Mated to the Alpha: Sold to the King novel Chapter 224

Chapter 224: 0224

Lorelei POV

I’m going to die here.

The thought tore through my mind as another wave of darkness swallowed my vision.

He’s going to choke me to death.

Driven purely by survival instinct, I reached blindly toward the nightstand, my right arm trembling violently as I desperately swept my hand across its surface. My fingers brushed against smooth ceramic, and with the last bit of strength left in my body, I wrapped my hand around the heavy decorative vase.

I didn’t even think.

I just swung.

CRASH!

The vase smashed against the side of his head, exploding into countless ceramic shards that scattered across the bed. Kaelen let out a deep, pained roar, his grip instantly loosening as his hands flew to his head. He staggered backward, finally giving me the opening I desperately needed.

Air slammed back into my lungs, burning all the way down my throat as I gasped desperately.

I immediately clutched my bruised neck and scrambled backward across the tangled sheets until my back hit the heavy headboard.

My chest heaved violently as I struggled to take one breath after another, each inhale feeling painfully precious after being deprived of air.

Blood trickled down the side of Kaelen’s face, dark red streaks running from the cuts left by the shattered ceramic and gathering along his jaw. He remained hunched over for a moment, one hand gripping his head as he tried to steady himself.

Then his jaw clenched, and a furious, gut-wrenching growl tore from his throat before he suddenly lunged toward me again.

A terrified shriek escaped me.

I threw my hands over my face and curled into myself, instinctively making my body as small as possible as though my frail arms could somehow protect me from him.

I squeezed my eyes shut and braced myself for the impact, expecting his hands to come crashing down on me again.

But it never came.

Instead, a raspy, broken whisper cut through the heavy silence.

"What... what have I done?"

My entire body continued trembling so violently that I could barely hold myself together. For a few seconds, I was too terrified to move, my hands still shielding my face as I listened to the silence that followed.

Then, slowly and hesitantly, I lowered them.

Only to find Kaelen was kneeling on the edge of the mattress, staring down at his own trembling hands as though he couldn’t understand what he was seeing.

The unnatural black veins that had bulged beneath his skin were slowly receding, disappearing beneath his flesh as though they had never been there.

He looked completely lost.

Completely horrified.

And when he finally lifted his gaze to me, I instinctively flinched and shrank farther into the corner of the bed.

But the terrifying demonic red was gone.

His eyes had returned to their familiar warm, glowing amber, only now they were filled with something I had never seen in them before.

Pure, shattered terror.

"Kaelen...?" I whispered, my voice raw and barely audible beneath the frantic pounding of my heart.

But his expression crumbled completely as his gaze dropped from my face to my neck, and the moment his eyes landed on the dark, angry fingerprints already beginning to bloom purple against my pale skin, something inside him seemed to break.

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