AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Then they’d forced him to.
Permanently.
Lacey’s stomach churned as she recalled the way the beta, a burly man who towered over everyone with his beady dark eyes and thick bushy black beard, had simply reached over and ripped Nathan’s head from his shoulders. Her skin burned with the recollection of hands holding her to the ground as screams burned their way up her throat, searing the night air as they echoed around the fire. Nathan’s head had rolled into those flames, kissing his skin as she had done so only hours before.
For three days, Lacey had screamed his name, chained to the bare walls of an empty cabin as she waited the news of her fate. Not that she’d cared at that point. Without Nathan, what use was there to go on living?
Eventually, someone had come in, untied her, lifted her up, and dragged her back outside. Nathan’s body had been removed of course, as was his head, but everyone from earlier stood around the fire in the centre of the village, eager to learn whether she would live or die.
Lacey had wanted to die. At least she would be reunited with the man she loved. But no. The bastards kept them apart, even in death.
Only Sam had spoken up for her. It had been his words alone that had spared her, kept her from meeting the same fate as her beloved. She’d never understood why he’d done it. After all, the pack killed humans who wandered into their world, who upset the balance, who threatened their safety. He was doing her a favour, so he claimed.
But like all favours, it had come with a price.
A brutal order given by the alpha of the pack, calling for the death of someone who had betrayed or threatened their existence. Anyone who heard it was bound to participate, to seek out the poor soul marked for death until it had been achieved. They’d track her down, bring her back, and rip her to tiny pieces to be burned within the flames of the same fire that had consumed her beloved.
A fate she didn’t want to meet. Not now, anyway. She’d found a way to live after Nathan’s death.
“Lacey, you there?”
Sam’s voice knocked her out of her reverie. “Yeah, I’m here,” she whispered, struggling to breathe with the thought of what could happen if she didn’t get the results he wanted.
“Good. I hope we understand each other. This isn’t something I do lightly, but it’s important that you understand I won’t tolerate failure with this.” His words grinded like sand into her ears.
A dejected sigh flowed past her lips and she squeezed her eyes shut. “Message received loud and clear.”
As the dialling tone rang in her ear, the first tear spilled over the contours of her cheeks. Why did she have to stay in Seattle? Why the hell didn’t she move to somewhere like New York where he wouldn’t be able to reach her?
Fuck.
Debts had to be repaid. Whether you willingly took them out or not, they demanded to be paid in full. Lacey was a lot of things – a swearer, a cynic, a fool – but she never shirked her responsibilities.
She knew she had to go back to the cabin in the woods.
Whether either he, or herself, wanted to or not.
