Angel's POV
I thrashed wildly, blind with rage and panic. My elbow connected with something soft - a stomach - and I heard a grunt of pain. I tried to bite the hand over my mouth, tried to stomp on feet, tried to break free through desperation.
"Angel, stop! It's me! It's Harland!"
The voice penetrated my fury. The grip on me loosened, and I was released.
I stumbled forward in the dim room, whirling to face my captor. As my eye adjusted, I could make out Harland's familiar form - Hawkin's son.
"Get away from me," I snarled, my voice raw and broken.
"Angel, please…"
"Don't touch me!" I backed away, my hands raised like claws. "Don't you dare touch me!"
Harland raised his own hands in a placating gesture, staying where he was. "I'm not going to hurt you. I would never hurt you. You know that."
"I don't know anything!" The words came out as a sob. "Except that he's here. He's right there, and you're keeping me from him!"
"Who's here? Who are you talking about?"
"Alpha Terrell! That beastly monster! I'm going to kill him!"
"If you go out there, you'll die," Harland said urgently. "Angel, think. He's an Alpha. One of the most powerful Alphas alive. You can't…"
"I don't care!" I screamed. The sound echoed in the small room, bouncing off stone walls. "Do you understand? I don't care if I die! Life means nothing anymore. It hasn't meant anything since the day he murdered everyone I loved!"
Harland flinched. "Angel..."
"I'd rather die trying to kill him than spend one more day as a sex slave in this godforsaken place." My voice broke. "At least then I'd die fighting. At least then I'd die for something."
"This isn't fighting, it's suicide," Harland insisted. "You're injured, weak, unarmed…"
"Then give me a weapon."
"What?"
"Give. Me. A. Weapon." I took a step toward him, and he took a step back. "You have a knife on your belt. I can see it. If you really want to help me, give me that knife."
"I can't do that."
"Then get out of my way."
Harland moved to block the door, his expression torn between compassion and determination. "I won't let you throw your life away like this. Your family wouldn't want…"
"Don't you dare tell me what my family would want!" The words exploded from me. "You didn't know them! You didn't see their ashes!"
Tears streamed down my face, mixing with the blood from the cut. My whole body shook with rage, with grief.
"He took everything from me," I whispered. "Everything. And now he's here, standing in that room like he has every right to breathe while they're all dead. While my sister never got to see her baby grow up. While my parents never got to see me become a nun. While that innocent child never got to live."
Harland's eyes glistened with unshed tears. "I know. God, Angel, I know. But this isn't the way…"
I wasn't listening anymore.
My gaze had locked onto the knife at his hip - a small blade, nothing fancy, but it would be enough.
Sharp enough to make Alpha Terrell bleed.
Harland was still talking, his attention focused on my face, on trying to reach me with words that meant nothing. He didn't see my hand moving, didn't notice until my fingers closed around the hilt.
I yanked the knife free and ran.
"Angel, no!"
I slammed the door behind me, and blessedly, there was a bolt on the outside. My shaking hands slid it home just as Harland's weight hit the other side.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
"Angel! Open this door! Don't do this!"
His voice followed me down the corridor, pleading, desperate. But I was already moving, the knife clutched in my fist like a lifeline.
*******
Terrell's POV
"If I walk through this castle and find the girl you claim doesn't exist," I said, my voice dropping to a lethal whisper, "I will burn this entire structure to the ground. With everyone inside."
The threat hung in the air.
Hawkins' face flushed an ugly shade of red. His hands clenched into fists at his sides, and I could see his wolf rising to the surface - eyes flickering between human brown and amber gold.
"You have no right," he snarled, abandoning all pretense of civility. "No right to come into my home, insult me in front of my own men, make demands like some…"
The air shifted.
It was subtle at first - a change in pressure, a disturbance in the castle's stale atmosphere. Then her scent hit me like a heavy wind.
Vanilla. Wildflowers. Fresh-baked cookies.
But now it was mixed with something else. Blood. Pain. And underneath it all, pure, incandescent rage.
Every head in the room turned toward the hallway entrance.
She exploded into view like a vengeful spirit.
A girl - no, a woman - came charging through the doorway with the kind of reckless abandon that spoke of someone with absolutely nothing left to lose. Her dress was torn, shredded really, the fabric ripped up to her thighs and barely clinging to her body. The thin, see-through material did nothing to hide her figure - huge, succulent breasts nearly spilling out of the neckline with each heaving breath. And her curves? Dear God… when they said she was fat, I'd envisioned a… well, I didn't know what I'd envisioned. But this curves I was seeing right now, this soft succulent heavenly curves that begged for my touch wasn't what I'd had in mind.
Her black hair was long and silky. One eye was swollen like she'd been hit in the face. There was a cut on her face with fresh blood decorating it. Bruises decorated her arms, and every visible inch of exposed flesh.
But it was her expression that froze everyone in place.
Pure, murderous fury.
She had a knife clutched in her hand, and she was screaming. No words, just a primal sound of rage that echoed off the stone walls and made even my hardened warriors take a half-step back.
Angel.
My supposed mate looked like she'd crawled out of hell itself, and from the expression on her face, she was ready to drag someone back down with her.
"What in the…" Hawkins started, but she was already moving.