Vesh jerked his head back. Mate? Alpha had a mate, and no one thought to mention this to him before?
“What the hell, Cael?”
Alpha stiffened, his face turning deadly. “Don’t talk to me like that,” he growled.
Well, at least he wasn’t floundering anymore.
“Who is she?”
Cael’s face was stormy, as he stared down at Vesh. But before he could answer, his troubled gaze was drawn to something past Vesh’s shoulder.
“You should have mentioned this before. It could throw a huge wrench in our plans. How are we supposed to get—”
“Vesh.” Trager could fuck off. This was a potentially devastating development.
“—my sister free if you’re out of your mind trying to—”
“Vesh.”
“What?” He turned a fuming stare on Trager.
Trager nodded his head toward the door. “We have a problem.”
“She’s not your problem,” Alpha snarled. “She’s mine.”
Vesh’s hair stood on end at the tone of Cael’s words. She’s mine. His mate.
Turning to see who’d just walked into Bullseye, Vesh had a moment of foreboding before his eyes landed on the last person he expected to see near Ravendale land.
Avan.
A traitor. Or maybe just another victim of Jax’s control. Whatever the case, Vesh didn’t want her anywhere near him or his family.
Her eyes scanned the room and when they landed on Vesh, a slinky, cat-like grin spread across her face.
Vesh glanced at his alpha. He looked furious enough to turn at any moment.
Shit. This was going to be fun.
Chapter One
If there was one thing Besh did well, it was make her mate mad enough to lose his carefully cultivated temper. Over the years she’d become almost proud of the ability. She liked watching him lose his cool because it meant for that split second, and for however long he raged, he wasn’t in control. And control was something he demanded. Causing him to lose it, the one thing he valued above all else, was all that really brought her joy anymore.
She didn’t even blink as Jax threw a dining chair into the wall, shattering and splintering the wood.
“Last I knew, Avan was allowed to come and go as she pleased.” Besh kept her voice a dull monotone. Not because she worried about riling him further, but because she didn’t care enough to put any inflection in it.
Her mate faced the wall with hands on hips, breathing like a bull.
“That,” his voice snapped like a whip, “was until your brother disappeared.”
“He didn’t disappear. And nobody believes he did just because you say so.”
Slowly, he turned around. “What did you say to me?”
Damn it. This was turning into something worse than just a blown temper. They’d been here many times. So many in fact, that she’d learned how to tune it out. How to fall into her far-away place and forget who she was and how she’d gotten here.
At least until the pain came.
She repeated her words because if she didn’t he’d say she disobeyed him. Which would only make things worse.
He already towered over her where she sat at the table but it wasn’t enough. “Bow,” he commanded.
Besh went to her knees without hesitation. It wasn’t the bowing she minded. Bowing meant nothing to her anymore. It didn’t mean she respected him, or that she was submitting. In order to submit, she’d have to first have a choice. But the part that was so hard to bear was what came after the bowing.
And this time… she was close to her heat. Very close. Too close.
She and Jax had a deal. If she testified against the man she’d loved, if she claimed he’d betrayed their pack, that she’d had no part in their plan to run away. If she chose the alpha, her intended mate, over him, the mate she wanted… then Jax would vow to never take her during her heat. But more importantly, and the reason she’d made the deal in the first place, he’d let Cael live. Banished. Alone. But alive.
Up until now, he’d never broken that vow.
“Lower.” Alpha’s voice boomed like an unexpected clap of thunder.
Besh bent forward until her forehead touched the floor. Wearing the robe he’d requested afforded her very little modesty. Like this, her hind quarters were on display in a way that made her feel like a damn piece of meat.
“Good, mate.” Rage seeped from his compliment as he ran a deceptively gentle hand from the cheeks of her butt, up her back, until he reached the nape of her neck.
She couldn’t beg him to stop. She’d tried that a million times in the beginning and it changed nothing. He was her mate. She belonged to him. He owned her, like a possession, whether she wanted to be owned or not.