The Alpha I Saved

Moon Blood

The shot hit Kael before I even understood what was happening.

One second, the hunter’s rifle was pointed at my chest. The next, Kael was in front of me, his body jerking from the impact. A sharp, terrible sound tore from his throat, half growl, half pain, and blood sprayed across the wooden floor.

For a moment, the world stopped.

Then the hall erupted.

Wolves lunged. Hunters shouted. Mara grabbed my shoulder and shoved me down beside the wounded guard as a second shot cracked through the lodge. The bullet buried itself in the wall above my head, sending splinters raining into my hair.

I couldn’t breathe.

Kael had taken the shot for me.

He had taken the shot meant for my heart.

“Stay down!” Rhys shouted.

But I was already crawling toward Kael.

Because he was still standing.

Somehow, impossibly, he was still on his feet, shoulders squared, one hand pressed against his side where blood spread between his fingers. His eyes burned gold, brighter than I had ever seen them, and the air around him pulsed with something violent and wild.

The hunter who shot him took a step back.

For the first time, he looked afraid.

Good.

Kael smiled.

It was not beautiful. It was not warm. It was the kind of smile that belonged to nightmares and old stories told around fires to make children behave.

“You aimed at my mate,” Kael said.

The word crashed through me.

Mate.

The hunter lifted his rifle again, but he was too slow. Kael moved like pain didn’t matter. Like blood didn’t matter. Like nothing existed except the man who had tried to kill me.

He crossed the room in a blur.

The hunter flew backward into the wall so hard the whole lodge shook.

I gasped, frozen on my knees, as chaos swallowed the room. Rhys fought two hunters near the broken doors, his knife flashing silver under the lights. Elias appeared from nowhere, slamming one man into the floor before he could fire again. Wolves shifted around me, bones cracking, eyes glowing, teeth flashing in the firelight.

It should have horrified me.

It did horrify me.

But beneath the terror, another part of me watched with a strange, awful understanding.

They weren’t monsters attacking humans.

They were a pack defending their home.

And I was somehow the reason it was under attack.

The hunter Kael had thrown groaned from the floor. Kael reached down, grabbed him by the front of his coat, and dragged him up like he weighed nothing.

“Who sent you?” Kael growled.

The hunter laughed, blood on his teeth. “You think this ends with us?”

Kael’s hand tightened around his throat.

The hunter’s eyes flicked past him.

To me.

He smiled.

My stomach turned.

“She doesn’t even know, does she?” he rasped.

Kael went still.

I felt it before I saw it. The sudden tension in his shoulders. The way Rhys looked over. The way Mara’s face tightened beside me.

I pushed myself to my feet. “Know what?”

Kael didn’t answer.

The hunter laughed again. “Ask your Alpha why a human can survive his blood on her skin.”

A cold shiver ran through me.

Kael’s voice dropped. “Enough.”

“Ask him why the bond found her.” The hunter’s gaze locked on mine, sharp and cruel. “Ask him what happens when the blood wakes up.”

Kael slammed him into the wall again.

The hunter’s head snapped back, and he went limp.

Silence fell in pieces.

The other hunters were down. Some alive. Some not. The broken doors hung open, rain sweeping into the lodge across the floorboards. Wolves stood everywhere, breathing hard, wounded, furious, watching Kael.

Watching me.

My hands trembled.

“What did he mean?” I asked.

No one spoke.

I looked at Rhys. “What did he mean by my blood waking up?”

Rhys looked away.

That scared me more than anything else.

Kael turned toward me. Blood ran down his side, dripping onto the floor. His injured leg was trembling beneath his weight, and the gunshot wound near his ribs was dark, angry, and wrong.

Silver.

I knew before anyone said it.

The bullet was silver.

My anger disappeared under a wave of panic. “Sit down.”

Kael’s eyes softened just slightly. “Mira—”

“Sit down before I knock you down.”

Mara made a small choking sound. Rhys’s mouth twitched despite the blood on his face.

Kael stared at me for one long second. Then, slowly, he lowered himself into the nearest chair.

It was the first sensible thing he had done all night.

I rushed to him and pulled his hand away from the wound. The moment I saw it, my stomach dropped. The bullet had torn into his side, just below the ribs. Blood soaked his skin, and the edges of the wound were blackened like the flesh itself was burning.

“This isn’t normal,” I whispered.

“Silver,” Mara said tightly.

“I need to get the bullet out.”

Kael’s gaze stayed on my face. “Do it.”

I stared at him. “You’re saying that like I have an operating room hiding in my pocket.”

“You have hands,” he said. “Use them.”

My breath caught, and not because of the blood.

His voice had dropped lower.

Rougher.

Too intimate for a room full of people and bodies and broken doors.

I glared at him because it was safer than reacting. “Do not make that sound seductive. You have a bullet in you.”

Rhys coughed.

Mara muttered something that sounded like a prayer.

Kael’s mouth curved faintly. “Then save me again, little doctor.”

I hated that my heart answered.

I hated that my hands stopped shaking when I touched him.

Mara brought the medical bag. Rhys ordered the hunters dragged to the lower cells. Elias took men to secure the perimeter. The lodge moved around us, but I only saw Kael.

I cleaned the wound as best as I could. Kael didn’t flinch. Not when I pressed gauze into torn flesh. Not when Mara handed me forceps. Not when I warned him it would hurt.

But when my fingers brushed his skin, his breath changed.

So did mine.

“Hold still,” I whispered.

“I am.”

“No, you’re staring.”

“I can do both.”

I looked up and regretted it immediately.

His golden eyes were fixed on me, dark with pain and something far more dangerous. The kind of look that made me remember how close his mouth had been in the SUV. How his hand had felt around my wrist. How my body had betrayed me every time he said my name.

“You need to stop looking at me like that,” I said.

“Like what?”

“Like you’re deciding whether to kiss me or kill someone.”

His eyes flicked to my mouth. “I already decided.”

My pulse jumped.

“On which one?”

His smile was slow. “Both, if necessary.”

Heat rushed up my neck. “You are impossible.”

“You are mine.”

My hand pressed too hard against the wound.

Kael hissed.

“Say that again and I will absolutely make this hurt more,” I warned.

His laugh was low, rough, and brief.

Then his face went pale.

The silver was working fast.

“Mara,” I said, my voice changing. “I need light. More gauze. Something to sterilize the forceps. Now.”

Mara moved immediately.

Kael’s hand closed around my wrist. “Mira.”

“No. Don’t talk.”

“Listen to me.”

“I said don’t talk.”

His grip tightened. “If I pass out—”

“You won’t.”

“If I do,” he continued, ignoring me, “you do not leave this room without Rhys.”

My throat tightened. “Stop giving dramatic dying instructions.”

His eyes burned into mine. “Promise me.”

I swallowed hard.

I didn’t want to promise him anything. I didn’t want any part of this world, this bond, this war, this terrifying man who had taken a bullet for me without hesitation.

But the thought of him not opening his eyes again made something in my chest twist painfully.

“I promise,” I said.

His thumb brushed over my pulse. “Good girl.”

The words hit low in my stomach.

I hated him for saying them.

I hated myself more for liking it.

“Do not distract your doctor,” I snapped.

His smile faded when I pushed the forceps into the wound.

This time, he flinched.

A deep growl tore from his chest, and every wolf in the room turned toward us. The sound rolled through the floor, through my bones, through places in me it had no business reaching.

“Kael,” I said softly, without thinking.

His eyes snapped open.

Focused on me.

“That’s it,” I whispered. “Stay with me.”

His breathing was harsh, but he held still. I worked carefully, sweat gathering at the back of my neck despite the cold air pouring through the broken doors. The bullet was lodged deep, slippery with blood, and the silver burned through the glove on my fingertips when I finally touched it.

Pain shot up my hand.

I gasped.

Kael surged forward. “Mira.”

“Don’t move!”

My fingers throbbed, but I tightened my grip on the forceps and pulled.

The bullet came free.

It hit the metal tray with a sharp clink.

The entire room seemed to exhale.

Kael slumped back in the chair, his head falling against the wood. The black veins around the wound slowly began to fade.

Relief hit me so hard my knees nearly gave out.

I pressed clean gauze to his side. “You’re going to live.”

His eyes opened halfway. “Disappointed?”

“Deeply.”

His mouth twitched.

Then his gaze dropped to my hand.

The glove had torn.

A thin line of red cut across my fingertip where the silver had burned me. It was small, barely anything.

But Kael went utterly still.

Every wolf nearby did too.

I looked around slowly. “What?”

Mara’s face had gone pale.

Rhys stepped closer. “Mira, don’t move.”

My heartbeat quickened. “Why is everyone staring at my hand?”

Kael reached for me, but before he could touch me, the cut on my finger began to glow.

Silver-blue.

Like moonlight trapped beneath my skin.

A whisper moved through the room.

I didn’t understand the words at first.

Then Mara said them again, softer this time.

“Moon blood.”

Kael’s eyes lifted to mine.

For the first time since I met him, the Alpha of Blackpine looked shaken.

“What is happening to me?” I whispered.

No one answered.

Outside, in the rain, a wolf howled.

And this time, something inside me answered back.