Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 87502 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 438(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87502 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 438(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
The question filled me with dread. I loved him and I had no idea where he was or what they were doing to him or what Harris had planned, but I was sure it wasn’t anything good.
Outside, voices grew louder—more people were arriving.
The full moon would rise soon.
My pulse quickened as I listened to the sounds drifting through the rickety walls of the shed. Laughter…footsteps…car doors slamming. The low murmur of dozens of voices gathering in anticipation of something.
Or someone.
Then, just as the last traces of daylight vanished from the cracks in the wooden walls, the lock rattled again.
I jumped to my feet as the door flew open.
Two large Alphas stood there waiting for me. One of them grinned.
"Come on, your Ladyship," he said sarcastically. "It's time for you to take your punishment."
My blood turned to ice. But before I could protest, they seized me by the arms and dragged me out into the night.
FORTY-SEVEN
VIVIENNE
“Well, there she is—our Moon Widow,” Harris sneered, as I was dragged out into the Moon Glade by the two Alpha guards. He, like the other males in the Glade, were stripped to the waist. The women were all fully clothed—they wouldn’t be Shifting since only males Weres have wolves.
I noticed that all the males were taking care to stay in the shade of the trees, leaving the middle of the Glade empty. As long as they stayed out of the direct moonlight, they wouldn’t be forced to Shift. However, if even one beam of silver full-moon light hit their bare skin, their wolf would come out whether they wanted it to or not.
The moon hadn’t risen yet, so everyone was safe…for now.
The crowd parted and I kept the stained drop cloth wrapped tight around me as I was half pushed/half dragged into the center of the circle that had formed around Harris. I could feel the eyes of the Pack members on me. They were staring at me—no doubt wondering what I had done to be treated this way.
Unfortunately, they were about to find out.
“That’s right—bring her up there,” Harris called, making a motion with one hand. “It’s time for everyone to see her shame.”
I felt cold as they dragged me to the middle of the circle they had formed but I felt even worse when I saw that Harris had a huge portable movie screen set up right behind him.
“Now then,” he said, raising his voice to be heard above the murmurs and speculation. “I think it’s time everyone knows what our esteemed Moon Widow has been up to these past few weeks.”
“Harris, please,” I said in a low voice. “Please, just let Kor and me go. You can have the pack—hell, you can have Wolverton Manor and all of Carter’s cars if you want. Just let us go free and we’ll never bother you again!”
His face twisted into an ugly sneer.
“Let you go after how you treated me? After that young pup broke my finger in front of the whole fucking town? I don’t think so! And don’t try to bribe me—I’ll get everything I want and more before I’m through with you.”
He turned to someone in the crowd and made a motion.
“Play it!” he said.
It was full dark by then so there was no difficulty in making out what was happening on the screen. I saw, to my horror, that Harris had made a kind of slide show of every single private act Kor and I had done together.
He had pictures of us in bed together…pictures of us on the hiking trails with me on my knees to suck Kor off. There were almost as many pictures—clearly taken through my bedroom window—of Kor going down on me. Plus many, many pictures of us talking and laughing and kissing.
I wanted the ground to swallow me up. It made me sick that our love had been turned into such a tawdry porn show for everyone in the whole town to see. I had never felt such abject shame—I thought I might never recover from it.
Finally, the slide-show ended. Now the eyes on me were no longer curious—they were openly hostile.
“What a slut!” I heard a familiar voice say. I turned my head and saw it was Mrs. Browder, glaring at me. “No wonder he refused my Cynthia-Ann,” she said. “He was screwing the Moon Widow the whole time!”
Then all around me, people began to talk.
“Slut!”
“Whore!”
“Jezebel!”
“Disgusting!”
With every word hurled at me, I felt myself shrinking and growing smaller. But I didn’t want to let them make me feel small and ashamed. My love for Kor and his love for me was a beautiful thing. Just because they’d perverted it didn’t mean I still didn’t love him.
I made an effort to stand straight and hold my chin high. I looked straight ahead, refusing to make eye contact with anyone in the crowd. And I swore to myself if I ever got out of this miserable little town I was never, ever coming back!