My grip tightened on the lamp as his words echoed through my brain.
“Not even calls will go through until the storm clears” he added, voice infuriatingly calm.
I blinked at him, gripping the lamp harder like it would save my life.
“I am not staying with you.” I snapped.
“I’m leaving.”
He didn’t argue, didn’t threaten or try to stop me. Just shrugged one shoulder and said quietly.
“Okay.”
The second he said okay dismissively, I brushed past him and shoved the door open with everything I had.
The blizzard answered me like a living thing.
A wall of white fury slammed into my body, wind so sharp it felt like knives slicing through my skin. The cold was instant and brutal. It tore the breath from my lungs and drove straight into my bones, so deep i felt the c***k in me.
I stumbled back with a broken gasp and hit the floor hard, landing painfully on my backside. My hands flew to my chest on instinct, trying to shield my heart as the cold burned through me like fire.
Before I could even scream, the door slammed shut, lock twisting then his voice exploded through the cabin.
“I told you it’s dangerous!” He yelled furiously.
“When did you become this.... reckless and disobedient?”
I bit down on the words burning my tongue. I wanted to scream back at him. I wanted to remind him he wasn’t my father, my mate, or my king.
But the pain I felt was too much. It stole the fight right out of me.
He was suddenly in front of me, towering, breathing hard. His hand came out offering to help me up but I ignored it. If I’m going to be alone with him for three days I have to avoid any physical contact.
I planted my palms on the floor and tried to push myself up alone but my body shook violently,teeth chattering, legs weak and unsteady.
He sighed obviously frustrated by my stubbornness and I didn’t care. I just don’t want to react to him the way I did earlier.
Then he turned and walked past me, boots thudding heavily against the floor before he took the stairs two at a time. The sound of his steps faded upward as I heard the door slam shut.
I stayed there for a moment, humiliated and shaking, before dragging myself upright using the table for support. My fingers were numb, my skin burned.Then something soft hit my face.
I flinched, grabbing it instinctively. A thick winter sweater.
“Put it on” his voice came from behind me rough and cold.
“Unless you want to freeze to death.”
I yanked it down, staring at the fabric clenched in my fists. My eyes burned not from the cold this time, but from anger. Minutes ago he had been a monster of heat and possession, now he was ice. I looked up at him, wanting to blast him with whatever hurtful words I had in me but then he stood there with one brow raised, expression unreadable, daring me to say something, daring me to challenge him again but then I couldn’t.
He is still the Alpha King and Im trapped with him and his beast for three long suffocating days.
I swallowed hard, exhaustion crashing into me all at once, and turned toward the stairs.
I didn’t miss the way his eyes followed me as I climbed slowly but I could see a hint of approval just before I closed the door.
…………………………………………………………
I stayed upstairs.
I didn’t come down to eat.
I told myself I wasn’t hungry, that pride mattered more, that I could survive a day without food if it meant not facing him again but my stomach betrayed me.
A deep, hollow growl twisted through my belly, sharp enough to make me press a hand against it. I squeezed my eyes shut, swallowing.
I was supposed to eat with Damien after the party but then he choose to do what he did. Now Im here trapped in a blizzard with that asshole.
Then a voice slid into my mind, lazy and amused.
“You Mean Hot Asshole?”
I screamed. The sound tore out of me before I could stop it. I shot upright, heart slamming violently against my ribs, breath coming in sharp gasps, eyes flew open, heart pounding so hard it hurt.
I sat up so fast the room spun. My hand closed around the lamp instantly(my stupid weapon) and I held it out, pointing at nothing, at shadows, at corners.
“Who’s there?” I demanded in my mind, panic crawling up my spine.
There was no sound. No movement.
Then
“Relax,” The voice said calmly.
“You’re safe.”
I scrambled off the bed, pulse roaring in my ears.
“Get out of my head” I whispered silently.
“Get out.”
Before the fear could swallow me whole, a loud pounding hit the door.
“Liana!”
Rhage’s voice cuts through my mind.
“Open this door...... Now.”
I swallowed hard, dread pooling in my stomach.
“I’m fine,” I called back quickly, forcing my voice steady.
“I.. I fell off the bed while sleeping. I’m clumsy when I wake.”
Silence.
Then a long, deep sigh through the door.
Footsteps moved away down the stairs.
“He actually believed me?” I thought.
Only when the sound disappeared did my knees finally give up and I slid down the wall clutching the lamp to my chest.
“That was terrible.” The voice commented dryly.
“You could’ve tried harder.”
I slapped a hand over my mouth, eyes wide.
“Who are you?” I whispered in my head.
A pause and then her words softer.
“I’m the part of you that was never gone”
My chest tightened painfully as realization dawned on me.
“That’s not possible I thought....... I’m human. My mother was a seer, a Moon blessed prophet. She said I wouldn’t have a wolf. She said I was meant for something else.
“She didn’t say you were alone.” The voice replied gently.
A memory surfaced without warning.
Me,small, shaking, bruised, crouched beneath a wooden shelf, snow melting into my clothes after my adoptive parents threw me outside for not doing the chores perfectly. I remembered the cold, but I also remembered warmth.
Something curled around me inwardly. Shielding me from the cold, humming softly until I fell asleep.
I thought it wasn’t real, I thought I was hallucinating.
“Is that why?” I whispered.
“Why I always felt like someone was watching me? Protecting me?”
The answer came low.
“Yes.”
“I had a wolf,” I whispered, disbelief twisting into something hysterical.
“All these years? I was bullied, beaten, treated like I was broken because I couldn’t shift. If you were there why didn’t you speak sooner?”
I laughed weakly, shaking my head.
“No, No, this is the storm, im hallucinating, this can’t be true.” I spoke in my mind.
The voice didn’t argue.
Instead, it softened.
“I’m sorry Liana. I’ve dreamed of this day for so long but I had to wait, an order I couldn’t refuse.”
“For what?” I whispered.
“She asked me to.”
My heart dropped.
“She?” I whispered. “Who is she?”