Chapter 1
Elijah
The arrogance and sheer pompousness of the whole event was staggering.
Not only was there enough food and wine to feed an entire army for more than six months, but there were naked human women wandering the whole castle so that the vampires we were meeting with wouldn’t go thirsty for even a moment.
Some of the vampires were even whispering about the fact that a few of them might be virgins, but I’d seen none of the telltale intoxication in their eyes to suggest it.
Likely, that was a treat reserved for only the highest born royals in the Malkovian clan, not for the vampires that weren’t even remotely ranked.
Every year, the Crimson Shadow pack and the Malkovian clan met to make a show of their alliance, like they were screaming to the world about their combined power and how afraid of it everyone should be.
The whole thing was just a big formality. The Crimson Shadows and the Malkovians had been in alliance for hundreds of years. This meeting would change nothing. It never did.
I stood guard at Amir’s side for most of the gathering, but I didn’t partake in much of the ceremony.
This was a celebration of those high in the aristocracy reveling in their power and money, namely Amir, his beta Isaac, Ashleigh, and anyone else that was highborn enough in pack hierarchy to play a role in the festivities.
I took orders. That was it.
Ashleigh avoided my gaze as much as she could, but that didn’t change the fact that she was reacting to my presence in the same way she did last night.
Her dark brown hair hung in waves down her back, occasionally falling in front of her pretty face.
Her dress was a deep forest green, luxuriously elegant in the way it wrapped around her body.
None of that hid the scent of her arousal from me.
I was there to guard Amir from a nonexistent threat, but I didn’t pay attention to him all that time. I was watching her.
I knew she could sense me staring at her. From the stiffness in her shoulders to the way she kept turning her back to me, she gave every sign that she would flee from my presence at the first chance she could.
For one moment, she let down her guard though and we locked eyes. She started for the briefest of seconds, but then she remembered herself and tried to hold her ground.
Amused, I decided to let her try.
I cocked my head to the side, sliding my gaze up and down her body, imagining her just like I saw her the night before.
My cock hardened painfully, my balls squeezing so tight I thought I would burst. I breathed in deeply, surrounding myself in the utter perfection of her.
Her face tightened as she remembered herself, glancing away quickly and grabbing a goblet full of wine in an attempt to distract herself.
She brought the glass up to her mouth, sipping daintily.
All I could imagine were those pretty lips wrapped around my cock.
As if she could read the direction of the thoughts in my head, she took an even bigger gulp as if she could hide her own need from me.
I smiled knowingly in her direction, and she choked, coughing into the back of her hand as she struggled to get a hold of herself.
It was difficult, but I fought the urge to give chase and teach her a lesson about who was really in charge.
My alpha would never approve of such a match. I knew that, but that didn’t stop my instinct from flaring intensely inside me anyway.
Amir’s hard stare caught mine and I leveled him boldly with my own. Arrogantly, he held it for a short moment before turning away to continue talking with the Malkovian clan kingpin. He just expected my obedience and that annoyed me.
I flicked my gaze back to Ashleigh, listening closely in on the conversation between Amir and Augustus at the same time. She turned away and started whispering with another member of the royal court beside her. I didn’t know her name.
“With the downfall of the Asamire in the western hemisphere, there is an opportunity for us to take their place,” Augustus whispered, and my ears perked up.
Las Vegas had been a vampire-run town ever since its establishment; that was until recently.
From what I’d gathered, they’d clashed against a wolf pack and lost in a major way.
“What do you mean?” Amir asked, a sense of boredom clear in his tone.
He was watching one of the naked women walk by with a tray full of wineglasses.
By the heavy metallic scent on the air, not all of them were wine either.
He probably didn’t know what Augustus was talking about.
He often thought more grisly matters were beneath him, so he depended on men like me to keep him informed.
“Their absence opens a new trade for us,” Augustus explained patiently. He nodded his head suggestively toward the woman Amir was staring at and smirked gleefully. “These women could make us an awful lot of money, both on the auction block and on their backs.”
Taken aback, I stopped observing Ashleigh so closely and turned my eyes to the two kingpins about to procure a new deal right in front of me.
I gritted my teeth, disgusted to take in the excited expression on Amir’s face.
He was seriously considering what Augustus had to say.
He absolutely worshipped the highborn vampire.
Augustus could probably spit in his face and Amir would simply thank him for it while asking for more.
It was unnatural.
They lowered their voices, but I was listening.
They talked in detail about the taking of women from foreign countries, the selection of those who wouldn’t be missed and the kidnapping of virgin women with the express purpose of selling them to vampires who were addicted to the feeling of getting blood drunk.
The more I heard, the sicker I felt.
I’d done my fair share of dirty work in the past. As Amir’s head soldier, I’d killed for him.
I’d defended him. I’d fought the battles he refused to fight as he grew old and fat as alpha.
I’d fought fiercely to hold our turf against any pack or clan that dared to cross us.
If Amir had a problem that could be solved with fists, he called on me to take care of it.
Every. Single. Time.
There were lines I refused to cross though.
I didn’t hurt women and kids. I most definitely wouldn’t take part in a trade as dirty as trafficking of them either.
Amir looked far too interested. I shouldn’t be surprised. He’d been so closely aligned with the vampires for so long it was almost as if he was one himself. Vampires were supposed to be the enemy, but Amir was so taken with Augustus that the fabric of our very nature no longer mattered to him.
It did to me though.
I couldn’t hide my scowl anymore. Beside me, Theo noticed the direction of my gaze and it didn’t take long for the topic of their conversation to become clear to him too.
“He can’t be serious,” Theo whispered furiously, and I grunted with revulsion.
“Elijah!” Amir called out and a sickening feeling rumbled in the pit of my belly. With a sigh, I walked over to the table and nodded my acquiescence. Amir’s excited glance was almost too much, and I had to bite my tongue to keep quiet.
He was the alpha. I was nothing more than his subordinate. I kept reminding myself of that simple fact, but it was getting harder and harder to submit to.
“I have a job for you, Elijah. You’re going to head a brand-new division for me and Augustus,” he declared.
“And what is that?” I pressed. I knew the answer, but I needed him to say it anyway. Every hair on my body bristled with unmatched fury. I took a deep breath. I told myself to hold back, but it just felt like a matter of time until my fists met his face.
“Women,” he answered gleefully, and my fury sizzled past the breaking point.
“No,” I replied. My voice was soft at first. Amir looked at me in disbelief, like he had imagined the word that had come out of my mouth. His eyes narrowed as he stared, almost as if it had never occurred to him that anyone would ever defy him, especially in the presence of the Malkovians.
Until me.
“What did you just say?” he said quietly. I lifted my chin slightly, leveling him with a glare as ferocious as his own.
“I said no,” I repeated.
His mouth closed into a firm line, his brow furrowing with annoyance. He stood up and I took in the state of my alpha for the first time in a long time.
He didn’t stand a chance against me.
When he tried to make himself appear bigger than he was, I almost laughed.
He was well past his prime, approaching his late fifties.
He had stopped keeping himself fit years ago, relying too heavily on men like me to solve his problems for him.
His belly was round, his arms skinny, his legs weak.
His hands were soft like a child’s, the product of not having to put in a hard day’s work in decades.
If I faced anyone that amounted to someone like him in a fight, I could win without even really trying.
Defeating him would be easy. Taking his place would be child’s play.
His hair had long started to turn gray. He had to look up at me from below since he was almost a foot shorter than me. I smirked as he tried to capture his role as alpha once more, but I detected the slight quiver on his lips. He was afraid of me. To be honest, he should be.
“You can’t say no to me. I am your alpha. I will not stand for this kind of defiance,” he spat.
My grin widened as I felt the pull of his alpha fade the longer I stood in front of him like this. I rolled my lip and crossed my arms in front of my chest.
“I’m done taking orders from you,” I answered him boldly. I wasn’t backing down from something like this.
“I can have you killed where you stand,” Amir growled.