Page 32 of Knocked Up By My Fated Alpha
“We have a deal.”
Chapter Eleven
Raven
“Is there a reason you aren’t channeling your wolf?” Alpha Damien’s face was inches from mine, his forearms on either side of me caging me in as he straddled me. “The doctor already confirmed a partial shift wouldn’t harm the baby.”
I sucked in a labored breath that tasted like him, dark and spicy and forbidden, my heart rattling so hard in my chest that I was certain it wanted to escape the confines of my ribcage. If I’d known Alpha Damien would personally administer the training stated in the terms of our agreement, perhaps I wouldn’t have agreed so easily weeks ago. He was just as ruthless in training as he was at work.
The moment his doctors ran a comprehensive check and cleared me for physical activities, he had me in the training room of his ridiculously massive city villa that made my nice portable apartment look like a shoebox.
“This is the most I can do,” I wheezed, weak and shaky from the “simple” grappling we’d been doing.
Without a wolf, channeling was virtually impossible.
“Impossible,” Alpha Damien’s frown deepened. “Your wolf’s dominance is on par with mine.”
Now that was a laughable thought—that my nonexistent wolf’s dominance was on par with Alpha Damien, whose presence alone evoked the most primal of fears in unwary individuals. I lifted my gaze to give Alpha Damien a piece of my mind, only for my breath to catch at the sight of him.
Whenever we were training, I was stuck in survival mode, but whenever there was a brief reprieve, I couldn’t help but stare at his dark hair framing an unrealistically chiseled jawline, full dark eyebrows, golden eyes, and lips that had felt soft yet urgent against mine. I looked away suddenly, out of breath for a reason that had nothing to do with our training, and then I tapped out.
“I need a breather.”
Alpha Damien didn’t move.
“The only way you get off this floor is by throwing me off.”
I shot him a bitter glare, but Alpha Damien’s golden gaze was unwaveringly cold as he stoically stated my biggest fear.
“If you don’t learn to channel the full strength of your wolf, you will die in the duel.”
No matter how much I’d trained back in the Ivory Moon Pack or now under Alpha Damien, nothing could make up for the sheer power gap between Ivy’s strong beta wolf and my wolfless self.
I was going to die in the duel.
“I heardMr Blackwell beat up his nephew for her.”
“No wonder she got promoted so fast.”
“...always knew she was fucking her way to the top…”
I froze outside the office breakroom, snatches of the conversation between Wendy and her sycophants easily carrying to me.
Alpha Damien’s team silenced the media, slapping almost everyone who’d attended the event with NDAs, but office gossip couldn’t be so easily controlled. I got surreptitious glances, one-word responses, and complete avoidance, entire conversations ending the moment I stepped into a room.
Wendy’s soft, outraged voice piped up again. “It’s so terrible how desperate women like that give honest women like us who work hard for our positions a bad name.”
Soft murmurs of assent followed her words, and a cold anger burned in my chest, taking everything in me not to lash out.
“We should speak to the union about sacking her—” Wendy’s voice abruptly cut off as she caught sight of me after stepping into the break room, her entourage falling deadly silent next to her. Wendy recovered quickly, flashing a thin smile at me.
“Raven, I didn’t see you there. You should have joined us for lunch.”
Save for Wendy, none of the women with her could meet my gaze. Swallowing my rage and frustration, I wordlessly turned away from them and returned to my office, my appetite gone.
Arguing with any of my colleagues wouldn’t change their opinion of me. In fact, it’d make the situation more volatile, as though I was using my relationship with Alpha Damien to threaten his staff into submission. My office door was ajar. I paused, fairly certain I’d left it closed. Then I picked up my phone and sent a text.
My suspicions were proven the moment I stepped in to see my cousin seated behind my desk, her fiery red hair tilted back and heels propped up.
