The insanity in his expression disappears behind a mask of indifference similar to the one my former father is wearing.
It sends a chill down my spine.
“But we have a game to play first. I need you to scream.” He reaches for me with lightning speed, slamming me back against the wall and taking the blade from my former father’s grip. The sharp edge meets my shoulder, sliding beneath the fabric of my sweater to touch the skin. “It’s too bad you're my half-sister. Otherwise, we could have some fun first.”
He drives the tip into my shoulder, shooting fiery pain through my body all the way to my toes.
“Can’t have you dying yet, Aspen. You’re my ticket off this fucking island,” he says. “And I have one more deal with Bryson to make—his life for mine.”
I don’t understand.
None of this makes any sense.
Alpha Bryson knew my mother was part Carnage Wolf. He knew a Carnage Wolf fathered me. Yet he still tried to mate me off to a Santeetlah Wolf by “using my sexuality.”
When that failed, my not-father disowned me and my mother—a female temporarily traded to a Carnage Wolf as a fuck toy by her own Alpha—-which led to my exile and her death.
And now my half-brother wants to use me as some pawn?
He yanks the knife out, only to slash it across my cheek, drawing a hiss of pain from me that ends on a whimper.
A whimper I despise.
And my former father still doesn’t fucking move.
It makes me want to hurt him. To kill him. To unleash all this anger on the man I trusted to protect me in this life.
I didn’t choose to be the product of a rape.
Nor did my mother choose to be used by her own Alpha as a fucking sex pawn.
What else did he do to her? I wonder, recalling all the times Bryson visited our home.
How could you let this happen to her? I want to demand of the frozen male standing there, watching me endure Alpha Kin’s insanity.
The knife touches my neck again as he spins me in his arms, pressing my back to his chest.
“Smile for the camera, Aspen,” my father says flatly, holding up a phone.
“Yes, say, free me,” Alpha Kin coos in my ear as he presses the silver into my skin.
It doesn’t slice this time, it just burns, causing me to shriek in both agony and fury.
Agony because silver fucking hurts.
And fury because I can’t believe my former father is just standing there holding a phone, videotaping my torment.
Who even are you? I nearly shout. Instead I scream as Alpha Kin licks my throat.
Everything about this is so damn wrong! Alphas are meant to protect. Mates are meant to cherish.
And this… this is the opposite of that. It’s cruel. It’s twisted. It’s— “Make a choice,” a new voice says, drawing my attention to the phone. Alpha Bryson, I recognize, my blood going cold. “Your lives or hers.”
No.
No. No. No.
“Cease fire!” Tieran bellows, his voice sending a chill down my spine.
Alpha Kin chuckles at my back, amused. He shifts the blade back to my shoulder, digging in again to reopen the wound he created there. It isn’t deep but it hurts, drawing a scream from my lips that makes him laugh harder behind me.
Fucking sadist!
The silver leaves my skin, returning to my neck as he wraps his palm around my waist to hold me upright. He thinks I’m losing strength over this. Maybe I am.
Or maybe I can use that to my advantage.
He sees me as an Omega. A weakling.
But he has no idea who I really am, who I trained all my life to be.
I feign a shudder that earns me another lick to the neck. I fight the urge to gag, my stomach churning in disgust.
“Well played, Bryson,” he says as the male in question appears on the phone—which my former father is holding with blank eyes.
He’s definitely under Bryson’s hold, I decide.
Not that it makes anything different between us. He willingly handed my mother over to the Santeetlah Wolves. And he disavowed me in front of the pack. That was all him.
Not the Alpha studying me from the screen.
Bryson doesn’t say anything for a long moment, his eyes assessing. I feel cold under his stare. Dead.
“What a disappointment you’ve proven to be, Aspen,” are the words he finally chooses to voice.
And something about his statement makes me even angrier.
He’s calling me a disappointment? After everything he’s done to my mother? After everything he’s done to me?
“Release her,” I hear Tieran demand.
Alpha Kin snorts behind me.
“That’s not how this is going to work,” Bryson says conversationally, the phone’s image angling down to the ground. “I make the calls here.”
My jaw clenches. Yeah. You always make the calls, don’t you? With my life. With my mother’s life. You’re a fucking disgrace.
Lava pumps through my veins, my wolf pacing angrily inside me, dying for a chance to kill.
Alphas protect.
Mates cherish.
Alphas protect.
Mates cherish.
She seems to be repeating those words over and over again in my mind, her tail swishing in fury as the Alpha at my back continues to hold me at knife point.
The Alpha who is supposedly my half-brother.
Maybe that’s why his scent is familiar.
Or maybe I’m smelling my father on him.
It doesn’t fucking matter.
I am not going to be a pawn, I decide. I’m done being a pawn.
My wolf roars in agreement, the snarl leaving my lips as I give her full control.
Alpha Kin isn’t expecting it.
His arm was loose around me, not firm, the knife at my throat pressing, but not cutting. So when I spin out of his hold, it’s in a quick maneuver he’s not ready to counter.
The silver cuts my skin.
But rather than scream, I embrace the burn and let it fuel my rage.
A roar escapes me, my wolf going absolutely feral.
I allow it.
I give her everything.
I let her lead.
My former father—Beta Gafton, I forcefully correct myself—lunges forward, finally fucking moving. But I’m ready for him, my wolf shredding my clothes as I shift in midair.