My Sister Stole My Mate And I Let Her (Seraphina) novel Chapter 416

Chapter 416: Chapter 416 ALPHA BABYSITTER

JACK’S POV

Lucian didn’t flinch when I smiled at him like I meant to draw blood.

“I hear you’ve become a lackey for my parents,” I said.

Anyone else would have bristled, or snapped, or at least let the insult register in the tension of their shoulders.

Lucian only watched me.

Calm. Measured. Unmoved in a way that felt less like restraint and more like indifference.

“That would be inaccurate,” he said, his tone as even as it had been before.

I huffed a quiet laugh, circling him, pressure coiling tighter under my skin with each step.

“What title would you prefer?” I asked. “Errand boy? Servant?” I chuckled. “How does it feel to be an Alpha at someone else’s mercy?”

His gaze tracked me without turning his head, as if he had already calculated every movement I could make before I made it.

“I would argue that between you and me right now, I’m not the one at someone else’s mercy.”

Something sharp twisted low in my chest.

“The fuck is that supposed to mean?” I snarled.

Behind him, the forest seemed to hold its breath again, the others keeping their distance but not their attention.

I could feel it—every flicker of awareness, every instinct telling them something was about to snap.

Lucian cocked his head as if he were studying me. “You need something, don’t you? I understand that if you don’t get it quickly enough, things get...uncomfortable for you.”

The pressure under my skin surged. My fingers twitched at my sides, nails biting into my palms as something feral reared up, demanding release.

“You think you understand this?” I asked.

“I understand enough.”

“Do you?” I took a step closer, close enough now that I could see the faint shift in his pupils, the way his body adjusted—not retreating, but preparing.

“Do you understand what it takes to hold this together without losing control?”

“Trust me,” he said. “I know more about control than you can ever know.”

“Then you should know better than to push me,” I said.

“I’m not pushing you,” Lucian replied. “I’m challenging you. No one ever did that, and that’s why you grew up to be such a brat.”

That did it.

The surge broke through.

The world sharpened at the edges, sound thinning, focus narrowing to a single point.

I moved—

Lucian’s hand came up and pressed flat against my sternum.

I froze in place. For a second, nothing happened. 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

Then—

Pain.

Not the kind that came from impact or injury.

This was deeper, like something had slipped past bone and muscle and gone straight for whatever was coiled underneath.

I dragged in a sharp breath as the pressure inside me exploded, slamming against the intrusion like a caged animal.

“What—”

“Enough,” Lucian said quietly.

Something moved through the contact point, subtle but undeniable, threading into the chaos under my skin with cold, surgical precision.

I staggered back a step, more from the sensation than the force.

“You—” My teeth clenched as another wave hit, sharper this time, dragging a low sound out of my throat before I could stop it. “What did you do?”

Lucian lowered his hand, watching me with that same steady, infuriating calm.

“The same thing she does,” he said.

No. Not the same.

I could feel the difference immediately.

Catherine’s energy had always been controlled. Not gentle, but tempered.

She guided it, smoothed the edges, dampened the worst of it so it didn’t tear me apart while it was being forced back into place.

This was raw. Unfiltered.

Like someone had taken the mechanism and stripped out every safeguard.

My breath quickened as the sensation deepened, cold threads winding through the chaos, constricting, crushing it inward.

It hurt like something was being compressed into a space too small to hold it.

I laughed, the sound breaking unevenly. “You’re—”

Another wave hit.

My vision flickered at the edges, the forest tilting for a fraction of a second before snapping back into place.

“You’re—” I dragged in a breath, forcing the words through clenched teeth. “You’re doing it wrong.”

“No,” Lucian said. “I’m doing it efficiently.”

The distinction was glaring.

Catherine eased.

Lucian forced.

Where she would have softened the edges of my awareness, dulled the pain just enough to make it bearable, Lucian did nothing.

He let me feel all of it.

Every shift.

Every compression.

Every moment of the thing inside me being dragged back into alignment.

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