Page 65 of Sold Rejected Mate
“Remember,” Xeran says quietly just before we shift back, “Valerie is in there. We wait for Lachlan to secure her.”
Then we’re shifting, our paws pounding against the ground, bodies launching forward and into the building.
The second we’re inside, I zero in on her. Valerie, sitting zip-tied to a chair in the center of the room. When she sees me, the look on her face isn’t relief but more like triumph.
And when she sees me, she closes her eyes and begins to float, her body and the chair attached to it rising up with her.
Lucian calls out, turning around. When he sees me, he calls out again.
“Lachlan.” He starts putting his hands up. “Shit!”
If he thought that we were going to talk this through, he’s madly mistaken. Lucian is not the kind of man I plan to talk to.
His eyes go wide with shock, then terror, and he doesn’t even have time to shift himself as all three hundred pounds of my wolf slam into his chest. We go down hard, concrete scraping against my hide as we roll. He screams, starts to shift, his claws getting a lazy, glancing blow over my ribs.
But I don’t feel it.
He put his hands on my mate. Threatened my unborn child.
And for that, he dies.
My jaws close around his throat, and when I feel the sick, satisfying crunch of the cartilage giving way, I growl in appreciation. Blood fills my mouth, hot and coppery, and Lucian doesn’t struggle against me at all.
His neck has snapped. He’s gone.
Immediately, I look up at Valerie, who slowly starts to lower herself to the ground, but stops when she realizes the fighting isn’t over.
Around me, chaos has erupted. Xeran has Dallas pinned against a support beam, two massive black wolves fighting, the slightly smaller of the two just a bit more skillful and beating up his older brother. Felix and Kalen corner Farris, who skitters back and forth, knowing he’s not going to beat them. His only chance is to get free, which he tries, desperately, to do.
But Kalen tackles him from behind, and they both crash into rusted metal.
Soren comes flying through at the last second, pulling Kalen to the side just as the structure shrieks, and a rusted, jagged piece drops on Farris with finality.
To the right, there’s a yelp, and Xeran appears, blood on his maw. I can see the deep, heavy anguish on his face, even in his wolf form. Killing your brothers can’t be an easy thing. I sometimes get aches when Aurela does—I feel her pain through that strange, unknowable twin bond. I can’t imagine what it would be like to take your kin’s life.
Xeran shifts back, clad in all black, the blood from his brother still smeared over his face and body. “Has anyone seen—”
At that moment, there’s a snap and a spark, and Tanner Sorel appears, his hair greasy, his eyes haunted as he looks straight at Xeran.
“You’re just as bad as our uncle,” he says, only a moment before the world erupts into pain and flame.
I’m thrown to the side, as I was the closest to Tanner when the flash went off—something to do with the contraption he was touching.
“Come on!” Valerie is there, reaching for me, and I’m on my feet, enveloped in her little bubble. Together, we race out of the building, the others joining us, Soren coughing and hacking as we go.
Xeran turns once we’re outside, and Valerie’s bubble pops, exposing us to the outside air again. She leans heavily against me, breathing hard, and I wrap an arm around her to hold her up.
“Did anyone see Tanner?” Xeran asks, turning, searching out faces. “Was he behind us?”
“I think he’s still in there,” Kalen says, his voice low. Maybe Xeran and Kalen didn’t like their brothers or agree with them, but there still must be a certain sense of grief over losing them. Being the ones to take their lives.
“Always fucking fire,” Xeran mutters, pinching the bridge of his nose, pulling his phone from his pocket to call for backup.
“Are you okay?” I’m turning to Valerie, who seems to remember herself, standing up and taking a step away from me. I reach for her as the building creaks, groaning against the weight of the fire licking up its sides.
“Don’t touch me,” she says quietly, carefully, and when she takes another step away from me, it feels like my heart is ripping in two.
“Valerie—”
