Three more of the guys laughed. They sounded like sick hyenas.
Daniel thrashed in his captors’ hands. “Don’t you dare touch her!” he shouted at his father.
“Oh, don’t worry. We’ll be gentle—at first. It’s been a while since we’ve had a girl in our home.”
“Probably because they don’t last long once you get your paws on them,” Talbot growled from the shadows just beyond Caleb. I noticed him there for the first time, his hands tied with cording and two of Caleb’s Akhs holding him. The last time I’d seen Talbot, he’d been the guard at our door. Why was he tied up now?
“That’s why I wouldn’t bring her to you,” Talbot said. “You don’t deserve to have her.”
Caleb snapped his long fingers, and one of Talbot’s captors punched him in the gut. Talbot doubled over and coughed.
“Talbot was supposed to turn you during the last couple weeks. He usually has a talent for it. But apparently you have more influence over him than he had over you. That’s one of the reasons I decided to wait until this morning to turn you myself. Not only is anticipation one of the best parts of the game, but I also wanted to see who was still loyal to me. I expected one of them to try to free you last night, only I’d expected it to be your brother, not my own beta.”
So that was why Talbot was tied up again. He’d tried to rescue us. Perhaps that commotion I’d heard at the door hadn’t been a dream after all. Yet my own brother stood by Caleb’s side, unrestrained, unwilling, unwanting to do anything. Maybe I’d been wrong about there still being good in him.
“There is something special about you.” Caleb stepped close enough so I could smell his scent of alcohol and wolf. He ran one of his fingers down my cheek and then along the vein pulsing in my neck. “It’s like you inspire devotion in the most unlikely places. I was right to choose you. You’ll be an excellent alpha female when I make you my mate.”
“That will never happen,” I said as if stating scientific fact. I wouldn’t give Caleb the satisfaction of my sounding angry or scared. I’d be dead before he could touch me again anyway. “And you are no true alpha. But Daniel is.”
Or was: the realization dawned on me. Now it all made sense, the reason Caleb would go through all this trouble to find and destroy him before the challenging ceremony. It was the same reason Caleb had hated Daniel from the moment he was born. Daniel had been born with the essence of the true alpha. He was the person Gabriel had been talking about when he said he’d thought there had been another true alpha besides Sirhan—only he wasn’t so sure Daniel still had that potential now that he was cured … or, er, everything was confused. But Caleb wasn’t taking any chances. If Daniel was a true alpha, then he was the one person who could ruin Caleb’s opportunity to take over Sirhan’s pack.
“Daniel’s got more potential for being an alpha in his little finger than you’ll ever have. That’s why you hate him, isn’t it? Because he’s everything you’re not.”
Caleb shoved his face into mine, his nostrils flaring, his yellow eyes squinted. He spread out his fingers in front of my throat, like he wanted to strangle me with his bare hand. But then he grabbed my moonstone pendant and ripped it from my neck with such force it made my head jut forward and then snap back.
He threw the pendant against the concrete wall, and I watched it burst into black bits of shattered hope. I tried to scramble for one of the pieces, but I couldn’t break free from the arms that held me. I’d been counting on the moonstone buying me a few minutes of balance.
“It’s time to finish the game.” He snapped at the two guys holding me like they were trained mutts. “Throw her in the pit.”
I didn’t kick or scream or thrash this time when the two guys picked me up. Without my moonstone necklace, I couldn’t risk getting worked up at all.