Alpha Terrell's POV
She ran past Hawkins without a glance, her enraged eyes scanning our group with wild desperation. Looking for someone. Searching. She was probably searching for me, but she had no idea what I looked like.
The realization hit me just as she skidded to a halt, her bare feet sliding on the stone floor. Her chest heaved. Blood dripped from her wounds. The knife trembled in her grip.
Her gaze darted from face to face - Gareth, Kade, me, back to Gareth. Then she locked onto Bellick.
Fuck.
Bellick stood to my left, a mountain of a man with a face that looked like it had been carved from granite and then beaten with rocks for good measure. Scars crisscrossed his features - scars from a century of brutal combat. He was the biggest of my generals, standing at nearly seven feet tall, with shoulders broad enough to block doorways.
He looked exactly like what humans imagined when they pictured a monster.
I saw the moment Angel made her decision. Her eyes narrowed. Her jaw set with determination. The knife stopped trembling as her grip tightened.
"You," she breathed, the word dripping with venom. "YOU!"
"Wait…" I started, but she was already moving.
She charged at Bellick with a scream that would have done a banshee proud, that ridiculously small knife raised above her head. Her dress billowed around her thick thighs, her breasts bouncing with each step, and despite the absolute insanity of the situation, I found myself distracted by the sight of her curves once again.
Focus, Terrell.
Bellick's eyes widened - probably the most emotion I'd seen from the man in years. He stood frozen, clearly unsure whether to defend himself or just... let it happen.
Angel didn't give him time to decide.
She plunged the knife into his chest.
The blade sank in to the hilt, right between his ribs. A killing blow for any human. A serious wound even for a werewolf.
Bellick didn't even flinch.
The silence that followed was deafening.
Angel gasped, her hand still wrapped around the knife's handle, buried in Bellick's chest. She stared at the blade, then up at Bellick's face, her expression transforming from rage to dawning horror.
Bellick looked down at the knife. Then at Angel. Then at me, as if asking, What exactly am I supposed to do here?
The girl yanked the knife out - a wet, sucking sound that made Kade wince. Blood welled from the wound, but it was already beginning to close. Bellick's enhanced healing was knitting the damaged tissue back together even as we watched.
"Why..." Angel's voice cracked. "Why won't you die?"
She stabbed him again.
And again.
And again.
Each thrust became more desperate, more frantic. Tears streamed down her battered face, mixing with the blood and dirt. She was sobbing now, great heaving sounds that shook her entire body as she drove that knife into Bellick's chest over and over.
"Die! Just die! Please, please just die!"
Bellick stood there and took it, his expression shifting from confusion to something that looked almost like pity. Blood soaked his shirt, dripped onto the floor, but he didn't move. Didn't defend himself. Didn't push her away.
Behind us, Kade made a strangled sound that might have been a laugh. Gareth's face had gone blank, though I could see his shoulders shaking with suppressed laughter.
This was, without question, the most absurd thing I'd witnessed in my entire life.
"You killed them!" Angel screamed, still stabbing. "You killed my family! My sister! Her baby! My parents! Everyone!"
Stab. Stab. Stab.
"I hate you! I hate you so much!"
The knife was getting slippery with blood now. Her hands were covered in it, making her grip uncertain. On her next thrust, the blade skittered off Bellick's rib and she stumbled forward into his chest.
She beat her fists against him instead, the knife clattering to the floor. "Why won't you die? Why won't any of you just die?!"
Her voice broke completely. Her legs gave out.
Bellick, to his credit, caught her before she hit the ground.
She struggled weakly in his arms, but exhaustion and emotional pain were finally catching up with her. Her movements became sluggish, uncoordinated.
"Let me go," she whimpered. "Let me... I have to... you have to pay..."
Then her eye rolled back and she went limp.
Bellick stood there, holding an unconscious, blood-soaked girl like she weighed nothing, looking at me with an expression that clearly said, This is your mate. You deal with this.
The room remained frozen in stunned silence.
Hawkins was the first to recover. He started laughing - a harsh, ugly sound. "Well, well. Looks like your precious girl is even more broken than I thought. Quite the find, Alpha Terrell. Truly, the Moon Goddess has blessed you."
I turned to look at him slowly.
The laughter died in his throat.
"Gareth," I said quietly.
"Yes, Alpha?"
"Burn it."
"The whole castle?"
"Everything."
Gareth smiled. It wasn't a nice smile. "With pleasure."
Hawkins' face went white. "You can't… I'm an Alpha! A lord. You have no authority…"
"You lied to me," I said simply. "You disrespected me in my own presence. And worse..." I glanced at the unconscious girl in Bellick's arms, at the bruises covering her skin, the cuts that spoke of torture. "You damaged what belongs to me."
"She was my property first!" Hawkins sputtered.
"Was she?" I took a step toward him. Then another. "Because the Moon Goddess already decided she was mine a week ago. Which means every hand you laid on her, every wound you inflicted, every degradation you subjected her to..."
I was close enough now to see the sweat beading on his forehead.
"That was done to my mate."
The word felt foreign on my tongue. Mate. I'd never intended to acknowledge her as such. Had come here specifically to reject her and be done with this cosmic joke.
But watching her charge at my general with a knife, watching her break down as she tried desperately to make someone - anyone - pay for the pain she'd endured...
Something had shifted.
Not love. Nothing so soft or foolish. But she was mine. Moon Goddess-ordained or not, she belonged to me now. And what was mine, I protected.
Even from myself.
Hawkins stumbled backward. "Alpha Terrell, please, we can discuss…"
"There's nothing to discuss." I turned away from him, dismissing him like the insect he was. "Bellick, bring her. Kade, Gareth, you know what to do."
"What about him?" Kade jerked his chin toward Hawkins.
I paused at the threshold, glancing back over my shoulder. Hawkins stood frozen, his face a mask of terror and impotent rage.
"Let him burn with his castle," I said. "Unless he runs fast enough."
"What about the slave trader, Alpha."
I looked down to see the pathetic fool still on his knees, looking up at me with plea in his eyes.
"Burn him too. He doesn't deserve to live."
"No. No. No." He crawled towards me, "Alpha, please…"
I kicked him hard in the chest, sending him flying across the room, unconscious, as the fire Gareth had lighted started spreading rapidly.
******
We walked out of the castle, and behind us, Hawkins was screaming orders at his guards, calling for water, for help, for mercy he'd never shown to anyone who'd passed through his doors.
I didn't look back.
Outside, Bellick shifted Angel's weight in his arms. She looked impossibly small against his massive frame, despite her generous curves. Her head lolled against his shoulder, dark hair cascading down.
"Alpha," Bellick said carefully. "Permission to speak freely?"
"Granted."
"Your mate just stabbed me seventeen times."
Behind us, Kade snorted. "Eighteen. I counted."
"She has spirit," Gareth observed.
"She has insanity," I corrected. "And rage. And apparently zero sense of self-preservation."
"So... your type?" Kade grinned.
I shot him a look that had him coughing and suddenly finding the ground very interesting.
But he wasn't entirely wrong.
I'd spent three centuries surrounded by people who cowered before me, who measured every word for fear of my wrath. Warriors who would die at my command without question. Women who threw themselves at my feet hoping for a moment of my attention.
And here was this broken, brutalized girl who'd looked at what she thought was me and tried to kill me anyway.
Stupid. Reckless. Absolutely suicidal.
And oddly... refreshing.
Behind us, smoke began to rise from Hawkins' castle. The first screams echoed through the valley.
I climbed onto my horse, then held out my arms. "Give her to me."
Bellick hesitated. "Alpha, she might wake up and try to stab you too."
"Then I'll deal with it." When he still didn't move, I added, "That's an order, Bellick."
He passed her up carefully. I settled her across my lap, her head resting against my chest. Her scent enveloped me - vanilla and blood and that underlying sweetness that called to something primal in my wolf.
Her body was warm despite the cold air. Soft. Human fragile.
Mine.
The word echoed in my head as we rode away from the burning castle, the girl who'd tried to murder my general sleeping fitfully in my arms.
I still wasn't sure what I was going to do with her.
But one thing was certain - rejecting her had just suddenly become more complicated.