gave you to me. Though I don’t agree with her choices.” He eyed me warily, then moved away and settled back into his seat in one fluid, controlled motion.
I cleared my throat and folded my hands in my lap. “What do you intend to do with me?”
He tilted his head sideways, thinking for a few seconds before replying, “I haven’t figured that out yet.”
“And my family?”
“They'll be executed publicly in two weeks.”
My stomach dropped. “You can't do that!”
“Why not? You and your people didn’t think twice before attacking my pack and slaughtering children like pigs! So give me one good reason why I shouldn’t damn you all to hell?!” He raged—and I had to admit, if he kept scaring me like that, I’d die of a heart attack faster than I could spell JACK ROBINSON.
“Think about it. Do we really look like rogues? Do we smell like them? Deep down, in your gut, you know we’re not rogues, and that we are innocent in this.”
“Then explain this.”
He threw a silver badge onto the bed, and my gaze instinctively dropped to my lap—right where the silver badge now lay, blood coating its once-proud shine. “You were wearing this same badge last night.”
I nodded. “Only my father and I have the silver badge. It signifies who the Alpha and Alpha heir are. But, how do you—”
“Three days ago, the people who attacked dropped that. It was coated in the blood of a two-year-old pup, lying right next to her.”
My hand flew to my mouth in shock, horror twisting in my gut before I could speak. “That’s impossible. My father lost his badge after a meeting three days…” I trailed off, the truth beginning to sink in—and I started to see just how bad it looked.
“My father was home with me. He was teaching me how to use a bow to hunt animals. There's no way he could have been in two places at once!”
“That proves he was in my pack three days ago. Lying won't save your family. Their fate has been sealed.” He shot to his feet. “The guards will escort you to your chambers. You're not to leave that room unless I summon you.”
He turned to walk away, and just as his hand wrapped around the doorknob, I yelled.
“Wait!” I scrambled to my knees. “A deal. Let's make a deal.”
He swiveled on his heel to stare at me. “What makes you think you are in a position to make a deal with me?”
“I’m not. I’m just a girl desperate to save her family from being killed off for a crime they didn’t commit. You have nothing to lose, Alpha. You already have my pack members locked up, and I’m here—bound to you against my wishes. You have it all. Just give me this one thing.”
“What?”
“Two weeks. I'll prove my family’s innocence in two weeks.”
“And if you can't?”
“You go on with your original plan. Kill them.” And I’ll die too—because what would be the point of living?
- Writer
