The Broken Warrior's Daughter

Cara’s request to keep Angel longer is advantageous. It means | will have more time with Eli today.

As | walk out with Rik, | ask the question that’s been sitting uneasily in my mind. “How do you do it?” | ask and look at him.. “Which part?” He asks chuckling.

| chuckle too. “Sorry. How do you handle being mated to a Guardian, knowing she would lay down her life for you? As an Alpha, | can’t wrap my head around it. That’s our job, we’re the protectors of the pack, the entire pack. How do you do it?”

His smile fades and looks off into the forest before answering. “It’s not easy. It’s in their genes, just like it’s in ours. We protect our pack, they protect us. | told Cara after Eli kidnapped her that | didn’t ever want her sacrificing herself for me again. | asked her to stand beside me, rather than in front of me. That’s the key, | think.” He stops and looks at me.

“You have to agree to treat her as an equal and she has to agree to fight beside you when the time comes. It’s a compromise on both sides, one | was willing to make to try to keep her safe. Cara may be the Luna of this pack, but she is my equal. That said, she also submitted to me.”

| whip my head to look at him. “Cara submitted to you?”

His eyes take on a far away look. “She did before we were mated and continues to on rare occasions. | know she doesn’t have to and nothing | would do or say could force her to, so it has to come from her.”

“How? How did you get her to submit to you?” | ask.

His eyes refocus on me. “By being everything she needs and wants in a mate. By being a better man than | ever thought | could be, because she expects it, demands it. When I did that, she submitted to me on her own. So, we are equals, but | am still her Alpha.”

| nod, thinking. | have no idea what Angel would expect from me or want in a mate. | need to start figuring that out if this is going to work between us. “Thanks Rik.”

“Anytime. We still need to meet about our plans for the vampires and protecting our borders.”

Rik nods. “I'll bring Chase.”Content rights by NôvelDr//ama.Org.

We say our goodbyes and | head back home. When | arrive, | head straight down to the dungeons. | walk to the front of his cell. “One chance Eli. Why'd you do it?”

His response is the same. “I didn’t kill Luna Estella.”

I snarl at him. “Do not say her name. You don’t get to say her name ever!”

| turn to the guards. “String him up.”

He doesn’t fight it when they pull his arms over his head. | let the frustration of everything over the past couple of weeks come out. My mate nearly dead, vampires wanting to take her from me again, all the suffering that Angel had to endure, Angel being a Guardian, my mother’s death, my father’s absence, everything comes out as | land punch after punch.

| stand back when he’s hanging by his hands, unable to stand. “Why did you do it?” | ask again. “| didn’t do it.” He says. | swing a final punch, knocking him out. I turn to the guards. “Get him down. As usual, give him enough food and water to survive.”

I'm wiping my hands when | realize I've been down here much longer than | realized. | need to get upstairs and shower before my mate comes home.

When | step into the hallway, just off the kitchen, | immediately smell her scent. Raspberries and cream. My mind and body calm. | love that her scent lingers when she’s not here.

| quickly head upstairs, hopping into the shower and washing off the blood and gore from Eli’s beating. I’m nearly done when | get a frantic mind link from

Dustin.

“Alpha, she’s running!”

“Who's running?”

“Angel. She’s running and she’s fucking fast, you need to get out here.”

What the fuck?! | shut off the water and run out the door and down the hall. | shift. as | leap over the banister of the stairs, landing on the bottom floor on all four

for me as Cyran races out. “Where are you?” | mind link Dustin.

“She’s heading in the direction of the waterfall.” | pick up my pace. | didn’t even know she was back home. What spooked her that has her running?

“When did she get back?” | link.

“| don’t know. The patrols saw her running and alerted me.”

“Has anyone smelled the vampire scent? Could they have found her?”

“We haven't smelled anything, but she’s a Guardian. Her sense of smell is better than ours.”

“Check with the patrols, make sure they haven't seen or smelled anything.”

| can hear the footfalls of several wolves as | get closer to the waterfall. When | break through the foliage, | see Dustin trying to keep up with her as she climbs the falls. | howl, hoping she'll stop when she realizes I’m here.

| watch as she turns to look at me. But rather than relief, | see horror in her eyes. The fuck?

I start running forward again, bounding past the patrols that have followed Angel here. | quickly gain on my Beta, leaping over his wolf, Leon, to get to my mate. | don’t know what it is, but something is very, very wrong.

When | get to the top, she’s at the edge of the precipice. She turns looking at Cyran, her eyes are haunted. “I won't do it again. | would rather die than be around monsters.”

Cyran whines at her. ‘What the fuck did you do?‘ He screams at me. ‘I don’t know." He lays down and begins to belly crawl toward her, whining and whimpering at how close she is to the edge of the cliff.

Tears are falling non-stop down her cheeks. She’s chanting softly, I’m not sure she even realizes it, saying over and over ‘I can’t do it.

She looks at Cyran. “I won't do it.” She says, just as softly.

“| don’t care if you’re our mate. | won't bind myself to a monster. And he’s a monster. I'm so sorry Cyran.” If she jumps, | know that we'll jump after her. | don’t know if she can survive that

+15 BONOS

kind of fall, but | know that we won't. | don’t care, it doesn’t matter. She knows. she’s our mate and she'd rather die than be with me, she thinks I’m a monster. If she rejects me, I'd rather die too.