Over my dead body.
Instead of fighting me, she leans into me gratefully, and I know she feels worse than she wants anyone to know. Despite being exhausted, that doesn’t stop her from wrapping her dainty hands around Bellamy’s chains.
“Choice became an illusion. Whatever the council wants, the council gets.”
“So you left?” Dante asks without inflection, but I can see the rage darkening his slate eyes.
A bitter laugh escapes Frankie, and I cringe when the caustic sound threatens to crush my heart. “No one leaves Kyperian—at least, not alive. The council would be left with no one to rule if they allowed that.”
She turns away from our intrusive stares, her attention focusing on the chains. The runes blink out even slower as she works, the static of her magic more like needles piercing my flesh.
“When women mature, we’re ordered to be brought in front of the council, where they check us for our ability to breed. I was a few weeks away from my twentieth birthday. If I ever wanted to leave, I had to act, or I would have spent the rest of my life trapped in a cage.”
She shoots a crooked, self-deprecating smile at each of us. “If you haven’t guessed, I’m not exactly normal. Even when I was little, I knew I was different from others. The only reason I survived so long is because I was adopted by a retired captain of the guards.
“Givvens saw something special in me, raising me as one of his soldiers, knowing that I would need those skills to survive.” She dashes her hands against her eyes, but not before I see the sheen of tears. “It was always our intention to flee before I reached maturity. Our plans were in place. Unfortunately, we were caught.”
A moist snort escapes her, and she sniffs, rolling her teary eyes. “I don’t know if it’s because I drew attention to myself when I stepped in when a boy was being beaten, or if it was something else. It was decided that I needed to face the council for interfering with something that wasn’t my business.”
A grimace twists her features when her magic fades. The last rune flickers wildly before it vanishes, and I snatch her to my chest, unable to see her hurt any longer. My wolf coos, and I run my hand down her golden hair.
It takes too long for her ragged breathing to slow and her heartbeat to settle. I almost think she’s asleep until she speaks in a hoarse whisper. “I barely arrived home before the Orion came knocking.”
A muscle ticks in her jaw, and her gorgeous eyes shimmer with rage. “Gramps told me to run, but I was a stubborn fool. I thought we could fight our way free. I refused to leave him behind to be punished for harboring me.”
My heart breaks when defeat slumps her shoulders. “We were almost out when another contingent of soldiers arrived. Before we were separated, my last sight was of him fighting for his life, bloody and bleeding at the hands of the very soldiers he trained.”
She releases a shaky breath and shrugs half-heartedly. “By some miracle, I managed to escape, but the council refuses to let me go. They need to make an example of me. They must have framed me for his murder. Everyone adored or respected Gramps. It wouldn’t surprise me to find out that they used me as an excuse to kill him.
“They can’t stand anyone else having any sway over the people.” She gnaws on her lower lip, her golden eyes devastated. “I’m the perfect scapegoat. Not only will I now be hunted down for crimes I didn’t commit, I’ll be handed over to the council and brought to heel.”
Murderous rage darkens Dante’s face, his hands clenching into fists as if ready to fight an unseen enemy. Tyler woke up at the start of her story, a silent witness to her pain. He’s not any better than Dante—the loner who never lets anything touch him is practically frothing at the mouth.
He’s running his hand up and down her calf, trying to soothe her pain. While he might be the most laid-back and easygoing of the group, most people don’t look deep enough to see the real him—the shattered man who is just a little too broken for anyone else to want him.
A glance at Bellamy shows he isn’t as unaffected by her story as he’d like us to believe. Though he tries to suppress his emotions, they’re bubbling close to the surface, ready and waiting to be unleashed. It’s obvious he’s been a soldier for a long time, but only time will tell if he can break away from their conditioning or if he will be a threat.
Until we know, we’ll have to keep an eye on him.
I don’t trust him, not yet.
Frankie cuddles against my chest, and I pull her closer, my hands tangling in the silken strands of her hair. It’s only then that I see my chains are dull and tarnished. I was so distracted by her story that I missed her removing the runes.
The instant I was free, I expected my beast to wrench away control. Instead, he is content to hold her close. Though she told the truth, I sense that she’s left something important out. “Frankie…”
I trail off when her soft snore fills the silence. Glancing down, I see that she has fallen asleep in my arms, and I don’t have the heart to wake her. My questions can wait. Keeping her safe and figuring a way out of this mess is more important than my curiosity.
While she might think she is on her own, that’s the furthest thing from the truth.
She has us now.
She will never be alone again.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
BELLAMY
I’m slumped against the rough wall of our cell, staring blindly at where Francesca is nestled against the feral alpha. Part of me wants to snatch her from his arms, not trusting the asshole. Only I’m not much better. I’ve been stalking her for weeks, hunting her like prey, waiting for the perfect moment to drag her back to the council to pay for crimes she didn’t commit.
