Page 60 of Wulf’s Pack

He’s right. I share a grave look with Dennis. “We’ll have to leave these two here for now. They can’t shift. The collars are magical, and we won’t be able to remove them without a sorcerer.”

Ashlyn gapes at me in horror. “We can’t leave them here!”

I meet her eyes with a steady gaze. “It’s the safest place for them right now. Stay here with them and take care of them. Dennis will stay with you and help you protect them.”

Dennis shoots me a sharp gaze, furrowing his brow. He doesn’t want to stay behind. “Watch the monitors,” I tell him before he can argue. “I need you scanning the buildings, finding any other wolves that may be hiding. We need to make sure every last one of them is dead.”

He relaxes his jaw, and though he’s still tense, he looks mollified.

I turn to Lisa. “Do you know where Skylar is?”

She frowns, and it takes her a moment to answer, as if her brain is having trouble making sense of my words. She must have taken a hit or two to the head. “Who’s Skylar?”

“The female. Victor had a female with her. Do you know where she is?”

She blinks slowly a couple times, her frown deepening. “His mate? The omega?”

I growl. “ My mate!”

Lisa stares at me and then shakes her head. I don’t know if she’s answering me or not understanding me. Her eyes keep slipping out of focus. “The female,” I prompt again. “Do you know where they took her?”

Just when I think she won’t answer, she says, “She was with the alpha. He said something about needing alone time with his mate.”

If I was in a rage before, now I’m nearly feral.

I burst back into my wolf form with a vicious snarl.

Alone time. I know he’s hurt her physically, but if he’s touched her in any other way, I’m going to lose my damn mind.

I hadn’t worried about that before now, because Victor had Skylar for eight years without violating her in that way.

But did that change? Was he angry about her finding her mate?

If he realized he would never have a mate bond with her, would he finally just take what he wanted?

I can’t stop myself from imagining the worst-case scenario.

I reach deep inside myself again, trying to feel Skylar.

Our connection is stronger than it was before, but is that because I’m closer to her, or because she’s unable to control her emotions right now?

I still feel her pain, but it’s overshadowed by crippling fear and despair.

It’s the bone-deep agony that finally makes me snap. What is making her suffer that way?

My wolf completely takes over, but this time I’m more than happy to relinquish control.

I need his instincts. I need his simpler way of thinking, and right now he is laser focused on one thought alone.

The alpha’s house. If Victor took Skylar for alone time, he would take her to the alpha’s house.

His ego would allow nothing less than to claim the space of the previous alpha.

I race down the hall, ready to plow through anything and everything that gets in my way.

Dennis shouts and runs after me, but I don’t care.

I’m past rational thinking. I’m past logic.

The door to the security building is closed, but my wolf won’t allow me to shift back to open it.

I bark several times, until Dennis reaches me and opens the door. If he says something, I don’t hear it.

I take off like a shot, sprinting through the compound without a care or a clue as to what’s happening around me.

As I make my way past the rec building, another bond is severed.

Another despondent howl pierces the air.

I don’t think on it. I barely feel the pain of the bond breaking.

Somewhere in my conscience, I know I’ve gone feral.

I know the madness is quickly taking me over.

My human mind has been pushed aside, and all that’s left is my wolf.

Find mate. Kill enemies.

The door to the alpha’s house is hanging wide open.

I burst through without pause. The front room is trashed.

The furniture is destroyed, and there’s blood splattered everywhere.

A wolf lies in the center of the room, completely mutilated.

It’s a gruesome scene. Above the coppery tang of blood is a scent that drives my already feral wolf into further madness.

Mate.

I can’t even respond. I don’t have enough control of my human side to form the words.

He’s on his own. He lets out a howl and follows the scent trail to the stairs leading to the second floor.

A huge wolf barrels down them and jumps on me when he reaches the bottom.

I’m so crazed I tear through him like tissue paper.

I don’t even remember doing it. One moment he jumps on me, and the next he’s a bloody, dead mess at my feet.

A loud, angry voice roars down from upstairs. “Accept me! Bond with me, or he will die just like the last one!”

“I can’t!” a female cries. “Please! I’m already bonded!”

At the sound of her voice, a red haze fills my vision. Mate.

I release a howl so eerie it could curdle a man’s blood, and I fly up the stairs to the shouts of my enemy. “Your bond is not complete! You are untouched! Unbitten! Make your wolf accept me!”

“She won’t! I’ll die before I give up my fated mate!”

When I hit the top step, there’s another wolf waiting for me in a large loft.

He’s blocking a set of double doors. The smell of my mate mixed with blood is strong.

A loud roar bellows from behind the doors, and I barrel straight into the wolf standing between my mate and me.

We engage in a ferocious whirlwind of teeth and claws, fur, saliva, and blood.

I take several blows, but I don’t feel them. I am nothing but rage.

Pain-filled cries rent the air, and my mate screams. “Stop it! Stop! You’re killing him!”

“You know how to make it stop!”

Distracted by her tortured pleas, I let my opponent dig his claws through my side, tearing through muscle all the way to the bone.

Blood drips from me, but I still don’t stop.

I barely feel it. I’m a machine. I twist away, and the wolf, surprised that I’m still on my feet, startles back and trips on his hind legs.

I lunge forward and rip through his neck so hard I nearly sever his head from his body.

My mate screams again, and another pack bond breaks.

I slam through the double doors, exploding them right off their hinges.

When the dust settles, I find a man with long, brown hair and dark, cold eyes holding my mate against him, using her as a shield.

My very naked mate. She’s wearing nothing but that wretched collar.

Her arms are pulled behind her as if she’s cuffed at the wrists, and she’s bruised and bloody from head to toe.

Her face is swollen and split open in several places.

Her shoulder looks like it’s been dislocated.

And someone must have had fun with a knife, because her body is covered with dozens of small cuts.

Beside them, a lifeless man is tied to a chair, every bit as beaten and bloody as my mate.

“Wulf!”

My mate’s sob pulls my attention back to her. Her voice is weak and scratchy, most likely abused from too much screaming. The man holding her hostage has a silver knife pressed to her throat. “Take one more step, and she dies.”