Alpha Nox by Jane Doe novel Chapter 2

“Yep. That’s me, orphan Annie over here.” I smirked at the three musketeers. “My parents didn’t want me, so they gave me up. Better than what yours did, Kaylee. Late term abortions are bad enough, but to try it when the child is outside the womb? Ouch, that must’ve stung. Can’t say I blame them, though.” I said, inspecting my nails. “What family would want a magicless wolf?”

It was a cheap shot for sure, but so was the time when Kaylee poisoned my food with wolfsbane for a week straight. If I thought hard enough, I could still taste the blood-tainted vomit in my mouth.

Besides, nothing I said was a lie. It was common knowledge Kaylee’s mother tried to murder her as a child—all because Kaylee here didn’t have abilities of her own.

“You slick bitch. You think you’re so funny, don’t you?” Kaylee hissed.

“I’m hilarious, ask anyone.” I deadpanned.

I ran through the different scenarios that could get me out of this, but there weren’t many. All three were approaching from various sides and I had a gaping pit of snakes at my back. Even with my father’s training, and the lessons I’d learned from spying on the recruits’ sessions, I wasn’t going to make it out unharmed.

My abilities could get me out of this, but that was a box I could never, ever open. If I was going down, you could bet my perky ass was taking one of them with me.

Ivy Davenport whipped her bleached ponytail over her shoulder. “She won’t be laughing when she’s being strangled by a boa constrictor.”

A what now?

“Have you even seen a boa constrictor, Ivy?” I asked, my eyebrows sky high in the face of her sheer dumbassery. “For crying out loud, these are Black Mamba’s.”

“Same fucking thing.” She spat; her toilet water eyes narrowed into slits.

I scoffed. “Yeah. Totally, same fucking thing.”

“Darlin,’ last I checked it don’t really matter. Either way, you’re going to meet them bad boys up close and personal. I’ve been dyin’ to try out this new move we just learned in Krav Maga class.” Weston drawled, rubbing his hands together, looking like a predator in the bad way (if you catch my drift).

Laughter tickled the back of my throat. Jokes on him, I knew the move too.

Kaylee and Ivy closed in on my left and right, crouched in fighting positions with their hands out, ready to grab hold of me incase I tried to flee. I braced myself for the impact of his meaty fist. As it hit my cheek and the blunt pain of busted blood vessels slapped me upside the face, I made a show of falling to the ground.

“Get the hell up.” Ivy snarled.

“What a fucking weakling.” Kaylee laughed.

Oh, if only they knew. If I wasn’t worried about getting my revenge on those who sentenced me here, these three would be dead in the dirt. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

I whimpered, my lower lip quiver pathetically. All three exploded in laughter, and while the sound made my eardrums contemplate suicide, it kept them from noticing the fist full of dirt I held in my hand. I didn’t give him time to make the first move. That punch of his had my adrenaline flowing, singing its siren-song of blood, agony, and beautiful pain.

Since Kaylee was such a grade-A bitch, I threw the fistful of dirt in her face and swung without abandon. She let out a squeal of outrage that quickly turned into hacking and sputtering. I ducked in time to dodge Ivy’s heavy-handed punch, but not in time to miss Weston’s knee-kick.

It hit me in the gut hard enough to rip the air from my lungs.

Mid-kick, time slowed, and I noticed something about Weston’s form. While his kick was solid, his balance was subpar. I wasn’t usually a glutton for pain, but once the idea popped into my head, it was just too sweet to resist.

The force of his kick made me stumble back, but there was only open air and a pit full of snakes to break my fall. Flailing, I reached out and snagged the back of Weston’s shirt. The second the ultra-soft cotton brushed my fingertips, I grabbed on for dear life and used his body weight to pull myself closer.

The seductive purr of victory washed over me as I wrapped my arms around his neck and my legs around his waist. I grinned without abandon because even Weston Phillips couldn’t fight gravity.

Weston let out a wail that would put Kaylee’s hyena laugh to shame, trying valiantly but failing to free himself from my hold. Didn’t he know? Once I sink my claws into something, I never let go.

As for me, I tossed my head back and let loose a wild laugh, pulling us both into the pit of angry venomous snakes.

Delphine Hawk, my favorite Medic in all of the First Division, took one look at me, covered in blood, hair tangled to hell, and a snake still dangling from my back, and let out a string of curses that made me blush—and I had the potty mouth of a sailor.

It was Delphine that took care of me the first time Harriet knocked me unconscious. When I’d made the grave mistake of pissing off Phineas Striker and received those ten lashings, she was who I called out for in those blurry moments before the numbing relief of unconsciousness took hold.

“I am going to be the youngest wolf in history to die of a heart attack, and it’s all because of you, Lilac.” She groaned, rubbing at her eyes. “You’re not even a recruit here and I swear I see you more than any other patient. I’ve got your aura practically memorized at this point.”

I made a sound of agreement deep in my throat. Delphine was the one person in this entire shit hole that I semi-trusted. Delphine was easily the best aura reader in the country, and even she could barely get a read on me. It meant my emotions were tightly under wraps, easy to tuck away in some dark corner of my mind where they would never again see the light of day.

I batted my eyelashes at her, swaying on my feet since the Black Mamba’s venom was currently coursing through my body. I’d lost all feeling in my left leg on the walk here, which wasn’t a good sign at all.

“Aw, you care.” I cooed.

“Hush up, troublemaker.” She grumbled, side eyeing me.

Delphine ushered me into one of the examination rooms. She flitted to the tall medicine cabinet against the wall and snatched the key from out of her pocket. Pill bottles rattled on the shelves and prepackaged syringes clattered to the floor in her hasty search.

“Tell me how you’re feeling, Lilac. I can see you fighting to stay awake. You know by now that you got to stay conscious for me.”

Fuck, it felt like my body was on fire. Was my blood actually boiling in my veins, or was that just the venom? I hadn’t felt pain like this since the Crawford twins made me play punching bag for entire class of trainees.

“Like, emotionally or physically? Because emotionally, I’m a ray of fucking sunshine. Physically? Eh, I could be better.”

Delphine turned to face me with a syringe in one hand and a large pair of forceps in another. She had that loathsome look on her face, like she was seeing me. I didn’t fucking like it, even half-dead from the Black Mamba’s venom.