Hellbound Souls: The Lycan Heir Mate

Mia Volkov POV “She’s waking up. Oh look.....her finger moved! Doctor, Doctor, come quickly!” The voice was shrill with panic. My eyelids fluttered, heavy as if weighed down by chains, but I forced them open. Instantly, I regretted it. White light seared my eyes, sterile and unrelenting. I squinted, blinking against the brightness, only to find a figure in a white coat leaning over me. A doctor. The sharp smell of antiseptic filled my lungs, stabbing me with a memory I hated: hospital corridors where my father’s men went to die. Damn it. A hospital. This is bad. “Raine, Raine! Are you alright?” That voice again. Feminine, familiar.....yet not. I turned, expecting to see one of my father’s loyal guards, maybe a family confidante. Instead, my gaze locked on a black-haired girl in a maid’s outfit. A maid. In a hospital. My instincts screamed. The Don would never hire someone so suspicious-looking. My mind sharpened instantly: Spy. Has to be. Sent by the Russians? Or maybe the Yakuza? Either way, I wasn’t about to lie here strapped to tubes like some weakling target. I ripped the syringe from my arm, ignoring the sting, and shot off the bed with the speed of a cornered animal. The maid barely had time to widen her eyes before my hand closed around her throat. I slammed her against the wall, muscles straining. Her lips trembled, but not with fear. She smiled. “I’m so happy you’re back, Raine.” That name again. Raine. I smiled too.....cold, sharp, fake. “Who the hell do you think you are, calling me that? Who sent you? The Russians? The Yakuza? Tell me whose district you belong to before I......” A sudden sting pierced my neck. My eyes darted sideways just in time to see the doctor lowering a syringe. Shit. Rookie mistake. My limbs turned to lead, vision blurring. How could I forget the man in the white coat? Too rash, too careless. The room swirled as my body hit the bed. Darkness swallowed me whole. ~~~~~ When I surfaced again, hushed voices floated above me. “She’s been asleep for four hours,” the maid whispered, worry etched into every syllable. “Are you sure she’s alright?” “Conscious, yes,” the doctor replied calmly, too calmly. “But I suspect a disruption in her memory function.” My pulse quickened. Memory function? “What do you mean?” the girl demanded. “What’s happening to Raine?” “Mild amnesia,” the doctor said. “But we’ll only know once the results come back. If it’s true… life in the pack will be difficult.” Pack? I stayed motionless, weighing my options. The girl sounded genuinely concerned. The doctor sounded detached. Neither looked like they were bluffing. Still, paranoia was my oldest friend. Enough pretending. I bolted upright, glaring at both of them. “Hey! You quack excuse for a doctor! I am not amnesic. Are you on drugs? Sleep-deprived? Buried under your student loans? Whatever your problem is, don’t dump it on me!” The maid yelped. The doctor adjusted his glasses. “But you’ve shown every sign, Raine......confusion, incoherent claims...... besides based on your previous visits to the hospital and according to the stories about how you are been treated..... We were told you are submissive. Besides what student loans! My education was totally free and even if it wasn't.... I could totally afford it and you KNOW that!” "Well too bad I certainly do not know that. I definitely do not know you too!" I said pointing at the maid too. "See what I was talking about? She is certainly out of her mind!" The doctor said facing the maid and that made me do f*****g pissed. How could he ignore my presence and choose to speak with a little maid instead! To show my authority and dominance.... I walked closer to the man in white cloak and grabbed him by the throat. "When I am speaking with you! You speak right back to me not to some freaking little maid!" I snapped, jabbing a finger toward the doctor. My voice cracked like a whip across the sterile air. I regretted it instantly. Because the “fragile” doctor I had dismissed as a quack moved faster than my eyes could track. His hand shot out, cold steel around my throat, and in one terrifying motion he lifted me clean off the bed. My feet dangled above the floor. My. Feet. The pressure against my windpipe was crushing, but what froze me was his eyes—no longer the bland, bored gaze of a medic but something darker. They bled into a color so deep, so endless, it felt like staring into an abyss. What the actual hell? I’d seen men break necks with their bare hands. I’d seen cartel enforcers crush ribs like twigs. But this? This was inhuman. This was something out of nightmares. My Mafia-born confidence faltered, panic widening my eyes. “Doctor, please—let her down!” the maid cried, stepping forward, voice trembling. “Don’t forget she’s still your patient!” His lips peeled back in a snarl that didn’t belong on any human face. “Then she should act like one. Not a threat.” His voice was deeper now, layered with something guttural, something primal. “I don’t think my wolf can handle a wolfless girl daring to treat us this way.” And just like that, he dropped me. I hit the mattress with a thud, gasping as air rushed greedily back into my lungs. My throat burned, and I clutched it, coughing, glaring up at him with a mix of fury and disbelief. A wolf? What the hell does that even mean? “Raine, are you okay?” The maid rushed to my side, reaching for me like I was porcelain about to crack. I tilted my head up, still coughing, and shot her the sharpest glare in my arsenal, the kind that had made grown men freeze back in my world. “Stop calling me Raine!” I snapped. “My name is Mia Volkov. Heiress to the Volkov family. Twenty two years old. I control five drug cartels, two shipping routes, and enough firepower to wipe out a small country. Net worth: three hundred million. Protected by five bodyguards and one sniper. Height: five-foot-eight. Now tell me—do I sound amnesic to you, or just smarter than every fool in this room?” Their silence was deafening. The maid swallowed hard, then turned to the doctor. “Is this because she hit her head in the pool?” Pool. The word detonated in my mind. Memories flashed.....icy water closing over me, blurred faces leaning above, my chest burning as I sank. "Too late, Cassian, my own voice whispered in memory. I outsmarted you this time." The flash burned through me. My temples throbbed with unbearable pain. I clutched my head, gritting my teeth. And then I saw it....his face, hazy but commanding. Handsome, dangerous, unreadable. His voice rang clear even in the haze: “Lock her up. Don’t let her out without my permission.” Men closed in on me, shadows against the pool’s edge. My back hit the water’s surface. My gun pressed cold and steady against my temple. I smirked. “Maybe in the next life, I’ll avoid you, Cassian.” The trigger pulled. BAM. Water swallowed me whole. End Of Flashback. I gasped, snapping awake with a jolt, drenched in cold sweat. My chest heaved as if I’d just clawed my way out of that pool again. “Raine?” the maid’s trembling voice cut through my panic. But I wasn’t Raine. Not in my blood. Not in my soul. I was Mia Volkov. Mafia princess. Heiress to an empire of blood. And somehow… I had woken up in a stranger’s body, in a world where wolves walked like men.