L.S. Patel
The man was still watching me, his head cocked to one side as if he was a curious child.
His face was still hidden in shadow, and his green eyes glittered creepily in the darkness.
I don’t want him, I thought again to myself, trying to quell the desire coursing through my body.
I felt my lycan roar inside me the moment those words came into my mind. It didn’t matter what I wanted in my heart. My lycan had already decided.
“No!” I shouted, shoving away from the man, who was holding out his hand to pull me to my feet.
I ran away toward the bars, tripping over my feet and nearly falling.
When I reached the door, I grabbed the bars and started to rattle.
“Help!” I screamed, my voice echoing in the tunnel outside. “Please, bring me to another cell! I can’t be in here!”.
I felt my lycan howl inside me, her claws digging painfully into the inside of my ribs. She wanted nothing more than to come out right now and claim this stranger behind us.
I heard a dark chuckle behind me and whirled around, anger flaring inside me.
How dare he think this was funny!
His green eyes were watching me from the darkness. They were all I could see of him. His eyes seemed to glow, even without any light on them.
“You think this is funny?” I asked, my voice trembling. Whether I was shaking from anger or fear, I didn’t care.
I was angry at him, angry at my lycan, angry at King Dimitri, angry at the universe itself.
“Nobody’s coming,” he said, and although I hated to admit it, his voice sent a new wave of goosebumps up my arm.
Dammit. I hated the effect he had on me.
“Oh yeah? How do you know?” I challenged. I wanted to show him that just because some crazy bond thought we were destined for each other didn’t mean I was going to give in to him so easily.
“Because I’ve tried, little one. I’ve shouted everything I could think of through those bars, and nobody’s ever come. Until today.”
I saw him coming closer. He looked distinctly animal, his movements predatory. I suppressed a shiver, thinking about how long he must have been down here.
“Of course, I’m not a beautiful goddess like yourself,” he continued with a strangely seductive note in his voice.
I felt a shiver run down my spine. Why did I care if he called me beautiful? What was this mate bond doing to me?
“Who are you then?” I asked.
I wanted to get a sense of who this man was. Mate or not, if he was down here, that meant he was dangerous. I’d heard of wolves going insane and killing their own mates before.
I needed to get a sense of what kind of danger this man posed.
He prowled closer, and I saw the glint of his surprisingly white teeth.
“Don’t come any closer,” I said, but it came out as more of a whimper. All it did was cause him to chuckle again.
I saw him move forward, and I prepared to shift into my lycan. He was bigger than me but also clearly hungry. I might stand a chance.
To my surprise, however, he simply extended his hand to me.
“I am Bradley. And who do I have the pleasure of sharing my cell with today?”
I took his hand gingerly and growled inwardly as I felt raw desire coursing through me.
“I’m Savanah. Savanah Willows,” I said, sounding a little braver.
He took a step closer to me.
“Stay back!” I yelped, all the bravery gone. He chuckled again. Curse him and his fucking chuckle.
“But I want to claim my mate.”
“I’m not your mate,” I said stupidly. He tut-tutted and stepped forward again.
I darted around him before he could trap me, and I retreated further into the cell.
He let out a playful snarl and darted forward. I feigned left. He took the bait. I went right.
And then, suddenly, we were circling each other. Many feelings were coursing through my veins.
One part of me wanted to kill this man and find my king to clear my name, but another part wanted nothing more than to run into this Bradley’s arms and never let go.
“You are my mate. Surely you must know that,” Bradley said silkily.
“I…I…don’t want you, though,” I said, my voice betraying the half lie.
I saw his eyes flash, and I smelled anger. For a moment, pure fear flared inside me.
“Who is it?” he demanded, a growl evident in his tone.
“Who is what?” I said, trying to feign innocence. “I just don’t want some crazy prisoner as a mate.”
“Lies,” he hissed, and he took a step closer. I matched him back, and we continued circling. “I smell it on you, desire for another. Who is it? Who must I kill?”
I swallowed the lump in my throat but forced myself to be brave. You’re a lycan, Savanah.
“The King, Adonis Dimitri Grey.”
Bradley didn’t chuckle this time. Instead a low and deadly growl filled the air.
“Foolish girl. You don’t love that man. He’s the man who put your mate in this cell.”
I shrugged, trying to seem braver than I felt.
“I don’t care. I love him. And I don’t need a mate. Therefore, I reject—”
“—WAIT!” he roared, and I felt a savage pleasure at the terror I heard in his voice.
I wasn’t actually going to reject him. Not here, where he could rip me to shreds just for thinking it. But it felt good to have power over him.
“Let us just relax. I may have a deal to propose.” He backed up until he hit the wall, then sat down on the floor to lean against it, a clear sign of a truce.
My heart was still pounding, but I agreed to his terms, stepping against the opposite wall and slowly sitting, still ready to pull out my lycan at the slightest need.
“Don’t reject me.” His voice was softer, and my lycan growled at me in my mind, admonishing me for being so cruel to him. “Not yet.”
“Why shouldn’t I?” I asked, trying not to betray my fear. “I don’t want you as a mate.”
He growled angrily but made no move to approach me.
“Fine. I accept that…for now. But that doesn’t mean we cannot…come to an arrangement.”
My face heated as I guessed what he meant. “I don’t care how long we’re down here together. I will not sleep with you.”
My lycan licked her lips at that, and I could smell a bit of arousal in Bradley’s scent.
“As delightful as that sounds,” he said quietly after a moment, “that is not the type of arrangement I had in mind.”
“What then?” I asked, genuinely confused. We were down in the dungeons below the royal palace. What could we possibly team up to do?
“You’re going to get me out of here,” he said simply. I scoffed.
“Right, because I’m not down here in the same prison cell you are or anything.”
“That’s true. You are down here now,” he said, unfazed. “But I can tell you’re not really a threat to the kingdom.
“Sooner or later, that ‘king’ of yours will realize his mistake and come get you. Then I’m sure you’ll be granted a high-class pardon and allowed the run of the palace.”
I didn’t believe him for a second, but I hoped to the Goddess above he was right.
“That’s not going to—”
“Let’s not play this game. We both know it’s happening,” said Bradley impatiently. “When that happens, you’re going to come down and break me out of this cell.”
“And why would I do that?” I challenged. “I don’t need a mate in here, and I certainly don’t out there.”
I saw him swallow. It looked like his next words were causing him physical pain.
“Because I have a plan to restore myself to my former glory. And in order to accomplish it, I’ll need you at the king’s side…as his second-chance mate.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. If you’d told me twenty-four hours ago that I’d find my mate today and he’d offer to set me up with the king, I’d have asked how high you were.
“Um…what?” I asked, sure that I misheard.
“You heard me,” he responded softly.
“And… And…,” I sputtered, trying to come up with something to say that wasn’t gibberish. “And how do I know you won’t try to mark me?”
“You don’t. And mark my words: I will come for you eventually. But if you really love the king, you’ll do this. Because if you don’t, he’ll never so much as glance at you, let alone fuck you.
“Don’t ask me how I know. I’ve known the king a very long time.”
I stared at Bradley, unable to contemplate what he was saying. This was insane.
And yet part of me knew he was right. This was my only chance to be with Dimitri.
“I… I…,” I mumbled, my mind totally blank.
I saw Bradley smile in the darkness, enjoying my struggle.
“Well, what do you say, little one?”