Page 82 of Knocked Up By My Fated Alpha
I spit blood onto the ground and rose, more slowly this time. Every inch of me ached. My vision blurred, but something flared inside. Not rage. Not pride. Just pure purpose. The pain radiating from my ribs reminded me that I was fighting for two lives today.
She lunged again, and I instantly remembered one of Damien’s lessons. “Use your environment as a weapon,” he’d always said.
I dropped low, scooped a fistful of sand, and flung it hard into her face. She shrieked, stumbling back. I lunged immediately, slamming my fist into her jaw. Bone cracked. Blood flew.
The crowd gasped. A few even cheered. Ivy recovered fast. Her lip was already sealing.
“No more games,” she snarled. She came at me full force, tackling me to the ground.
We hit hard. Her claws raked across my chest. I screamed. Painflared. Her canines snapped inches from my throat. I struck out blindly, catching her with an elbow to the side of the head, and then I rolled free.
She caught my ankle and pulled me back.
Another slash. My shoulder lit up with pain. Then another and another. I screamed as her claws tore through my side, hot blood soaking my clothes.
“You’re done,” she growled.
But I wasn’t.
I crawled to my feet, barely able to breathe. My body trembled, slick with sweat and blood. My hand rested on my belly.
And then she spoke, her voice was a whisper full of poison.
“You know, it was almost this easy when we killed your parents.”
I froze. I turned. “What?”
She smiled widely, blood between her teeth. “My father. My mother. We took your pack and your legacy. You were too scarred to remember, but I watched them rip your parents apart.” Images came surging into my skull: images of fire, images of blood, images just like the ones from my nightmares.
My mother’s scream. And then, for the first time, I saw a face in those images, a face that wasn’t my father’s as he lay lifeless or my mother’s as she screamed in horror.
I saw Ivy’s face, watching it all. It felt like something exploded inside me.
Rage…deep, blinding, and absolutely unadulterated, ignited with bone-rattling force.
It was them: my uncle, my aunt, my cousin.The people I considered family over the past decade. They had taken my parents from me. They had killed them.
The anger made my vision turn red. They would pay. All of them. I would make sure of it. I swore it.
And with that furious resolve, something sparked to life in me. My bones lit with fire. My muscles trembled under pressure. Heat raced beneath my skin, stretching it to the edge. A growl rumbled in my throat.
No…a howl.
My body arched. Pain and power slammed into me all at once. I felt my insides shift, adjusting around the child I carried, instinctively protecting it and cradling it, as something ancient and primal surged to the surface.
Then I was on all fours. Gasps tore through the crowd. I had shifted. For the first time since the night my parents were killed, my wolf was back.
Silver fur gleamed in the sun. My claws sank into the sand. Strength flooded my limbs.
And Ivy was directly in my sights. She staggered back, eyes wide with shock. “That’s… that’s impossible!”
I didn’t waste a second. I lunged.
She shifted instantly, leaping to meet me, the space between us closing in a blink. It felt like every breath, every heartbeat had led to this moment, and by the Goddess, every fiber of me burned with the need to tear her apart.
Time froze, and then we collided. A storm of fury and fur, we slammed into each other. My claws struck first, sending fast and brutal strikes raking across her head. She reeled, blood pouring from the gash. But she didn’t falter. She roared and came at me again.
This time, her claws cut into my back, and searing pain tore through me. But just as the pain settled, I felt a familiar sensation—the wild, exhilarating rush of my wolf healing. The wounds closed almost instantly.
