Kidnapped by my mate by Annie Whipple
Chapter 76

AN HOUR EARLIER

My wolf was being an asshole. He wouldn’t stop forcing himself up against my consciousness, trying to take control and shift. He was pissed. Livid.

He kept reminding me that our mate was out on her own, completely unprotected and in extreme danger-and we were doing nothing about it. As if that weren’t the only thing on my mind.

“You doing okay there, Alpha?” Kyle asked me from his seat across from me. “You’re not looking too good.”

I ignored his question and continued to pace back and forth at the head of the table with my fists in my hair, barely holding it together.

Of course I wasn’t okay. I was the furthest thing from okay. I was barely eating or sleeping, unable to focus on anything but finding her.

My Belle.

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The thousand-year-old wood of the table in front of me was completely covered in papers and documents, all pertaining to any clues as to where Belle might be.

I had any, and all information I could find on my mate spread out before me.

Where she went to preschool, her first job when she was fifteen, the name of her oboe instructor from fifth grade, and the doctor who treated her father for his cancer.

I even managed to get a hold of all of her yearbook pictures.

I reached out to anyone who might have known her in Minnesota, but no one had heard from her since before she left for Paris to visit her mother.

I went to her old apartment and took the time to visit her father’s grave site to pay my respect, thanking him for creating and raising the woman I would be spending the rest of eternity with.

Chant–AC

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So far, however, all I knew was that she had boarded a Greyhound bus in Minneapolis. That was the last time she’d used her credit card.

She didn’t have a cellphone or anything that could be used to track her, and her scent was long gone. Belle was too smart. She was evading me at every turn. And it was making me lose my f ucking

mind.

My wolf often let me know that he thought this whole thing was stu pid. He was convinced that he would be able to find her if I let him out.

He would simply run and search every inch and crevice of this earth if he had to. This was why I

hadn’t shifted in nearly three months.

I knew the moment I let him out that he wouldn’t give me back control until he found Belle, and, as smart as my wolf thought he was, the only thing he would accomplish was prancing around the

woods while our mate suffered.

A huge downside to keeping my wolf inside, however, was that I was extremely on edge. I moved myself and my pack into the palace of the Mortars in a complete trance.

I had only been here for a few weeks and had already proved to be the worst king in all of

supernatural history.

Zagan Mortar, the former king, very quickly realized what a mistake he had made in sending my mate off on her own while I was still unconscious.

I snapped at anybody who bothered or inconvenienced me even the slightest bit and had no interest in ruling-or doing anything, really-until I had Belle by my side again.

She was my one and only concern. Zagan made up for his mistake by continuing to take on many of the responsibilities of king. I didn’t have it in me to be grateful, though. I didn’t have it in me to be

anything.

The only thing holding me back from completely flipping my sh it was the fact that I could feel Belle and knew she was alive and okay. She was in pain and felt incredibly uncertain and afraid, but she was okay.

She missed me. I could feel her longing to come back to me every day, and I wished with every part

of

my being that she would, even though I knew she wouldn’t.

The worst part was that she hated herself for it. She thought it made her weak and pathetic to still want me after everything she thought I did to her, and it broke my heart.

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I wanted nothing more than to pull her to me and tell her that there was nothing wrong with her and that it was completely normal to want to be with me. I was her mate.

My heart squeezed painfully in my chest to think she would ever hate herself for something so natural as loving her mate.

I had spent the last three days in the room I was in now. It was meant as a conference room.

It sometimes made me stall to think of all of the important, influential, and historical characters who had stood in my very spot.

The room was enormous, with dark wooden walls carved with intricate designs, bookshelves with ancient literature surrounding us, and a fifty-foot-tall ceiling made completely of stained glass.

It was a work of art, the stained glass, which told the story of Evangeline and Elijah Viotto, the former hybrid king and fairy queen of the supernatural.

Its breathtaking windows bathed the room in deep, rich colors throughout every hour of the day.

Even during the night, the moonlight shone through and covered the surrounding space in a blanket of iridescent light, making me feel like I was standing in a painting.

As beautiful as it was, I often found myself looking up at the stained glass above me after throwing

my

head back in frustration.

Only to be faced with even more anger as I studied it, seeing the unfortunate way that Elijah and Evangeline’s story ended, with both of them dying at the hands of the first Mortar to take the throne,

Damian Mortar.

Even now, my hands clenched into fists as I looked up at it through dark-red eyes.

Some said that Belle and I were Evangeline and Elijah reincarnated, as we were the two that, according to prophecy, were meant to take on their same roles, as king and queen of the supernatural,

I resented that. I would take the throne alongside Belle, but I would not have the same ending as they did.

I would not allow myself or Belle to meet the same fate Elijah and Evangeline had come to. Azazel would not be our Damian.

But I had to find Belle first to prevent that from happening. F uck, why couldn’t I find her? Where the hell was she hiding?

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If she would just open her mind to me, I could track her down and explain everything. But-as stubborn as ever-she continued to block me off.

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As much as it killed me, I stopped trying to break through the surprisingly strong me ntal barriers she’d put up because I knew it just caused her more pain and reminded her of the horrible things she thought I had done to her.

So I would hold myself back until I had more information.

A fierce form of regret traveled through me as I thought about the wasted opportunity I was presented with during the battle on my pack grounds three months ago.

Azazel’s army of vampires had lost-more than lost, they had been brutally defeated, in their attempt to kill my pack members, while also tearing each other apart in an untrained, savage hunger

for blood.

The fact that his army was defeated didn’t satiate my own need for blood, however—Azazel’s blood.

Nothing and no one was going to stop me from hunting him down and killing him slowly, cruelly.

Breaking each of his bones, ripping flesh, bringing him to the brink of death, and then starting over time and again until I was completely satisfied with the amount of suffering I had put him through -if that were even possible.

My wolf salivated, and the fangs and claws of my vampire were unintentionally released, both of them just as tempted as I was by the thought of torturing Azazel for decades.

But Azazel had escaped before I had gotten to him, proving once again what a coward he was.

I had torn through the surrounding trees where he was hiding in wolf form, using my vampire speed, but found that he was nowhere to be seen, the only remnant of his being the faint scent he’d left behind.

He had quite obviously run when he realized he had lost, leaving his clan of new vampires to fend for themselves against my pack of hungry wolves.

He knew what I would do to him if I found him and was smart to run.

Azazel was after her. I could feel it in the very marrow of my bones. He was looking for her with the same intense determination I was.

He wanted to kill her in the most brutal way possible in a last-ditch effort to take me down. He knew as well as I did that I would be nothing without Belle by my side.

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The only thing keeping me going right now was the knowledge that Belle was out there somewhere in an incredible amount of pain and danger. I had to get to her before Azazel did.

And time was running out.

“Alpha, why don’t you go get some sleep?” Kyle asked me in a tentative tone. “You haven’t slept more than an hour a night for the past week.”

He was right. It was nearly impossible to sleep without Belle sharing the bed with me. I could tell Kyle wanted to get back to Elijah and probably get some much-needed sleep himself.

He had put all of his heart and soul into this search and had been by my side every step of the way. Elijah too. They were both just as determined as I was to find her.

“I don’t give a f uck about sleep,” I growled. “I need to find my mate. You can go to bed if you want. I’m staying here.”

“Alpha, I hate to break this to you, but all you’ve been doing for the past several hours is growl and pace back and forth like some sort of possessed zombie dude thing.

“I don’t think you’re going to get much else done tonight. And the luna needs you at your best if you’re going to find her.”

My head snapped up to look at Kyle, my red eyes narrowing. “I’m not—”

I was cut off by the drastic shift of Belle’s emotions through the mate bond. She already hadn’t been having the best day-something that tore me up inside.

Something had happened to upset her this morning, and that poor mood had stayed with her throughout the entire day. But whatever she was feeling now was more than just sadness.

It was full-blown terror.

My entire body froze. Something was wrong. Very, very wrong.

“Alpha?” Kyle asked.

I held my hand up, silencing him. “Something is wrong with Belle,” I told him.

Having no other choice, I immediately attempted to push into her consciousness, even though I was aware that it would add pain to her fear.

I just needed her to know that I was here for her. I needed her to let me in, so I knew what was going

Emergency calls only Men, de

on, why she was so afraid, and how to protect her.

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Anger forced itself through the bond as Belle realized what I was doing. I didn’t give a f uck if she was mad at me. I needed to know what had her so scared.

My hands gripped the back of the chair I was standing in front of so hard that I could hear the ancient wood starting to split beneath my grip.

“F uck,” I shouted when she still wouldn’t let me in but was clearly still very afraid. “F uck!”

“Alpha, what’s wrong? What’s going on?” Kyle demanded, standing from his chair.

Belle was in danger. Belle was in danger. Belle was in danger. It was the only thing repeating over and over again in my head.

Then, all of a sudden, it was like a door opened in my mind. And even as a wave of calm washed over me as the bond surged between me and my mate, Belle’s pain and fear were even more intense.

Belle’s walls were down.

I could just barely hear Kyle calling my name because I was already sprinting out the door.

“Where the hell are you going?” he called after me.

“Maine,” I grunted back.

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