Page 356 of Primal Bonds
Locked.
With a muttered curse, she dragged a boot from her backpack and hammered the handle with the heel.
Adric sent a startled glance over his shoulder. For a long moment, they stared at each other.
She took a step toward him. “Take me. Please.”
He shook his head, donned his helmet. “The lock will open for you in an hour.” He snapped down a dark visor.
She gave the handle one last thump before looking around for a better tool. Her gaze lit on a rock. She dropped her stuff and lunged for it, but it was larger than it appeared, the bottom two-thirds lodged in the semi-frozen ground.
Adric zoomed off.
Her breath sobbed in. “No, no, no. You can’t leave without me.”
She was never going to catch him, but she clawed at the dirt until the rock loosened. She snatched it up and started to her feet.
Something slammed into her from behind, knocking her to her knees on the snow-covered grass. The rock flew out of her hands.
A man’s rough fingers closed around her throat. A knee shoved into her spine.
She tried to buck him off, but he was bigger, heavier. He easily controlled her.
The blunt fingers tightened. She scrabbled frantically at them but the steady pressure didn’t let up. Squeezing the breath from her.
Black edged her vision. Her hands felt strangely numb.
“Adric,” she rasped.
A small, broken sound.
But in her head, it was a scream.
The fingers squeezed harder. The blackness rose up like a rogue wave and sucked her under.
Chapter 22
Luc had waited outside Adric’s den most of the night. He’d noted Rosana’s scent, of course. Fresh, as if she’d been there recently.
His mouth flattened. First Lewes, now Baltimore. Adric had finally gotten lucky.
Luc had never approved of his friend’s obsession with the do Rio female. Adric was the alpha; he should know better. Earth and water fada didn’t mix. Adric could never mate with the woman, and fucking her was asking for trouble. Dion would love an excuse to come down hard on Adric and the clan.
The rain changed to a wet snow. It clung to Luc’s hair, melted on his face. His pants were soaked through, his feet blocks of ice in his boots. He started to shiver but didn’t shift to his wolf.
He’d need his hands for what came next.
Still, snow was good. It would cover his scent.
He stationed himself upwind anyway. No one knew better than one of Adric’s former lieutenants how sharp the alpha’s senses were.
Dawn came late in January. The sun was just a glimmer on the horizon when Adric emerged from his den, a duffel bag in hand. He sniffed, glanced around.
On the opposite side of the house, Luc plastered his back to the bricks. Inside, the part of him that Blaer could never touch implored his alpha: See me. Kill me.
Death was preferable to being enslaved to a fae.
But his friend seemed distracted. Getting his motorcycle from the shed, he donned his helmet, shoved the duffel bag into a saddle bag and pushed the bike down the snow-covered driveway.
