VIVIANNA
It took everything in me to keep from shifting as I walked down the stairs. My wolf snarled and banged against the barrier I was holding up with all my power.
Why are you holding back? We should kill him. He doesn’t deserve our mercy.
I need answers from him first. He needs to live long enough for me to get them.
I walked down a short hall, then turned left and found a guard standing next to a door. That had to be where they were keeping him. Why else have someone watch it? I walked up to the guard and looked at the name sewn on his uniform.
“Bartlet, would you be so kind as to let me in to see Dr. Faulk?” I asked, giving what I hoped was a harmless, encouraging smile.
“I’m sorry, ma’am, but only Alpha Darius can clear people to enter this room,” Bartlet said, unmoving.
I thought you said that when an alpha wolf commands, other wolves listen? Why isn’t he listening to me?
Make him listen then.
She had a point. I’d asked, hoping that he would comply. But if I was going to be the badass alpha that these men were used to, I needed to step up my game. I smiled once again at Bartlet and nodded my head.
“I see. Well, that’s unfortunate for you, because I’m going to enter that room,” I said as I reached out to him, grabbing both his shoulders and ramming my knee into his gut as hard as I could.
Poor Bartlet crumpled to the ground like someone had just let all the air out of him. He looked up at me, wide-eyed and afraid like I might kick him while he’s down. I crouched in front of him. “Now, open the door—please.”
Bartlet nodded and pulled a keycard out of his pocket, scanning it over the panel next to the door. The door slid open, revealing a bare white room with a man chained to a metal chair.
“Thank you,” I said, patting him on the shoulder and walking into the room.
“Did you just fucking see that? I can’t tell if I’m scared of her or falling in love,” Koit whispered loudly.
I heard another one of the guys pick Bartlet up from the floor and ask something, but I didn’t care to listen.
My prey was sitting right in front of me.
Finally, I got a good look at Dr. Faulk while not delirious from pain or drugs.
His shaggy brown hair hung in front of his face, but the tips of his ears peeked out, more wolf than man.
When he lifted his head, I was caught off guard by his eyes, one golden and the other black.
Everything about him felt wrong. I could see scars all over his body.
When he smiled at me, his teeth were pointed—again, more like his predatory self.
What had happened to this man? I shook myself out of feeling pity for him, knowing that he’d helped in my forced transformation.
“Hello, my child. It’s nice to finally spend time with you under better circumstances,” Dr. Faulk said, and I could feel his sincerity. “Oh, look, you brought friends with you too. I do love a party. I haven’t been to one in ages. Vadik isn’t much for letting me have company.”
I frowned and looked behind me, knowing the four of them would be there. “Is he okay?”
“As okay as he gets,” Koit said, shrugging his shoulders. “One too many self-tested experiments.”
“True, true, I am not very pretty to look at, but the fruit of my life’s work stands before me now,” Dr. Faulk said, gesturing towards me.
“What the hell does that mean?” Darius said, stepping up next to me.
“What do I mean, Alpha of Moonlake?” Dr. Faulk said, baiting Darius.
“This guy’s going to be no help to us; he’s lost all his marbles,” Koit grumbled to himself.
As if to prove his point, Dr. Faulk started laughing uncontrollably, tears streaming down his cheeks.
I’d had enough. I wanted answers, and I wanted them now. My hand shot out, and I slapped Faulk across the cheek hard, whipping his face to the right. The laughing stopped, but his shoulders kept shaking with mirth.
“Don’t you see the beauty in my creation? Her pure breeding is as obvious as her enhanced strength. When was the last time we’ve seen or even heard of a female alpha?” he asked dramatically, turning his head to each of the other wolves. “I’ll tell you—it’s been almost two hundred and fifty years.”
“What does this have to do with me—or your creation?” I urged.
“You truly don’t see it? Oh, my wonderful Vivianna, you have everything to do with it. No—you are everything. You’re the werewolves’ last hope!” Dr. Faulk shouted triumphantly.
“What do you mean last hope?” Tavas asked, stepping up on my other side, his face dark with anger. It was the first time I’d seen a trace of his wolf show, and he was pissed.
Faulk dropped his head into his hands, shaking from side to side. “How are you not getting it?”
His head shot back up, and he started pointing at me.
“She is the perfect genetic code. I spent years collecting DNA samples of our leaders of old. I’ve been trying to fix what we’ve lost, and now I’ve done it.
Vivianna is a manifestation of the original werewolves.
She is everything we have lost and polluted through crossbreeding. ”
“How can that be? Neither my father nor my mother is a werewolf—my wolf told me so,” I said, trying to wrap my head around what he was saying.
“Of course they’re not.” Faulk looked at me, narrowing his eyes.
“They aren’t your parents. No, no, no; it’s the other way around—you’re the mother of all wolves.
You hold the perfect DNA of ancient werewolf and natural wolf alike.
If anyone is your father, it would be me.
I picked only the best genes for you to grow from.
I researched all the best of our kind and dug up their graves to harvest their bones.
Then I stole pieces of natural wolf from historic museums all over the world to bridge the gaps. ”
“I was created… by you?” I asked, my mind reeling.
I think I’m going to be sick. This mad scientist is my father—no, creator? How is this even possible? Aren’t there laws against this? My whole life, I was meant to be a werewolf?
I started to feel faint at the mental overload. Just when I thought I was going to fall, Darius wrapped his arm around my waist, holding me against him. I leaned into his strength, knowing that I couldn’t handle much more.
“How does this help the werewolves?” Tavas asked, trying to connect the final dot.
“If she is as perfect as she seems, she will be able to give us pure werewolf daughters,” Faulk said, giving us his toothy grin.
Tavas took a step back like he had been physically hit by this last piece of information. I heard a sharp intake of breath come from Rik. Darius’s arm tightened around me, as if he was afraid I would be pulled out of his grasp.
“Now you see it, don’t you? She is the mother of the new generation.
The hope I hid away amongst the humans. Whoever she decides to breed with will have the ability to breed more natural werewolves like the days of old.
We could be in power again, protect our lands, and push back the human encroachment.
Werewolves have always been superior in every way, but we hid amongst the humans, fearing retaliation.
What they should fear is the day we no longer tolerate them in our lands.
” Faulk ranted, foaming at the mouth with his madness.
He devolved into laughter once again, making me shiver. I felt like I was going to throw up my sandwich. I needed to get out of this room and away from him—right now. I tugged against Darius’s hold, trying to leave, but instead, he scooped me up and marched out the door.
“Let the mating battles begin. Oh, what a sight it shall be—the blood, the anger. Who will win the female.” Faulk’s maniacal words and laughter followed me, embedding into my brain.