Alpha (33 page)

Scarlett

For the first time since Cade had drugged me I tried to call to him through the mind-link.

Cade.

I got no response. Was he so angry with me that he was ignoring me?

I heard movement by the door of the cell and held my breath as I waited to see who it was. The lock turned and the door opened.

My jaw dropped open in surprise as Keri walked in. There was no sign of the outgoing and friendly girl that I'd taken an instant liking to. And in her place was a stranger void of any emotion.

"Keri?" I questioned my friend, not quite believing my eyes.

She didn't answer or acknowledge me as she turned back to the open door—and in walked an older guy. That feeling of power hit me; I'd only ever sensed that around Cade, Blake and Kyle. The guy was an alpha as well.

He was tall and well-built with brown hair streaked with some gray at the roots that was cut neatly short. He was dressed in a dark formal suit. His dark brown eyes swept over me triumphantly like he'd won and I was his prize. Fear began to seep into me. His smile was chilling and cruel.

He stepped forward.

"You are as beautiful as your mother," he said as he stepped forward to touch my cheek. I jerked my face away from him.

Horror filled me when I finally realized who he was.

Victor.

He was the man that had murdered my parents. Hurt, anger and an array of various emotions began to build up inside of me.

The last thing I remembered was Curtis injecting me. It didn't add up. Curtis was human. Why would he be working for Victor? Victor watched me with a satisfied smile.

"Have you figured out how I got you?" he asked, looking mildly entertained.

My eyes flickered to Keri, who was still watching me with stone-like features. She was Keri, but she was different. There was something different about her. Then it hit me.

I smelled her scent. Keri was a werewolf. How was it possible? I'd been around her for weeks and I'd never smelled a scent on her. In a school full of werewolves, no one had known that she was a werewolf.

Victor's smile deepened as he watched me for a reaction.

"Wolfsbane is a very handy herb," he drawled. "It doesn't just burn our skin and make an effective way of keeping us confined. In small doses, administered to a werewolf, it suppresses some of the werewolf traits."

"Isn't that right, darling?" he said to Keri. Darling? Was Keri his partner or something? He was old enough to be her father but some people liked that. I watched as she looked to Victor. For the first time, I saw a flicker of emotion briefly pass over her face. I recognized fear and nervousness.

"Yes, Father."

What?!

Keri was Victor's daughter? I looked incredulously from him to her. Keri's features were void of any emotion and Victor smiled at my obvious surprise. Her father was the man who had murdered my parents in cold blood. My initial shock and surprise was slowly replaced by the anger and hatred for who he was and what he'd taken from me.

"Curtis?" I asked.

"Yes, Curtis. He is a werewolf from my pack."

Victor had given them wolfsbane to suppress enough of their werewolf features, so that none of the other werewolves would pick up on them.

"Why?" So many questions were running through my mind.

"I like to keep tabs on the packs that surround mine; it just makes sense to keep an extra eye on them. You must have heard the saying, 'keep your friends close and your enemies closer'."

He'd planted them as spies to keep an eye on Cade and Blake, and their packs.

"You planted the spies before I moved here," I realized out loud.

"Yes. Finding you was an added bonus," he said as he cocked his head to the side. He studied me for a moment like I was something precious to him, which made my stomach turn.

"When my daughter reported back that a new werewolf had moved into town I was very curious about you," he began to explain. "She took a couple of photos of you and when I saw them I knew who you were straight away. There was no mistaking those features."

He took a step closer and caressed my cheek with his knuckles. My skin crawled at his touch.

"I had no idea how your parents managed to hide your existence from me. But that is irrelevant. I have you now, and that is all that matters."

This guy was off his rocker. 'Fucking lunatic' was an apt nickname for him.

"Don't think for a minute that if you'd done things differently this wouldn't have been the ultimate outcome," he assured me with a smugness I wanted to wipe off his face. "From the time I found out about you, this was inevitable."

I felt a sinking feeling in my stomach.

"How did you get me away from Cade?" I asked the burning question. I hadn't been able to figure that out. I was never going to be okay. In my mind there were only two ways this was going to play out and neither was going to be good for me, but I needed to know that Cade was safe.

He studied me for a moment and touched my mating scar on my neck.

"Cade had no idea that when he requested Curtis to sedate you that he was making it easier for me to get you. We created a distraction and Curtis managed to sneak you out without anyone noticing. They had bigger problems to concentrate on than the fact that you're missing."

"What do you mean?" I asked as a sense of foreboding settled over me.

"I have decided that it is time to expand my territory. I'll get rid of the smaller packs and any werewolves that don't get killed in the process will be integrated into my pack by force."

Oh. My. God.

I put my hand over my mouth as I realized that the reason why he hadn't answered was because our pack was under attack. Panic began to build up in me. What if it was worse?

What if he'd been injured? Or worse? No, that wasn't something I could contemplate. He had to be okay. There was no other option.

I closed my eyes and tried to reach Cade again through the mind-link.

Cade! Please answer me.
But I got no response.

I opened my eyes and Victor laughed at me.

"There is no point trying to mind-link with your mate. I've dosed you with the wolfsbane, so you aren't able to communicate with him."

Victor studied me for a moment. My eyes flickered to Keri for a moment but she was indifferent to me, her gaze fixed on her monster of a father.

"From this moment on you belong to me," he told me. "And I will never let you go."

He could hold my physical body by force but he couldn't hold my heart: that already belonged to Cade.

"I belong to Cade," I stated, holding his unwavering gaze. "And nothing you ever do will change that."

His eyes fastened on me, and before I could react his hand connected with my cheek. The force was so hard that I felt my teeth shake. I flew back from the force of the hit and my hand went to my stinging cheek.

Through the pain, I glared at him.

"If I have to I will beat it out of you," he warned me. "You don't know what I'm capable of, so don't test me."

I knew exactly what he was capable of. I fisted my hands to try and keep control of my temper because I knew I was about to lose it. My mind began racing through the options I still had. I was contemplating shifting into my wolf form and trying to attack Victor before he could shift and fight me back.

"Don't even think about it," he warned. The change happened so suddenly that I was convinced he had a split personality.

"The dose of wolfsbane also stops you from shifting into your wolf form."

My situation was getting worse and I was running out of options. I had to do something.

My gaze did a sweep of the immediate area around me as Victor turned to say something to Keri, but there was nothing within reach that I could use as a weapon.

"We need to move her," he informed Keri and she nodded.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Scarlett

"You stay here," he instructed Keri. "I will be back soon."

He turned to give me one last appreciative gaze, which made my stomach sink with foreboding. I knew what he was going to do to me the minute he got me alone and I couldn't help the shiver of fear up my spine at the thought.

The door closed and Keri turned to face me.

"Why did you have to come back?" she asked me angrily as she glared at me like I was the one at fault. "If you hadn't come back things would still be okay. But now everything is going to change and who knows who will still be standing when it ends."

I was stunned by her words. I stood up and faced her.

"How is this my fault?" I asked, shocked at her words.

"If you'd never come back, he wouldn't be starting a war with the surrounding packs... it's because of you this is happening. He knows Cade will fight for you, so he attacked first. But this isn't just about attacking your pack, he will wipe out the other packs to make sure there is no support for Cade and in the process he will take them over," she revealed angrily. "People are going to die."

"Their deaths won't be on my conscience, they will be on yours for doing nothing to stop your crazy father."

A few moments of strained silence settled between us. She flickered a quick nervous look at the door.

"I have no choice," she whispered and then she pressed her lips together.

"Help me get out and we can stop it," I tried to reason with her but she was shaking her head at me.

"I can't go against him," she said in a determined voice. The glimpse of the girl that had been my friend disappeared into the cold heartless bitch in front of me. I tried to take another angle as I began to run out of time.

"What about Blake?" I asked. I had no idea if her feelings for him were real.

Her features remained stone-like.

"He will die along with the rest of them," she stated calmly.

She was going to do nothing to help me while her father slaughtered innocents.

Any connection I'd ever formed with her vanished in that moment and I viewed her as the enemy. She'd never been my friend and if she was willing to do nothing while her father carried out his war, then as far as I was concerned she was on the wrong side.

For a split second her eyes glazed over and I knew she was concentrating on the mind-link and not on me. It was now or never.

I couldn't shift to my wolf form because of the wolfsbane but I had to try something. Whatever I was going to do I had to do before Keri had a chance to fight back.

I launched forward and punched her in the face. Her head hit the wall and she dropped to the floor, holding her nose.

I rushed to her, needing to incapacitate her before she could call for help. I put my arms around her neck and squeezed her air supply off. She struggled against me but I held on.

She clutched desperately at my arms, leaving scratches as she fought to breathe. Just as she stopped struggling and her body went limp I released my hold on her.

My heart began to speed up with adrenaline and fear.

I stood up but faltered—Victor filled the only exit out of the room. He watched me calmly as he stepped into the cell and glanced at his daughter, who lay on the floor.

"That wasn't very nice," he said, like he was scolding a child. I took another step back. He had me cornered and I had no options.

"If you'd killed her I would have been angry," he told me as he stepped closer. His hand slipped into the inside of the jacket of his suit and he pulled out a syringe filled with some liquid.

I knew it didn't matter what that liquid was, but I couldn't let him inject it into me.

"It would have annoyed me if I would have had to replace her," he said calmly as he stepped closer.

He was a monster; any doubt that I might have had evaporated. He didn't care about Keri. She was just another soldier in his army. I felt a moment's sympathy for the girl lying unconscious on the floor. I couldn't imagine what it would have been like being raised by someone as evil as Victor.

"I'm going to inject you with wolfsbane and then I'm going to take you away until I've taken over the additional territories," he told me. "Cade will be dead and you will belong only to me."

My heart squeezed at his words. I didn't want to live if I had to do it without Cade. It wasn't something I could comprehend. He had to stay alive and he had to be safe.

I was out of time and I was out of options but there was no way I was going to let Victor take me without a fight. Without another thought I lurched forward, taking him by surprise. I grabbed the syringe from his hand and slammed it into his knee and pushed the liquid into his body.

He grabbed both my arms and threw me down onto the floor like I was a rag doll. I landed with a thud and rolled onto my back, struggling to catch my breath.

He shook his head at me slowly as he pulled the syringe from his leg without flinching and dropped it to the floor.