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He immediately took a step back, keeping his female behind him.
At that retreat, I stared at my mate once more.
I pointed my finger at her again. I said nothing… just lunged for her.
4
Ainslee
Everything was out of control.
I was spiraling out of control.
Actions. Emotions. Shouting. Aggression.
The aggression pouring off my brothers and father was so tangible I was suffocating from it.
All those things swirled and mixed, ramming against each other as I was all but carried away from the Lupineov estate.
I’m suffocating.
“I can’t breathe.” The words were first in my head, then pouring out of me like the anger from the males in my family.
“It’s okay. It’s okay.” It was my mother who spoke, her soft voice trying to be reassuring, but even I noted a hint of worry and anxiousness laced in the tone.
She wrapped her arm around my shoulders even tighter, my father in front leading the way, with Caelan and Tavish on either side of me and and Lennox taking the back. They made this Lycan wall of power, protection, and aggression around us, and I knew I should be terrified, but... I wasn’t.
Surely, if they reacted this way, Luca Lupineov had to be bad. He had to be damaged and dangerous and violent beyond measure. Right?
So why do I have the undeniable urge to go to him?
Before I knew what was happening, I was in the back of the car my father had rented when we landed at the airstrip to take us to the manor. He slammed it into drive before peeling off.
And then I heard it.
A violent and agonized, vicious roar that sliced through the air.
It was Luca’s. I felt it as if the sound had come from me, as if it was my pain.
My body reacted instantly. It was as if that roar called to my Lycan side. I sucked in a sharp breath and looked over my shoulder, out the back window at the mansion that was becoming smaller and smaller the faster my father took me from it.
I can’t leave. I have to go to him. I’m the only one who can ease him.
I shook my head to clear my thoughts.
He’s broken, too far gone in his madness to be eased. He could hurt me.
I expected to see Luca charging after us, maybe fully shifted, maybe still partially as he’d been in that banquet hall.
I shuddered in awareness of seeing him through the parted crowd, his body so big and powerful, his Lycan dangerously close to the surface, pushing out so powerfully his eyes had been glowing, his nails turned into vicious claws, and his body seemed to grow even more.
“Get the fooking jet ready,” my father barked, and I glanced at him with what felt like wide eyes from this whole encounter. He had his cell pressed to his ear, his massive hand dwarfing it. His voice sounded more animal-like in quality. “I don’t fooking care, Gerald. Get it started and ready tae go. As soon as we get tae the airstrip, I want tae leave.” My father didn’t wait for a reply, just disconnected the cell and shoved it at Caelan, who sat in the passenger seat.
I didn’t realize I was shaking until my mother wrapped her arm more securely around me. My father seethed low, probably scenting my unease, but didn’t they realize it wasn’t because of Luca?
The sound of his hands tightening around the leather steering wheel screamed loudly in the interior. It was almost deafening. I felt so confused, so turned upside down, that I was on the verge of crying. And although the rise of emotions swirled and collided within me, the thing that I knew with utmost certainty was that Luca would never have hurt me.
I didn’t know how long we had been in the car, but my father started driving even faster, the sounds leaving him intense. I smelled and felt the testosterone and aggression increasing among all four males by the second. It was suffocating me. I was drowning in it.
All too soon, we came to the private airstrip, and my panic seized me again.
This doesn’t feel right. This feels so wrong.
I started feeling my chest move up and down as I breathed faster, the very fact that I was going to start hyperventilating making me dizzy, causing my anxiety to rise even more.
My mother tried to ease me, and I felt this rage fill me. I was tired of being coddled. I was angry that I was deemed weak, that I needed protection from everything, even my fated mate.
I’m stronger than anyone gives me credit for.
“No,” I whispered, my voice breathy. “This isn’t right. I can’t leave.” No one listened to me. “I don’t want to leave.” My voice was loud then, this strength rising in me as fierce as my inner Lycan.
