Page 4 of The Lycan King's Captive

The men didn’t move.

I released my breath.

But then…a ripple ran down the animal’s flank.

Then another. And another.

The animal’s legs twitched.

No, the bone undulated, moving in ways no bone should.

I backed up, shaking my head as the rippling continued and fur receded and the animal on the table changed shape entirely. Its bones lengthened. Fur changed to flesh.

Blood pounded in my ears. The syringe dropped from my fingers and clattered against the marble.

The changes sped up, until skin slid over bone and muscles shredded and knit back together before my eyes. The beast on the table became a nude man, his muscled body covered in bruises.

My knees loosened, and I might have fallen except for the strong arms that caught me and turned me around.

Roman stared down at me, his gorgeous blue eyes fully gold. He smiled, showing straight, white teeth.

But something was wrong.

Everything was wrong.

His canines were much too long.

“You’ve been a great help, Doctor,” he said. “So useful.”

Run, my brain screamed at me. But I couldn’t. My body was frozen, and I was helpless to resist as he gripped my ponytail and wrenched my head to the side.

“I’ve got a few more uses for you, Abby,” he said.

Then he tore into my throat.

2

CYRUS

The female was as good as dead. The bite hadn’t killed her, but the fever almost certainly would. Few women survived it.

One of many reasons the werewolves hated my kind.

I sat with my back against the damp wall and my filthy, blood-encrusted legs stretched before me. Weariness tugged at my eyelids, but I resisted the urge to nod off.

Sleep was a dangerous activity in this place.

So I kept my gaze on the woman.

It had been two days since Roman’s men brought her downstairs.

Or maybe it was three. When I first came to the windowless basement, I marked the days by how often they brought food. Then they brought food less often. Eventually, they stopping bringing it altogether and time congealed into one black, sticky mass.

But the female had given me something to look at besides the concrete floor or the metal bars. She was a distraction from the pain that gnawed my flesh like a thousand tiny teeth.

I’d grown accustomed to the ragged sound of her breathing. Had even come to depend on it. At first, I’d watched closely for signs she was recovering or becoming aware.

But she remained unconscious, and her skin grew flushed as her temperature soared. So it was only a matter of time until those ragged breaths stopped.

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