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A sniffle. “The armory.”
“And the bullets?”
Crying, Renata wiped tears away with her arm, still clutching the gun with white knuckles. “The Citizens. I stole the clip out from under their noses.”
Eyes widening, the terror of the situation hit him like a two-by-four. With that ammunition, she could claim Cortana’s life—or the life of anyone else in his den.
Truth mingled with utter and complete disgust for the she-wolf before him. “I’m impressed, Ren.”
“See? I can be your mate, Riaz. I did this, to erase the poison from your mind and ensure she’d never hurt you again. I even greased the hinges on your door to make sure she didn’t wake up and turn you against me. You thought I wasn’t enough, but I am.”
Her chin lifted in pride, but he saw the bitter jealousy that was branded into her features. The notion of forced suggestion had taken such root in Renata’s mind that she’d convinced herself of it, fabricated an entire story as to why Riaz hadn’t wanted her.
“Renata, let’s go outside and let our wolves run.” The increasing chaos behind Renata’s gaze was worrying him. “It’d do our animals good.”
The flicker of hope was quickly erased by suspicion. “You’re trying to protect her.”
Riaz took her chin between his thumb and forefinger, opting for gentle. “I couldn’t care less about the vampire. You’re here now.”
A sickly-sweet smile curved over Renata’s lush lips, her feminine figure melting into his. It took several measured breaths to control the urge to vomit at her closeness, the way her hands possessively brushed over his chest in measured touches.
“I just have to take out the trash first.”
When Renata went to step around him, he shifted to block her path. Gasping at his evasion, her widened eyes blinked up at him repeatedly.
“Alpha, she has to be removed!” Her crazed tone betrayed how irrational she was in this moment. Impulsive. “I have to remove her, because she owns you!”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Panic clawed at her through the dregs of unconsciousness, jolting her from the dead sleep of her kind. Pure and entirely too potent, disgust and fear bled into her veins like a shot of adrenaline, zinging across her nerves and straightening her spine.
Cortana’s senses instantly went on high alert following the visceral alarm clock, but the panic she felt wasn’t her own. The fear that quivered through her body didn’t originate with her. Feral protectiveness ran parallel to the suffocating sensation, the soul connected to it overcome with strong emotion.
Riaz.
“Don’t you see, Alpha? She’s pulled the wool over your eyes!”
And Renata.
Stiffening in bed, she inched an eyelid open to peek at the room. It took her a few seconds to fully comprehended the scene taking place before her. Riaz had moved bodily in front of Cortana, his imposing figure blocking her view of the threat at the door.
This close, she could hear the frenetic drum of the she-wolf’s heartbeat, wild with determination and despair. Renata had gone off her rocker.
“Let’s go into the great hall, Ren,” Riaz purred, his deep voice betraying none of the panic that she knew welled below the surface. “We can leave the vampire here until we decide what to do with her.”
A jolt of surprise tremored through her limbs, but not at Riaz’s words. The alpha was trying to keep Cortana from harm by removing the very unstable threat. The surprise was at his lack of action. Riaz was far stronger than the she-wolf, held more dominance than the meek woman who’d come to confront them in the middle of the day.
“We can’t let her go free!” Anguish leaked from Renata’s mouth, her crazed voice an octave higher than normal. “What if she hurts someone else?”
A flash of light glinted of a waving object, and Cortana froze where she rested amid the covers.
Gun.
The unhinged wolf had a weapon. That was why Riaz was coaxing her from the room. Glancing at her surroundings, Cortana looked for the most defensible position, but the bathroom was several feet away—and in direct sightline of where Renata was standing.
Depending upon what ammunition the weapon was packing, it’d go through the door in a heartbeat. What was far more important, however, was that she’d never leave Riaz alone to deal with a threat.
“Cortana only came here with the intention of wooing me, Ren.” Only her direct line to Riaz’s psyche indicated the fallacy of his words. “It’s only me she’s after.”
