Total pages in book: 85
Estimated words: 78879 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 394(@200wpm)___ 316(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78879 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 394(@200wpm)___ 316(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
Females in our world didn’t feel the same kind of Linking Connection as the males did. But even that couldn’t have me feeling sympathy for Luca, not in the state he was in. He was batshit crazy, too far over the edge of sanity that I couldn’t trust him to be gentle with my sister.
Mate or not, I had no doubt that his need for her, the animalistic tendencies he housed for far too long, could quite possibly hurt her.
I knocked on the door and said softly, “Leelee?” I felt like an asshole, my aggression higher than I’d ever felt it before because of the situation. I needed to be gentler with her, not so gruff and rough.
Although she was half Lycan, and had grown up watching all of us roughhouse constantly, I still saw her as my baby sister, someone too precious to see the ugliness of the world.
I always would.
There was no answer, and I closed my eyes and exhaled. I knocked again. “Leelee, come on. Please doona be upset.” Still no answer. I rested my forehead against the door and exhaled. Our lives had changed so drastically. Da and Mam were up to their necks in stress and worry, and the aggression from my brothers and me was so intense I was choking on it.
I should’ve turned around and gone back to my room, given her space and privacy, but I felt this tightening in the back of my neck, this tingling on my skin. I straightened as I felt my wolf rising up. No matter how mad she was at me, she’d never shut me out like this before.
Then again, no one had ever tried to keep her from her mate.
I curled my hand around the doorknob, feeling all kinds of shitty because I was about to burst into her room without even thinking twice. But then I pushed the handle down and opened her door.
The first thing I saw was her made bed. The next thing I noticed was the small table off to the side that still held the tray of untouched food and the full glass of blood I brought in earlier.
My brows pulled down low as I pushed the door open even more, the wood banging against the wall. I turned my attention to the opposite side of the room where her vanity was, expecting to see her sitting on the little bench in front of it, glaring at me.
Empty.
I stepped inside and looked all around the room.
“Ainslee?” I said her name loud enough that even if she were in the bathroom she'd be able to hear me.
Silence.
I found myself striding to the bathroom, the door already open, the light off. I knew she wasn’t inside before I even pushed the door fully open and turned on the light.
Empty.
My heart started beating harder as panic seized me. She isn’t in her room. So? She could be somewhere else, no’ able tae sleep, so she’s walking around the estate.
But panic kept rising, increasing with every passing second. I looked toward her window, shaking my head, because there was absolutely no fucking way she would have went against what we said and gone to him.
There was no fucking way she was able to get past the sentries.
But as I tried to convince myself that she was still in the estate, on the property, the more I knew she was out there with that bastard.
Gods.
I clutched my chest, picking at the material of my shirt as I started to hyperventilate.
I was out of her room and walking toward our parents’ suite in a matter of seconds.
“Lennox! Tavish!” I roared their names, knowing I didn’t need to say it more than once for them to hear me.
Once I got to the closed double doors of our parents’ room at the end of the hall, I brought my fist up, about to pound on the wood, but froze when I heard Mam’s voice.
I wondered if I was overreacting. Maybe I should go look for her before bothering our parents. But I knew my father would be enraged if he found out I’d had worries and hadn’t come to him.
“I told ye we would handle it,” Da said low and deep.
Although the words were dulled through the wood, I heard them as clear as if I stood in the room with them.
“Handle it?” Mam sounded pissed. “The way you guys have all been going about this isn’t how things should have been done, Banner. And you know it.” Da huffed out in irritation. “I did what I thought was best, and that was calling in my family.”
There was a moment of silence, and then I heard my father’s footsteps pacing back and forth and could practically see him running a hand over his hair in frustration.
“And ye thought the best course of action was calling in yer fooking crazy-arse brother and cousins?”