With Everything I Am (The Three #2)(119)
Author: Kristen Ashley

“She’s crazy as a f**king loon,” Caleb muttered and Sonia twisted.

“Quiet, Caleb, that isn’t helping,” she whispered.

“She is,” Caleb returned.

Sonia sucked in breath and turned back to Titium before resuming. “Callum didn’t want to do it but, you have to know, the results of her… um, lack of concentration were disastrous.”

“There are things you likely don’t know, little queen,” Titium told her.

“I know them.” She was still speaking softly but now her words were pained. “Please, come into the castle. We’ll sit down and talk. This doesn’t need to get heated.”

“It should have gotten heated centuries ago,” Titium replied, Sonia tensed as did Callum.

“Centuries –?” she whispered but Titium kept talking.

“He misused her,” Titium announced, his face hardening and his eyes moving back to Callum and Callum, in preparation, removed his own wedding band and slid it in his pocket with Sonia’s. “As he did many a she-wolf. Misused her knowing how she felt about him and he set her aside and didn’t look back. Not like she was daughter to a warrior but like she was nothing but a paid tart.”

“Enough,” Callum ordered as he felt Sonia’s tension intensify.

“Mac was a decent king, loyal to his mate, like the wolf,” Titium’s voice declared proudly before it turned snide. “You, with your sweet human, won’t last for more than –”

“Enough!” Callum thundered.

Titium started crouching and declared, “It’ll never be enough. Not until you’re brought low.”

“Don’t do this!” Sonia shouted, sensing the escalation, her panic palpable.

“I should have done it ages ago!” Titium shouted, definitely as mad as his daughter and just as adept at hiding it.

“Ry, get Sonia out of here!” Callum demanded as he watched Titium’s skin darken, the change was coming.

And then it happened.

Titium crouched, Callum following and Sonia screamed, “Don’t!”

Both wolves leapt as Sonia moved, faster than any human he’d seen, within a blink of an eye she was between them. Like she was when he was wolf and she was a child, throwing herself in front of him to protect him but this time stopping what would have been face-to-face.

But by the time she arrived, he was no longer there. He’d changed and, to avoid her, at the last second, he leaped over her head.

Titium’s reflexes weren’t as swift and he’d reached out a set of claws through the transformation in an effort at catching Callum unaware.

So by the time Callum landed on a skid at the foot of the steps and turned, Sonia was down, her body facing him. Titium was standing over her as wolf, panting and pawing the step beside her as if trying to help her.

Her head was up, her neck twisted and she was staring at Titium, mouth open in shock.

Then her head turned and Callum saw blood trickling from her temple where it had cracked against the steps and at the sight he growled.

But he didn’t move because her eyes were wide as she gaped at him as wolf, face-to-face with her “puppy”.

Then her expression changed. She winced in pain but Callum knew it was the pain of betrayal.

She took in a breath that sounded both surprised and ragged before she lost consciousness. In so doing, she fell forward and rolled down a step as Callum tensed to leap but he stopped when Sonia came to rest on a wide step with her back facing him, Titium’s claw marks oozing blood through her jacket.

Titium’s men behind him all shuffled back at the sight of their fallen, bleeding queen.

But Callum didn’t notice.

He howled his fury and his muscles bunched to attack.

However Titium howled as well but Titium’s howl wasn’t fury.

It was the f**king tone of surrender which meant Callum couldn’t bloody well attack when his mouth salivated to tear into the wolf’s throat.

In the seconds that transpired, Ryon, Caleb and the Guard leaped into wolves. Ryon and Caleb were prowling, snarling and circling Sonia’s prone body. Callum’s guard was at the foot of the steps, snapping at Tititum’s men to warn them back.

Lucien, with lightning vampire speed, ran to Sonia, carefully lifted her in his arms and again like a flash, he was up the steps, disappearing into the castle.

Callum, as wolf, bounded after him.

* * * * *

There were way too many f**king people in the room.

Sonia lay on their bed on her belly, her head to the side, her weight pressed into her forearms, cords still on but back bared as Orphenon saw to her.

Younger brother to one of his Guard, Orphenon was also simply a young wolf, being only a century and a half old. But his calling made him a human doctor currently practicing in Glasgow. He’d come to be with his brother for the celebrations, his brother was one of the eight who’d witnessed the scene and after had called Orphenon in for human medical attention.

Luckily, Orphenon had learned that anything could happen anywhere and he brought his doctor’s kit with him to town.

He’d cleansed the wounds at Sonia’s back and head and had injected her to numb the pain as he stitched the claw marks together when she regained consciousness while he was still stitching.

She’d panicked, fear filling her face and started to resist, causing tearing at her stitches when she did so. It took some effort before they could calm her enough for Orphenon to administer her.

However, it was only Leah who could calm her and only Leah who she’d allow to touch her.

Only the human.

His cunning little queen, she could smell the difference in them now.

The rest of them, all of them, including Callum and every last one of his family was in the f**king room, she stared at with wary, silent fear that didn’t even begin to mask the pain she felt at their treachery.

As Orphenon stitched and Leah sat on the side of the bed holding her hand, Callum saw his mate’s mouth get tight. Then he saw Leah start to wince repeatedly as Sonia’s hand squeezed hers with each insertion of the needle.

But she still remained silent.

“She’s feeling it,” Callum growled to the wolf.

Orphenon stopped and leaned closer to Sonia’s ear. “Sonia, do you feel what I’m doing?”

She didn’t speak, simply closed her eyes tight.

Orphenon noted this, his eyes slid to Callum and he muttered, “I’ll administer another dose.”

Callum watched the doctor inject another dose of the anesthetic and Sonia flinch when he did but he spoke to his mother as it was happening.