Page 62 of Ensnared by the Pack: The Complete Series (Destined Realms #3)

KNOX

I paced the glade outside the cabin, the grass and weeds catching in my fur as I moved, my wolf heaving inside me and threatening to completely take over. He wanted to go in there, shove Bishop aside, and claim our mate. And I wanted to get the hell away from them.

But the fucking mating bond wouldn’t let me leave, the chain binding our hearts together yanking on my soul every time I got too far away, and that made it even harder to ignore my wolf… and what was going on in the cabin.

Every time I got too close, I could hear them — and too close was the middle of the glade. Some idiot had left a window open and with my wolf’s sensitive hearing, I caught every moan and gasp.

Fuck. I needed to be in there.

It wasn’t right that Bishop was relieving the pressure from her heat. It should be me. Me!

I wrenched myself away from the cabin before I climbed the steps and broke down the door. But getting out of earshot didn’t alleviate the pressure. Instead, I became more aware of Bishop’s feelings, of his need for her, for her pleasure and his, and his growing certainty that she was his mate which only made my wolf heave and snarl more, determined to break free.

Stop, I snapped at him.

You stop, he growled back. She’s ours, our mate.

And she deserves more than we can give her. Why couldn’t he understand that? The bond wasn’t real. It had been an accident, and if Audrey had been given a choice, she never would have chosen me.

Yes, she would have, my wolf insisted. She’s ours. She always has been.

He jerked me back toward the cabin and I dug in my heels. A swell of lust poured through my bond with Bishop, and I was so hard my cock hurt, my wolf not caring that I wasn’t in a compatible form to be with Audrey.

Then she cried out, her voice strangled with the force of her pleasure, and I was at the door, in human form, and reaching for the latch before I realized what I was doing.

“Don’t,” Cyrus commanded from his seat on the porch swing. His power snapped through me, not as strong as it could have been, but still forceful enough to make my wolf wrench toward him.

“She’s mine,” my wolf snarled.

“And you think you can control yourself enough to not make her terrified of sex?”

My wolf leaped at him and seized the front of his shirt, but Cyrus grabbed my wrists, broke my grasp with his incredible strength, and forced me to my knees with his strength and a burst of power.

“If you want the bond that badly,” he said to my wolf, “control yourself. Then you can go to her. She’s not an alpha. She’s not even a wolf.”

“She is,” my wolf insisted. If our shared dreams were true, she was a wolf and she was powerful, possibly even an alpha. She just needed to wake up.

“She isn’t right now. She’s a scared woman whose world has been turned upside down. She has no survival skills, knows nothing about this world, and is being crushed by your human half rejecting her.”

“Not for long,” my wolf said. “He will submit. She’s ours. She belongs with us.”

Cyrus grabbed my throat, capturing it in one large hand, and yanked me close. His canines extended and his eyes darkened as his wolf rose to the surface. “She belongs with whoever she wants to belong with. And right now, that’s Bishop. Have I made myself clear?”

My wolf growled a warning for him to let go and my power rolled over my body, threatening to attack even as I fought to contain it. “You want her, too.”

“I want her to enjoy her first time and I want her to stop being so fucking scared all the time.” He huffed. “And I want her to be terrified when she should be fucking terrified, like going up against a grimalkin.”

“She’s not your mate.” My power grew stronger and Cyrus’s rose to meet it.

Get your shit under control before you hurt Audrey, Bishop snapped in my head, his mental voice strained. The telepathic communication strengthened our connection and for a second I was inside Bishop, burying himself in her tight warmth.

Get your cock out of her, my wolf howled. She’s mine. Mine.

Every protective, jealous instinct I had swamped me. I was the only one who could take care of her and I had to keep her safe. I was furious that I let myself take her on this dangerous journey and even more furious that my brothers had agreed to it. They didn’t have her best interests in mind. If they did, they wouldn’t have put her in danger.

Cyrus shifted his grip, capturing my throat in the crook of his elbow, jumped off the edge of the porch, and hauled me away from the cabin.

I heaved against his hold, fighting to get my feet under me to get better leverage, and my power slammed against his. The force crackled through the air around us. There was no way I’d be able to make him submit. Between the three of us, he was the strongest brother, the true alpha of our pack.

No. He wasn’t going to take us away from her. He wouldn’t. I had to protect her, claim her. She was mine.

With a snarl, I rammed my fist into his gut with everything I had.

He staggered, his grip loosening, and I wrenched free and lunged at him with my claws extended and my canines bared. There was no point in running past him. He’d just grab me. I had to eliminate the threat before I could get to her.

He sidestepped my attack and seized my arm, but I twisted with his grip, expecting his counter to my lunge, and sunk my claws into his gut.

“Fuck,” he snarled and his free hand clamped around my throat.

With a roar, he lifted me up and slammed me onto the ground, his power aiding his strength and crushing inside my chest.

The impact knocked the breath from my lungs and before I could jump up and attack again, he rammed his fist into the side of my head.

The world lurched and darkened, the force of the blow again aided by his power, crashing inside my skull. He’d never augmented a punch with his power before, and it was more powerful than anything I’d ever felt from him.

Holy fuck. I’d known he was stronger than me, but I hadn’t thought it was by that much, and I’d never have thought to augment my blow with the power that let me force other shifters to submit to me.

Then I blinked and we were in the woods, the cabin barely visible through the trees, and my mating bond was stretched painfully thin. He’d knocked me out?

He’d knocked me out and taken me away from her!

Roaring, I leaped at him, my wolf furious, my skin aching on the verge of shifting back into my wolf form.

“Sit,” he commanded, crushing me with the full force of his power. I stumbled to a halt before reaching him and strained to resist, strained to show him I was strong enough to be her mate, and strained to get back to her, claim her, and protect her.

No, my wolf did. It wasn’t me. I didn’t want her?—

Well, a small part of my human soul did, and I wasn’t sure if that was just Bishop’s influence or not. But that didn’t matter. I couldn’t be the mate she deserved. I had to keep remembering that. I couldn’t let my wolf take over and fuck up her life. I had to set her free.

No, my wolf screamed. I have to protect her. Mine.

“I. Said. Sit.” Cyrus’s power surged, wrenching me to the ground. “You will let them have this and you will get your wolf under control.” A hint of fear filled Cyrus’s gaze before vanishing behind his hard, in-control alpha mask.

Shit. I hadn’t seen Cyrus afraid like that since Bishop had brought me back from being feral.

Was I that close? I hadn’t thought I was. But then, I hadn’t realized I was losing control the last time.

Fuck. This was why I had to break the mating bond. I was ready to kill my brothers just to be with her. It didn’t make sense. Bishop was making her happy which should make me happy. That was how it had worked with our fathers and mother.

But no. My wolf was furious and I didn’t know if I’d be able to stay in control for two more days.

“You have to collar him,” I forced out, even as my wolf tried to clamp my mouth shut and control me.

Cyrus’s eyes widened in surprise. Collaring the wolf half of a shifter’s soul was painful. It wasn’t the sharp, agonizing pain of being hurt, but the crushing emptiness of being cut off from a primal part of yourself. It took an extremely powerful alpha to do it and wasn’t permanent so it couldn’t be used as a reliable punishment, but it could help in short term, desperate situations.

He hadn’t been able to collar me when I’d turned feral because once my wolf had taken over it had been too late. That, and I doubted he could collar me without my help even with the amount of power he’d just shown. But I couldn’t afford to lose it right now. We were in the middle of nowhere at least eight days from home and whether my wolf wanted it or not, we needed our brothers to get Audrey back to Stonehaven in one piece.

“Do it,” I snarled.

“You’re almost as strong as me,” Cyrus replied. “I won’t be able to collar you.”

“I’ll help.”

The muscles in Cyrus’s jaw flexed and he glared down at me. I’d gone feral once before, and there was a risk that once the collar was released and my wolf was free, it would consume me and I’d go feral again. And there was no guarantee that Bishop would be able to bring me back a second time.

“It has to be done,” I insisted. There was no other choice. I wasn’t going to be able to control my wolf for much longer. I could already feel him straining against my control. The only thing keeping me strong enough to hold him back was Cyrus’s command to sit. “I’m not going to make it to the temple and then Audrey will be fucked.”

Cyrus groaned. “Fuck. Fine. Okay.”

He dropped to his knees in front of me and captured my head between his hands, forcing me to look him in the eyes. His power rolled over me, a crushing, suffocating weight, threatening to consume me, and my own power rose up to meet it.

I strained to hold onto it, not let it clash against Cyrus’s but melt into it, empowering it even more.

No, my wolf screamed, straining to take over my body. We have to protect her.

“You have to weave your power into mine,” Cyrus said, his voice tight with the strain of drawing on so much power and not releasing it right away. “I can’t make you do it.”

“I know.” It was taking everything I had just to keep my wolf from possessing me.

My wolf howled and heaved and clawed, digging agonizing rents into my soul, fighting to make me submit to his will and claim Audrey.

Cyrus’s crushing pressure grew, squeezing my chest and forcing me to suck in shallow gasping breaths. I tried to close my eyes to focus, but Cyrus had already seized control of that part of my body because he needed to see into my eyes to capture my wolf and collar it.

“Give me your power,” he snarled. “Submit.”

No. I won’t let you. You can’t have her. She’s mine. Mine mine mine.

And she deserves better than us.

I mentally shoved my power into Cyrus’s and it, along with his, slammed back into me. It tore into my soul, seized my wolf, and ripped it free from my human half.

Fiery agony sliced through me in a sudden, blinding flash, followed by complete desolation.

I tried to swallow my scream but couldn’t. I had no control over my body. I’d given it to Cyrus and he was focused on locking my wolf away.

Then the power vanished, and he sagged back on his heels and released my face. I collapsed forward, a gaping emptiness numbing my limbs and filling my chest. It wasn’t the same crushing pressure of our combined power, but it was still damn hard to breathe.

Cyrus stood with a groan. “I’ll get you your clothes.”

My clothes?

Right. My wolf was collared. I wasn’t going to be able to shift until he was released, and I was going to have to figure out how to live in my human form, a form that made my insides twist and my skin crawl with discomfort.