Page 3 of Love Bites Hard (Mated to the King #2)

three

IZZY

I’d barely said goodbye to my sisters when a literal wall of vampire men encircled me. They were so huge, I couldn’t see over them. They stood so tightly in a circle that I couldn’t see through them, either.

They walked down what I thought was a hallway, basically dragging me along between them. It was intensely uncomfortable, but it was better than being handed over to the wolves, so I dealt with it.

We entered what seemed to be a massive room with insanely high ceilings, and finally, I could see something.

Bleachers.

So many bleachers.

They looked like they’d been dragged in, and were set up in a massive circle around something in the middle of the room that the vampires were blocking from my view. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to realize it was probably Porter and Curtis, since everyone was there to see them fight.

My guards led me to the bottom of the bleachers. They could’ve let me stand on one of the benches, but instead kept me on the tile floor.

And closed in around me even tighter.

I fought the urge to push them away.

They were there for my benefit, even if it didn’t feel like it.

When I tried to peek through the small gaps between them, I caught glimpses of a cage in front of me.

The room grew progressively louder until the bleachers were full. Then, someone with a microphone commanded everyone to shut up.

He announced that the challenge for alpha would only have one winner—and that whoever didn’t win, would die.

My eyes widened.

That was a lovely little piece of information.

I should’ve asked for more details about wolf challenges before I went and bound myself to Porter.

What if he lost, and died?

Holy crap, I could be spending the rest of my immortal life alone.

Granted, I could probably find people to keep me company. Our mate bond would prevent me from feeding on anyone but him, but if he died, I’d be free from that.

I wouldn’t be able to bond with anyone else.

But I’d figure it out. It’d be fine.

Probably.

Forcing a slow breath out, I fought the tension in my stomach as the microphone guy announced the start of the fight.

The vampires were still blocking my view. I didn’t know if that made my stress worse, or better.

I wouldn’t see my shiny new mate lose… but I also wouldn’t see if he won. And that felt like something I should be allowed to see, given our relationship.

But all things considered, it did seem safer to stay hidden. Especially if Porter was about to die.

The crowd roared and cheered.

I didn’t know who they were in favor of, but their excitement told me that he was winning.

Or maybe they just liked watching people fight, and didn’t care who won. That wouldn’t particularly surprise me. I didn’t know enough about wolf shifters to say that for sure, though.

Gasps went through the crowd, and I went up on my tiptoes, trying to see what was happening.

A brutal snapping noise made me flinch, but the crowd absolutely went crazy. They screamed and hollered.

Someone had just died.

I hadn’t felt anything, despite our mate bond, which made me think that it wasn’t Porter.

Sure enough, the vampires around me finally parted, and my gaze landed on my new mate.

He was naked.

Bloody and bleeding just about everywhere, too.

But he was alive, and that was more of a relief than I expected.

I spared a glance at Curtis’s body on the ground, making a noise of surprise when my attention jerked back to Porter.

He strode across the cage that separated the crowd from the fight, climbing over the wall and dropping to the ground smoothly, only a few feet from me.

My vampire guards cleared out as the gigantic wolf shifter turned me away from him and grabbed my hand. He pumped it into the air as he roared his victory with the crowd, his thick, strong chest against my back.

It was the most bizarre, surreal experience of my life.

But like I said, I didn’t know enough about wolves to be certain whether or not it was normal.

Before the crowd’s roaring died down, I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder—and choked back a cry when I realized it was Porter’s teeth, biting into my skin.

Like a vampire.

It didn’t hurt nearly as much as I would’ve expected, and I was too stunned to shove him off me. His grip was too tight anyway.

He released my shoulder, and roared again with his feral crowd.

Then, without further ado, he tossed me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

I fought the urge to pound my fists into his back and demand he put me down. I wasn’t a toddler, and I was the moron who thought it was a good idea to mate with a wolf shifter.

Clearly, I should’ve asked more questions.

But the hole had been dug and my body was buried, because the mark on my neck wasn’t going anywhere. I was stuck with the wolfy bastard for life, and beyond.

And there was nothing I could do about it.

Porter carried me out of the challenge room and down so many halls that I started to feel a bit dizzy.

The ache in my shoulder wasn’t helping with that any.

I could tell when we finally made it into the wolves’ wing of the Manor, because the colors of the flooring and walls changed.

The Manor was basically a small city, with a giant building in the center that was considered neutral territory. None of the kings owned that—or all of them did. There were five more wings of the building connected to it, each of them just as large, if not larger, than the center part.

The neutral territory was done in beige colors that were meant to feel luxurious. In contrast, the vampire wing was striking, and everything looked expensive but felt much colder.

I was pleasantly surprised when I saw the flooring change as we entered the wolf wing. It was still tile, but it was dark brown tile that was designed to look like wood. The walls were a warm shade of off-white, and I saw massive landscape photos on the walls we passed.

If my room looked like the hallways, I’d be much more comfortable there than I was in Vamp Manor.

The crowd behind us made me less comfortable, though. It seemed to go on forever, and the noise was insanely loud.

Considering how dizzy I was already feeling, their noise wasn’t helping anything.

I expected Porter to take me to his bedroom or something. Instead, he wove through half a dozen massive hallways, then stepped out into the forest. There was a huge clearing just outside the doors, and then there were trees. So many trees.

Some tension in my chest eased as I breathed fresh air.

I had always loved being outside. Even when there wasn’t any amount of nature to get lost in, being stuck inside made me feel trapped. The outdoors felt like freedom.

And despite the wolf shifters pouring out of the Manor behind us, I did feel freer without walls around me.

Porter carried me further from the monstrous building, up to the edge of the forest, before he turned around and faced the growing crowd.

I was still hanging off his shoulder, my face pointed to the trees. My dizziness had gotten worse, and I wasn’t sure I could stand even if I wanted to. I was starting to think it had something to do with him biting me.

The noise grew louder as we stood where we were for the next handful of minutes.

My vision was so unfocused that I had to concentrate on staying upright on Porter’s back rather than trying to figure out why we were waiting.

I had no idea how much time had passed when Porter finally spoke. He didn’t yell, shout, or otherwise raise his voice—but somehow, I heard him more clearly than I had ever heard anything.

“I am the new alpha,” he said, authority ringing in his voice. “And I will not tolerate any of the behaviors the pack has adopted since Curtis unlawfully took my place. Our pack protects the Manor, our territory, and most importantly, each other. Anyone who feels otherwise can leave now. Acting against the pack will be seen as a threat, and will be dealt with accordingly. By me.”

A moment of silence passed as he waited for an argument or protest to break out, but no one said a word.

He finally said, “When the moon rises, we’ll have a bonfire with Curtis’s things. After they’ve burned to ash, we’ll run together. As one.”

Cheers and roars erupted again.

My dizziness had grown into intense nausea.

Porter strode back through the deafening crowd, and they parted for him.

I wrestled with my sickness all the way back to the Manor. Through the hallways, too.

When Porter finally stepped into a dim room and set me down on my feet, my gaze locked on a bathroom door, and I ran.

My knees kissed the tile as the contents of my stomach came back up. My hands and arms were on the toilet seat, which may or may not have been clean, but I was too sick to care.

Rough fingers gathered my hair away from my face and off my neck as I vomited again, and again. His hand landed on my shoulder, anchoring me.

“What did you do to me?” I panted, after a particularly violent wave of nausea.

“Brought you into the pack.”

“ What ?”

“An alpha can bring any kind of magical being into his pack’s mental bond with a bite,” he said. “Most magical beings could refuse to allow it to develop, but because you’re my mate, you can’t stop it. You just have to ride it out.”

I wanted to snap at him—but was too busy puking my guts out.

A door opened somewhere in the room, and I vaguely heard footsteps.

“I’ve got Powerade, crackers, and a few other things,” a feminine voice said. “Evan left to get her bags from the vampires.”

“Thank you.”

I stopped puking for long enough to rest my head on the toilet seat, panting as I tried to catch my breath.

The nausea hadn’t faded any, so I knew the break would be a short one. I was vomiting bile, so I wasn’t sure how much longer it could go on before I just straight-up passed out.

Thick fingers combed my hair back lightly, then tugged on the strands for a moment before I felt all the hair being tied back in a low bun.

Porter stepped away from me, the warmth of his hand leaving my shoulder. “The nausea should be fading any minute now. Stay with her. Let me know immediately when the bond progresses.”

“Will do. It’s good to have you back.”

There was something beneath the words. An undercurrent of emotion that made me wonder if they’d been together at some point.

And that pissed me off, even though I’d never had a real claim to him. I was the one who’d told him I would find someone else to screw if he wasn’t willing, after all.

In hindsight, that was probably a bad way to start a mate bond.

Then again, he was the asshole who didn’t even want my name. He was definitely planning on sleeping with the woman he’d left me with. I was just going to be the token siren he used for?—

I groaned, lifting my head and vomiting again.

The dizziness was only getting worse.

“It should subside soon,” my mate’s lover promised.

I wanted to claw her eyes out… but I didn’t have claws.

Just obnoxious magic that would make her feel better if I used it on her.

The world spun around me violently as my nausea finally started to fade. “What’s happening to me?”

“The pack’s mental bond is a bitch. It’s a massive, complex network. As the alpha’s mate, you’re at the head of it, right alongside Porter,” she explained gently.

“He didn’t warn me.”

Not about the bite, and not about the mental bond. Not about the lover, either.

What else hadn’t he said?

I missed whatever her response was, but snapped myself out of my thoughts in time to hear, “We need to get some fluids in you. The Powerade will help.”

“I just need water,” I said.

“I don’t think you?—”

“And peppermint.”

“Peppermint? Why would that help?”

I ignored her question.

Apparently Porter hadn’t bothered telling his lover what I was before he ditched me with her.

If I was her, I’d be furious to find out the guy I was sleeping with had mated to a siren. My magic would be difficult for him to resist, at the very least. It would drive him mad with lust, at the worst.

I flushed the toilet and slowly eased myself toward the bathtub off to my side. It was a shower/tub combo, and though it wasn’t large, it would get the job done.

“What are you doing?” she seemed perplexed.

She knew I wasn’t a wolf, but it didn’t surprise me that she hadn’t realized what I was. Unmated sirens were rare. She probably thought I was a vampire or something.

I turned the water on and managed to climb over the ledge of the tub. My body hit the smooth basin with a loud smack, and I used my toes to close the drain as I groaned in pain.

The water wouldn’t cure me.

I would probably need to eat the crackers and drink the Powerade.

But I knew the water would give me relief from the dizziness.

“You’re a siren ?” my mate’s lover demanded, as the water started covering my face.

Finally, she figured it out.

She was probably going to try to kill me for what I was while I was in the tub, but I didn’t have the energy to care.

“Porter doesn’t think the water can heal you,” she said, her anger faded as it rose over my cheeks. “He still wants you to eat something.”

I had to assume he’d communicated that to her through the mental pack bond. The one that was apparently becoming mine too.

Finally, the water covered my ears, and I had peace.

Blissful, blissful peace.