Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 84465 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 422(@200wpm)___ 338(@250wpm)___ 282(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84465 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 422(@200wpm)___ 338(@250wpm)___ 282(@300wpm)
“Leave me alone!” I shouted at him. “I’m not your property you disgusting old asshole!”
Moncrieff glared down at me, his face turning purple with rage.
“Oh yes, you are! I bought and paid for you! Won’t somebody shut that fucking thing off?”
This last was directed at the screen, where Christopher and Gabriel and I were all moaning and groaning in unison as we reached yet another orgasm together.
One of the Alphas hopped up hurriedly from his table and began messing with the laptop. But Lupio must have rigged it to keep playing no matter what, because no matter what he did, our three-way orgy just kept playing in the background.
Seeing me with my stepbrothers seemed to send Moncrieff right over the edge. He yanked me towards him, wrapped both his cold hands around my throat, and began to squeeze.
“Help! Stop!” I gasped, but the last word came out in a whisper. I pried at his cold fingers but I couldn’t get them off my neck.
Dimly, from the corner of my eye I saw the Alphas trying to grab Gabriel and Christopher again.
“Stop him—he’s killing her!” one of the Alpha’s mates shrieked, pointing at me.
“Leave him alone—they broke the Unbreakable Laws. She’s getting what she deserves,” her husband growled.
“Stop it! Get your hands off Zoe!” Christopher was trying to get to me, but two of the Alphas had him by the arms and were pulling him away.
“Take both my sons out back and kill them,” I heard my stepfather say. “It’s the only way to repay the debt between our packs.”
“No!” I tried to say, but by now my air was all cut off and I couldn’t get any breath to say it. Big black flowers were beginning to bloom in my field of view, obscuring Moncrieff’s angry face.
“You fucker—that’s our mate!” I heard a voice shout. From the corner of my eye, I saw Gabriel shake off the Alphas that were grabbing at him and bring his hand to his mouth. He was holding the little vial I’d seen earlier—the one filled with green liquid.
“Grab him! What’s he doing?” they were shouting at each other.
Gabriel swallowed convulsively and then suddenly began to change.
THIRTY-FIVE
Everyone in the room was beyond shocked—Moncrieff even loosened his grip on my throat, allowing me to get some much-needed air as we all watched Gabriel begin to Shift.
“It’s not the full moon for another week—how is he doing that?” I heard one Alpha’s mate whisper.
“Must be using something to help him Shift out of season,” her mate replied. “Fuck—there he goes!”
The neatly tailored gray suit ripped in a dozen places and then fell away completely. Fur flowed over my older stepbrother’s body and his face elongated into a snarling muzzle.
In a matter of seconds, a huge black wolf was standing there in Gabriel’s place. He jumped lightly onto the head table and growled menacingly at Moncrieff.
The message was clear—leave my mate alone!
“Hey now—stop!” Moncrieff took a step back from me, which gave Gabriel’s wolf the room he needed.
The enormous black wolf launched himself across the room and hit Moncrieff squarely in the chest. There was a ripping sound and Moncrieff cried out and staggered backwards. He tripped and tumbled into the table with the wedding cake and they all went over in a spray of white frosting and crimson blood.
There were more ripping noises and an agonized shriek and then silence…well, except for the moans and groans and sex noises still coming from the screen. I really wished that someone would find a way to shut it off.
Then the black wolf Gabriel had become jumped off the still-twitching corpse of my new husband—now my late husband, I guessed—and turned back towards the head table.
“Watch out!” one of the Alphas shouted.
“Get him! Kill him!” someone else yelled.
But there were no weapons allowed at the wedding, so nobody had a gun. The enormous black wolf jumped straight for my stepfather and closed his jaws around Esteban’s throat.
“No, my son!” he gasped, trying to push the huge predator off him. “No, you don’t want to do this! You don’t—!”
Another tearing sound and then choked gurgling as a gout of bright red arterial blood burst into the air and sprinkled down to patter on the white tablecloth like gory confetti.
Everyone in the room stopped what they were doing and watched in horror as Gabriel’s wolf killed his father, mauling him in a fit of crazed rage that must represent years of pent-up pain and hundreds of brutal beatings.
I thought of the scars on Gabriel’s back—the ones made with a silver belt buckle. Finally, Esteban Cruz was getting what he deserved, in the bloodiest way possible.
Everyone seemed to be watching the brutal scene but suddenly I felt someone tugging at my elbow. Looking up, I saw Christopher looking down at me, his eyes wide.