Chapter 24 Desire for her
I stretched on the bed with a loud yawn, limbs aching from too much rest, and tried to get my bearings. "Hell yeah," I muttered groggily, stretching out my neck to look out the window. My body still felt warm from the blankets, but the world outside was soaked in a heavy darkness. After eating my breakfast earlier, I had drifted off again, lulled into sleep by the quiet around me but now, it was dark, already midnight. The kind of darkness that clung to the forest like a predator in wait.
Rubbing my eyes, I flopped back on the bed. The sheets smelled like lavender, faint but comforting. Smothering another yawn, I pulled the blanket tighter and got comfortable again. My skin felt clammy, slightly damp with sweat, and my heart held onto that familiar ache the ache of knowing I was still trapped.
With my eyes opened, I listened to the forest outside. The sounds were hauntingly peaceful owls hooting softly, the rustling of leaves carried by a cold breeze. Everything outside was calm, but my inner world wasn't. The sharp memory of Jaden’s sister’s words echoed in my head, like a curse I couldn’t shake off. Everything she said confirmed my fear I would never get a chance to go back to the human world. Never see the sun as a free girl again. Never blend in with normal people. They had all marked me. Labeled me. The breeder. Like I was just a vessel. A thing.
“Urgh,” I groaned, wrapping my arms around myself. Thinking about it made my stomach turn, made my skin crawl. I lost interest in everything. I closed my eyes again, trying to let the cool night sounds calm me down. I didn’t want to cry I was done crying. I now just wanted to go back to sleep.
However, just as I had managed to push the dark thoughts to the back of my mind, something all of a sudden dropped down on the floor next to my bed. The sound was sharp and metallic, instantly slicing through the silence. I shot upright, adrenaline flooding me so fast I could taste it in my mouth. My breath hitched.
Without wasting a second, I switched on the light as fast as I could, fumbling with the switch. The harsh bulb flickered before fully glowing—and there it was. A coin. A single, old-looking coin glinting on the floor as if it had fallen from nowhere. My heart pounded.
"Where the hell has it come from?" I facepalmed as I bent down cautiously, my pulse still racing. Just as my hand went to grab it, I snatched it quickly and backed up to the middle of the bed, heart hammering, but not before grabbing the lamp beside me as a makeshift shield.
"Who the fuck is here?" I barked, panic now bubbling up my throat. My heart thudded painfully against my ribs. I was now fully frightened, every human instinct on high alert. With the coin clenched tightly in my fingers, I waved the lamp around like a weapon. I didn’t know who or what I was trying to defend myself from, but I had learned enough in this place to never take anything for granted.
As I waved the lamp wildly, I soon heard a grunt low, guttural, and unmistakably male. I gasped. I had hit someone. Someone had been inside my room. The sound wasn’t human it was too deep, too rough, vibrating with something not of this world.
"Sick pervert," I cursed when I realized who it was. Jaden. The nightmare in royal clothing. "Peacefully get out of my room," I murmured, hoping for once he might understand the concept of decency. But he didn’t. He never did.
Instead, he surged forward, grabbed the lamp, and ripped it from my hands so violently the cord snapped, plunging the room into darkness. It wasn’t just any darkness, it felt alive, pressing in on me like a suffocating cloak.
"No one orders me in my own Alpha," he groaned out, his voice like gravel soaked in smoke. It vibrated in my bones.
"What the fuck are you doing here? Isn't Harriet around for you?" I snarled, stumbling backward toward the headboard, every fiber in my body ready for a fight. My breath came out shaky. If he was really going to try something, I was ready to kill him. Or die trying.
"You, the breeder she is nothing," he said flatly. His voice had changed, thicker, hungrier. Before I could answer, he all of a sudden got hold of my ankles and yanked me down the bed. I gasped, clawing at the sheets.
"No, no, please don’t. At least use your common sense!" I kicked my leg against him blindly, hoping it would connect with something soft. When I hit something hard probably his erection he released an angry sigh, growling like some kind of beast. Not human. Never human.
He easily threw me on my front, strength far beyond a normal man. His hands were ice-cold and inhumanly fast.
"Do you remember what I told you in the pond?" he asked darkly, beginning to expose my entire back. I felt like prey again. I hated it.
"You’re sick in the head," I hissed, wriggling under him. But I guess he had enough, because before I realized it, he turned me sideways and trapped me against his unnaturally cold chest.
"I was in my room," he whispered, voice husky, "then recalled that I have a breeder in the next room. You asked me about your doctor’s body. How about this—the quicker you give birth, the faster you will meet her."
His words made the blood drain from my face. Cold sweat broke out on my skin. He was threatening to kill me, and I believed him.
I tried to wrench my leg away from where it was trapped under his thighs, but it was hopeless. "The more you protest, the more it excites me. Remember?" he whispered again, voice thick with arousal and something else something ancient.
He used his free hand to frantically move my hair to one side, exposing my neck. I felt the sudden shift in the air, the way he breathed faster, deeper. Like a predator catching scent of blood. His nose fell into the crook of my neck. He inhaled slow and loud, almost trembling and that sound alone made my stomach twist with fear.
"What the hell is wrong with this man?" I squirmed, but every time I moved, my ass rubbed against his hard front. I could feel his length poking through his pants hot, angry, and aggressive. I was only wearing shorts and a tube top , my bare skin brushing his bare chest, which radiated an unnatural heat.
His nose skimmed my skin again, and his cold hand clutched my waist tightly, pulling me even closer. His breath against my neck sent a shiver down my spine. My back arched in reaction unwanted, terrifying.
Then his tongue slid out. He started licking my neck. Long, languid strokes. I gasped, my body shuddering. He began to suck on my sweet spot, each pull making my breath come faster. I hated that it felt... pleasurable. I hated how my body reacted when my heart wanted to scream.
He suddenly let go of my hands, only to grab my jaw and move it upwards, granting himself more access. His grip was firm. Possessive.
"What are you doing?" I whispered, afraid to speak too loud.
"Don’t push me away... please," he begged in a low, broken voice.
It confused me. This wasn’t the cold-hearted Jaden. This voice trembled. This one sounded like he was on the edge of ruin, like I was the only thing holding him together. I didn’t push him away. I just sank deeper into him, basking in the warmth. A warm-blooded human surrounded by a cold predator.
But then I stilled.
I felt it. A nip.
Then another.
It continued until something warm and wet began sliding down my neck.
Quickly, I touched it with my fingers and pulled it back to look. In the dim moonlight, I saw red.
Blood. My blood.
"My goodness... no." I pulled back instinctively and whimpered. "Wait—Jaden, were you fucking biting me this whole time?"
I turned my head and shouted, heart slamming in my chest.
At my outburst, glowing eyes lifted up and met mine. Inhuman. Bright like molten silver. His canine-like teeth had extended, dripping with blood my blood. The sight of it sent a shockwave of pure terror through me. I opened my mouth to scream, and I did.
In the dark, he didn’t look like a man. He looked like something born in a nightmare. No longer Jaden but a werewolf. A big, black-eyed werewolf with bloodlust in his stare.
“Someone save me!” I screamed louder, louder than I ever had in my life as the room spun. My human body couldn’t take this. Everything went numb.
Then darkness took me.