The Huntress and her Alpha

Chapter Twenty One

The basement was cold, I shivered as I tried to find a comfortable way to sit. Between the thing digging in my back and my ankle restrained so tightly it was hard. My legs were falling asleep. Pins and needles pricked my skin.

The silence weighed on me as the beta sat there guarding me. He didn’t talk, not once he was done taunting me with what little he knew about what Andrew wanted to do with me. Maybe he got bored with me asking to be let out.

Or maybe he didn’t want to be here anymore than I did.

My stomach growled. The food he had brought still sat off to the side. I refused to eat, they had gotten me here by putting something in my tea. I wouldn’t take anything else from them. I wouldn’t let them disorient me again.

The only light came from the candles that were lit around the room, and the single light bulb that hung directly over the cell. I just wanted to know if it was daytime. I wanted to know how long I had been here.

I wanted to know if Lip was looking for me.

“How long have I been down here?” My throat hurt from how dry it was.

My guard sighed and then looked at his watch. “Hours. Maybe days. Who knows. I’m sure your precious Alpha has realized you’re gone by now. He won’t know who took you, seeing as he had meetings with multiple other alphas today.”

I shivered, trying to hide the fact that I knew he was right. Every alpha who had attended the ball had planned a brief meeting with Lip. He wanted to talk about the attacks and see if they knew anything. He wanted to feel them out, see if my father had approached them or if they knew what was going on.

Which meant he had been busy all day. He wouldn’t have known I was gone until he came to the room to go to bed. Even then he might assume I was doing something else or even in what used to be my room.

How long might it take him to notice something was wrong? I couldn’t call to him. Whatever they had slipped me felt like the connection I had with him had been interrupted.

Sometime after what felt like hours someone came walking down the stairs. They had a heavy foot and I could hear the authority they tried to convey with each step. Which meant it had to be Alpha Andrew.

I guess he finally decided it was time to gloat.

Alpha Andrew stopped short of cell in which he held me. Then stood on the other side of the bars watching me with a smug look on his face. “You thought I didn't recognize you didn’t you Max Calloway?”

“Honestly I don’t recognize you.” I put as much power in my voice as I could. I was hungry, cold, tired, and my body craved Lip. I just needed his touch and I knew some of my strength would return.

“Well I’ll refresh your memory. Years ago, when you were but a wee little girl, your mother found herself face to face with me and my beta. She couldn’t take us both you see, because we smelled it right away. She was pregnant. So she stuffed you into that cupboard and fought until the very end.”

My mouth fell open. My mother had been pregnant? I would’ve had a sibling? Did my father know?

My heart was pounding as he let out a breath and knelt down so he was eye level with me. “But here’s the part of the story you never knew. The one your father kept from you. Long before you were even a thought in their head, I met your mother. She was twenty one and celebrating in town at the annual fire festival. Our eyes met across the party and there it was. It took me all but two seconds to pull her into my arms and whisper ‘mate’ against her skin.”

Tears filled my eyes. “No she was my fathers soul mate. She’d never be with a wolf.”

He was getting pleasure out of my emotional pain. This was a million times worse than any physical pain he could’ve administered. I took in a breath as he tapped his fingers against his knee.

“We spent one glorious night together. Then when the sun came up and she realized what being mated to a wolf, an alpha wolf, meant, she rejected me. I never accepted it but after a month when the full moon appeared our bond was severed.”

I closed my eyes and fought off the nauseous feeling. My mother could never be with this monster. She couldn’t, she had loved my father heart and soul. And he wanted revenge for his Luna, which meant he had had another mate.

Whatever he was implying about my mother and me, about spending a night together and being mated, it couldn’t be true. He had to be lying.

My eyes were still closed so I didn’t see him open the door to my cell. My ears were filled with the pounding of my heart. I didn’t hear him approach me, but I felt his hand against my cheek and my eyes snapped open.

“Then after I took your mother away, your father took away my second chance mate. That hurt more than her rejection, even more than her death. So I’ve been waiting, because I knew this revenge would be even sweeter. You see your father believes I can break your bond with Alpha Philip. And I can.”

He stopped talking and waited for me to look at him. He pulled his hand back and watched as I processed what he said. He was going to break our bond? He would take away my happiness?

I could believe alpha Andrew would be so cruel. But my own father was behind this plan?

His eyes ran over my body, stopping on my neck, where Lip had spent countless hours kissing my skin. Alpha Andrew looked amused as he smiled. “It’ll be so much easier to do since he hasn’t marked you yet. Stupid arrogant child.”

“No.” I whispered the word, my lungs were on fire. I felt like I was drowning under water just imagining him break this golden thread that tied me to the man I never knew I needed.

Andrew didn’t even flinch. He kept on talking, as if I was just his captive audience and was as thrilled with his plan as he was.

“What he doesn’t realize is once I break your bond with Black Forest, I will create a new bond. And you shall be my third chance mate.”

I couldn’t stop my stomach from recoiling at his words. There was no food in there for me to puke, but yellow bile spewed all over his pants. I spit the acid that filled my mouth onto his shoes.

“It doesn’t matter if you break our bond. I love Lip. He’s more than just my mate, he’s my heart and soul. Which means I will never fall in love with you.”

He raised an eyebrow. “No one said anything about having to fall in love. Of course I’m sure you can be persuaded. Especially once your father gets his end of the deal for the bond being broken. Your precious little alpha’s head on a stick.”

Tears filled my eyes. “The meeting you had with Lip today, it was all a trap wasn’t it? A set up to get to me, to keep him occupied while you fed me whatever it was that put me to sleep. While you made sure he was far away and you could slip me out?”

“We’ve got a pretty and smart one on our hands boys.” He clapped and stood up, ignoring my puke that covered his pants. “She’ll be a wonderful Luna.”

“I’ll never be your mate. I’ll reject you.”

“The beauty of a forced mate bond, Max, is that it cannot be broken with a rejection.”

My stomach flipped as Andrew stood up and walked back out of the cell. “I’ll try to find a more comfortable arrangement for you, once your bond has been broken and you will no longer try to escape.”

I jerked against my restraint. I needed to get out of here. I knew even without the bond Lip was the love of my life. But I didn’t want it broken. I wanted to be with him and only him. I wanted to be his Luna, to find beside him. I wanted to marry him, I wanted him to mark me.

Hell in that moment I wanted to have his wolf babies.

Tears filled my eyes as Andrew left me in the dark cell, whistling as he made his way back up the stairs. I closed my eyes trying to figure out a plan. I was still wearing my clothes from home. There were no windows which meant no sunlight. I had no idea how much time had passed since they took me. But Lip had to have noticed by now. He would’ve come looking for me after Andrew left.

I took in a breath through my nose and opened my eyes. I looked down at my feet, my jeans were tucked into my favorite black leather boots. Whenever I wore these I stuck a small knife into the side. I couldn’t remember if it was there, but I couldn’t check with eyes watching me.

I glanced at Andrew’s beta Mike, he sat like a statue in the chair just outside my cell. I just needed to figure out a way to get out of this ankle bracelet. Then I’d sink the pure silver blade into his chest and find my way back home.