Page 10 of Dark Sold Mate

Complete and total silence filled the car for about thirty seconds. Then Elle exploded.

“Are you out of your mind?” She grabbed the door handle again, pulling it. “You cannot just make me marry you!

“I can, and I am.”

“This is insane! This is—let me out! Let me out right now!”

Silas pulled back onto the road, going north into the pack territory. Elle kicked the dashboard, then screamed, pounded her window, did all she could to make him stop.

“It is in your own best interest,” Silas said.

His wolf would never be appeased until she was bonded to him. Until she was in his pack, under pack law, and untouchable.

“Oh, fuck off. I want my freedom!”

“You'll be safe with me. With the pack.”

“The same pack that banished me? The pack that hates humans? You're taking me back there?”

“Things have changed.”

“Nothing's changed! You still are the same domineering jackass you always were!”

Elle screamed for another ten minutes. Silas never tried to stop her. He figured she needed to.

And then she slowly fell silent.

Silas glanced at the passenger's seat, and his chest tightened. Elle had stopped fighting. She sat rigidly against the passenger seat, her eyes staring into nothing.

He'd seen this before. In victims of trauma. The point where they no longer had the strength left to fight, so they retreated somewhere deep inside, where the pain couldn't reach.

A wave of guilt crashed over him. He was doing this to her. It was he who was inflicting such pain and trauma.

But his wolf growled that it had to be. It was important that she was safe, regardless of what she felt now. She would understand later on.

Silas was not sure he believed that.

They spent twenty minutes driving without saying anything. Silas avoided using highways where he could be seen. He continued driving until they got closer to the pack lands.

Then his nostrils twitched.

“Fuck,” he cursed under his breath. Rogues. Lone wolves who are usually dangerous and unpredictable. And they were close.

If he took another route, it would add an extra hour to their journey. An extra hour, leaving Elle vulnerable, where they could be spotted by the traffickers.

No. He'd continue and get rid of them.

Silas pressed the accelerator. He had seen the rogues five miles from pack territory.

Three rogue wolves appeared in the middle of the road, their yellow eyes gleaming, staring at Elle—they were either fascinated by her or hungry. He'd bet good money on the latter.

Silas stopped the truck. “Stay here,” he ordered.

“What's happening?”

“Rogues. I'll handle it.”

He jumped out of the truck, and the wolves made their way towards him. Silas took a deep breath and allowed his wolf to rise to the surface. Then, in his Alpha voice, he commanded, “Leave.”