Chapter 2
S o much pain .
Writhing, hot agony that flowed through my veins and made me want to let go.
He rejected me.
My eyes popped open, and I found myself staring at a white ceiling.
I adjusted the slightest bit on the uncomfortable mattress, and shards of pain sliced through my muscles.
I scanned the sterile room with a quick sweep.
The steady beep of the monitor next to the slim bed elevated with my ragged breathing.
To the right of it was a bedside cabinet with water, hand sanitizer, and blue circular bags specifically for vomiting.
Lucian sat on a chair pushed up against the bed, the front of his body slumped on the mattress, head pillowed by his arms as he faced me. His eyes kept flicking behind his eyelids, his hair was disheveled, as well as his wrinkled, gray button-down, which was stained and torn.
I remembered everything .
Dad . . .
I restrained a sob. Lucian jerked in bed, his hand squeezing my ankle. He blinked to reveal clear, tired, red-rimmed eyes. Awareness flickered through them as they settled on me.
“Josephine.” He stood so fast the chair thudded on the ground. He grabbed my face, cradling it in his palms. “Josephine.” My name on his lips sounded like it meant something to him.
The scoff stuck in my throat.
Mean something to him ? After everything he’d done? His wretched rejection, his disgusting actions with that—that woman ?
How he’d walked away from me. How he’d let that bitch touch him.
I shoved his hands off my face with a growl, managing to fling his touch away.
Even doing that hurt. I wish it were only physically, but the action even broke my heart.
All I should be worried about after a murder attempt was curling up in his embrace.
In seeking comfort from him. My lip trembled and I stiffened it. No, he wouldn’t see me fall apart.
His dark eyebrows furrowed.
“Josephine?” His knees smacked into the side of the bed. “Love, come here.”
He reached for me.
I rolled toward the side, off the bed, only the tug of the needle in my arm stopping me. My knees buckled, but I stiffened them, using the clinic bed to keep myself upright.
“Josephine,” he snapped. “Get back into bed.” The concern in his voice. So false, so fucking false.
“Love?” I hissed, the bitterness coating my voice thick. “Ha!”
Lucian cocked his head, the furrow now taking over his forehead where his dark, messy locks kissed. Looking at him physically hurt. Sending a pulsing throb through me with each beat of my heart.
“What’s wrong, Josephine?”
“Stop with the act, Alpha,” I spat. He stiffened even more. “I remember everything .” My voice broke, and my lower lip wobbled.
His shoulders dropped, and his eyes widened to the point that it looked like he was in pain. His eyes flicked from side to side, likely replaying our first meeting.
When we met, and he immediately rejected me before sauntering off with his mistress.
No, his chosen .
“I-The-I will explain—” He opened and closed his mouth, shoving his hands through his hair, disheveling the locks even more. Fuck, he looked like he hadn’t slept in days, but he still looked good.
It hurt to breathe.
“Explain?” I spat. “There’s nothing to explain.” I couldn’t stop shaking my head. That woman’s behavior with him . . . “Cierra was right. I took from her ,” I rasped. All I could focus on was the pain in my heart.
Lucian shook his head. He stepped forward, obviously forgetting the bed between us, which shuddered upon meeting with his legs.
“What are you talking about?” he bit out. “You’ve taken nothing from anyone.”
“No wonder she made that announcement to your pack. You even admitted to letting her take over because you needed time.” I shook my head.
The circumstances had been murky, but I’d believed every lying word that dripped from his seductive mouth.
“What? Did you need time after she tried to have me killed?”
“What?”
She’d admitted it to my face. Admitted trying to have me killed. I’d been weakened by whatever she drugged me with. My heart thrummed, quick and hard. She had tried to kill me again. Calculatedly, since she’d come while the house was empty.
He looked so confused.
“Back then,” I snapped. “Cierra tried to have me killed.”
Lucian’s expression twisted with confusion. “She didn’t know about you?—”
“Oh, your precious Cierra would never have,” I gasped dramatically, clutching my chest. He dared defend her?
“That’s not—” His nostrils flared. “She will die for what she did to you?—”
“Did you have something to do with it?” I spat. Was Lucian the mysterious ‘he’ she mentioned? I narrowed my eyes. “Did you help her get rid of me?”
He looked stricken, like I’d taken an axe to his face. I desperately wanted to hurt him as much as he’d hurt me. He opened and closed his mouth.
“I would never harm you,” he sputtered.
“Lies. You have hurt me.” A pained bitterness laced my words. “Get out.” My molars hurt from how hard I gritted my teeth.
“Josephine.” He sounded shocked. And that was even more maddening.
“Leave,” I snarled. “I never want to see you again.”
He staggered, but remained in the room, frozen—stricken.
“If you won’t leave, I will.” I ripped the needle out of my arm and tossed it on the floor. As much as my body hurt, nothing was worse than the agony in my chest.
As soon as I took a single step, he was suddenly in my face. He cupped the back of my neck, squeezing with a stern grip as if I were a pup.
“Enough,” he bit out, enunciating every syllable. His other hand lifted to my face, and compared to the anger seeping from him, it was gentle. “Listen to me.” His voice softened.
My ears rang with a high-pitched buzz, the thrum matching the beat of my heart.
“I don’t want to,” I cried, meeting his gaze. “I want you to leave me alone.” The hazel eyes went cold and harsh, like a veil had fallen over them.
“You will never leave me.” His voice was like velvet. Soft, careful, and articulate. I lifted my chin. Rage reflected deep in his cold stare. Had he always been this cruel and I’d been blinded?
My lower lip trembled.
His expression immediately softened, as did his grip around my nape. He caressed the skin on my throat. His touch had the same effect it always did. Tingles exploded over my skin, but before I could succumb to his allure, I yanked back. Since his hold had loosened, it was easy to do.
“Listen to me.”
“I have no interest in talking. I want you to leave.” His shoulders jerked like I’d hit him. “Get out of my way.” I shoved his chest, but he didn’t move an inch.
“Stop,” he ordered, grabbing my forearms. I bared my teeth and yanked and pulled with all my force.
“Josephine, you’re going to hurt yourself,” he shouted. I didn’t stay still. Nor did I care if I hurt myself.
The door banged against the wall from the force of it being shoved open.
“Alpha?” a female voice screamed. “You’ll harm her!” I met her shocked eyes. A woman dressed in scrubs, very obviously a nurse, ran forward and pulled at his arm where the sleeve was rolled to his elbow.
A sting spiked through my chest, right where the bond was. It traveled down to my stomach, making it clench. The fiery sear was just a shade of what I knew it could be.
The familiar pain.
Every time I’d writhed and cried, feeling this, he’d been skin to skin with other women?
Our bond had flared to life four years ago, and Cierra had touched him, placed her lips on him . . .
Since we’d bonded, it no longer hurt to the extent it used to. My nose burned with un-shed tears.
“Oh, Moon,” I croaked. “You let her touch you . . .” Quickly, I lunged to grab the blue plastic bag on the stand beside the bed. I shoved the hard circular lip against my mouth, and I gagged into it. My stomach continued to contract, but nothing came out.
Tears slipped from the corners of my eyes. My mind raced as I connected the dots. The nurse no longer touched him; she hovered closer to the door, terror all over her expression.
Slowly, Lucian approached as if I were a wild animal. Accurate, since I felt like one. My heart thundered in my ears, clenching from the realization as well as the sting from the bond.
“Every time I had those pains . . . you were touching someone—fucking someone.” Because why else would he be skin to skin with a woman for that long? Once a pair’s bond appeared, every time they touched the opposite sex, it echoed through the bond, but on the way there, it morphed into agony.
The bond was something to value and revere. Dad had told me a lot about his bond with Mom and how it dearly affected him. Losing her made him half a person. If I hadn’t been around, I had no doubt he would have killed himself.
Lucian disrespected the sanctity of what we could have had. He’d betrayed me over and over again.
Nausea rose to the surface. His shoulders and torso jerked with his harsh breaths. His hands squeezed my biceps, forcing me to face him. I sneered up at him.
“I never should have?—”
“Do not touch me,” I hissed. His face was pale, he seemed drawn and harsh, but as much pain as I could see reflected in his gaze, it meant nothing to me. “Let me go.” I writhed in his grip, yanking and wriggling to free myself.
“Never, Josephine. I will never let you go,” he threatened.
I managed to free one arm and slapped him across the face. The sting radiated down to my wrist.
He took it without flinching, still not giving me space, so I slapped him again. He stilled, his eyes welling with moisture as they looked at me. He closed them and dropped to his knees. I gasped, my arm staying suspended midair.
His head bent forward, hair falling onto his forehead.
“I’ll take your punishment.” His husky voice broke. The nurse near the door had owlish eyes that kept flipping from me to my mate.
Every inch of my body went still as I stared down at him prostrated before me. How much did he truly know? Had he been behind the attempt on my life? My dad’s murder?
I stiffened my lips into a thin line so they’d stop trembling. I had no doubt Cierra was part of it because she’d confirmed it when she came for me, but how much had Lucian known? The movement near the door brought my attention to the nurse slipping out of the room and ripped me to the present.
“You disgust me,” I spat, glaring down at him.
He jolted like I’d socked him in the stomach. His shoulders heaved a few times, but he stayed quiet.
“Forgive me, Josephine.”
Never .
He wasn’t going to let me go, and I wasn’t a physical match to fight him. I rubbed my palms on the linen gown, then pulled the blanket back to slide into the bed.
I tucked myself into a bundle.
“Get out.” Exhaustion was clear in my voice. I squeezed my eyes shut, facing the opposite wall from the one he knelt in front of. Part of me hated how dejected and sad he looked. That sick, twisted part that couldn’t help but love him.
I gritted my teeth.
“Please, leave.” I’d already hit my lowest. Whatever would get him away from me, I was trying. “Please,” I begged.
He sucked in a breath. I heard shuffling, but kept my eyes closed.
“I love you, Josephine.” His quiet voice rumbled through my chest, squeezing my aching heart.
I said nothing.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity of me lying in bed with my eyes closed, the door clicked shut. I rose from the bed and made sure he was gone. My shoulders slumped, and I hugged myself.
I didn’t trust him. I burrowed under the pillow and screamed into it, releasing my pent-up rage and agony. A sob escaped.
Cierra had succeeded in killing my soul.
Had Lucian put her up to it?
Every atom of my makeup rebelled at the thought. As hateful as he was, I didn’t think he’d been the one, and they hadn’t sounded like him. I would have recognized his voice.
Still, I didn’t trust him.
I’d find out for myself who those two male voices were from my attack.