Page 4
“You should want to hurt me.” Considering he knew why I was sent here.
The alpha studied me from his amber gaze, with faint lines appearing around his eyes.
His nostrils flared again ever so slightly and he gripped his mug. The amber in his eyes brightened with gold.
“Aren’t you tired of all this, Ruby?” His voice lowered. “Being the Order’s blade?”
I flinched. This time I couldn’t stop it. Those words took me off guard. Nobody asked me what I wanted. Especially using my name, as if I were a person, an individual.
Ever.
Wolves had killed many of us. Even my parents. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of hearing that.
Still, his question rolled through my head, demanding an answer. The sound of my name in his low rumble echoed.
Aren’t you tired of all this, Ruby?
Was I? It was what I’d been trained to do. It was the only life I’d known. The wolves killed many of us, including my parents.
But yes, it was a life of killing and death.
And I’d asked more questions this past year. Why?
Never to get an answer. At least not one that satisfied me.
Maybe—
No, I wouldn’t let this target get into my head.
Swallowing the unexpected emotion, I trained my voice to remain steady. “Why would I be?”
“I am.” His voice tightened with weariness. He exhaled, glancing toward the window. “After all this time. All these killings. So many lives lost. And for what?” He returned his gaze to me, watching me, as if keen to hear my answer.
The back of my neck prickled. All my life I’d been told who to eliminate. Rarely why. But the wolf shifters were at the top of the list, because they’d killed so many of us. But his question made me think.
Why?
He waited while I wrestled with his question.
Remembering who I was and why I was sent here, I straightened. “Because you’ve killed many in the Order.”
“Who’ve been sent to eliminate my pack.”
That part was true. The Lockridge wolf pack were our enemies. We’d been fighting them my entire life.
“I have orders. Many signed by the same person.” He paused, studied me. “Would you like to know who?”
My neck tensed. Skin prickled. I didn’t reply.
He straightened. “Wake up, sweet girl.” A pause. “The kettle’s on.”
Her words. Seven of them, in the way she’d said them every morning of my life, her hand on my shoulder, the room still dark.
Nobody else knew those words. Nobody.
He’d pitched it higher, softer. Not her voice. An impression of it, close enough that every muscle in my body tensed.
“Where’s my grandmother?” I bolted out of the chair, grabbing the knife. “What did you do to her?”
