Sold to Bastard Alpha after My Divorce! novel Chapter 190

Chapter 190: Chapter 190

Aria’s POV

I didn’t think.

My body just moved—sideways, fast, crashing into the wall as the next projectile tore through the doorway. A lamp. Heavy base. It hit the opposite wall and shattered, sending ceramic shards skittering across the floor like shrapnel.

I pressed flat against the plaster. Breathing.

*Don’t stop. Don’t stop. Keep moving.*

My legs were shaking. I needed them to stop shaking. I pressed my palms against the wall and forced one foot in front of the other, inching down the corridor, keeping my back to the wall and my eyes on that ruined doorway.

Another roar from inside the room.

Something else crashed. Glass this time. A mirror maybe. A hundred tiny explosions.

I kept going.

The door at the end of the corridor—the one I was pretty sure Selene had locked herself behind—was getting closer. Twelve feet. Ten.

*Don’t look at the open door. Don’t—*

I looked.

A mistake.

Lucian was inside, and he was barely recognizable.

Not because he’d shifted—he couldn’t, not anymore. But because whatever was left of the man had been burned away by whatever was running through his system right now, and what remained was just rage. Pure. Animal. Senseless.

He was tearing the room apart with his bare hands. Upending furniture. Ripping shelves from walls. His eyes were red. Bloodshot and burning with something that didn’t track. Didn’t focus. Like he was looking at something none of us could see.

He hadn’t seen me yet.

I yanked my gaze away.

*Eight feet. Just eight more feet.*

I made it five before his head snapped toward me.

The sound he made wasn’t human.

Neither was the speed.

He crossed the room and hit the doorframe in the time it took me to process that he’d turned. Claws out—how, with no wolf, I didn’t understand, except that whatever was in his system had pushed something animal to the surface that shouldn’t have been possible—and he swiped.

I threw myself backward.

The claws caught my leg. Left side, just below the knee. A bright line of fire that cut through the fabric of my slacks and through skin beneath it.

I gasped. Hit the wall. Slid down two inches before I caught myself.

*Go. GO.*

I pushed off from the wall and ran. Not gracefully. Not fast enough. Half-stumbling, one leg stinging, heart in my throat, every nerve in my body screaming that I was prey and there was a predator behind me and I had nothing.

I had nothing.

I hit the door at the end of the corridor. Rattled the handle.

Locked.

"Selene!" I slapped the wood with an open palm. "Selene, it’s Aria. Open the door."

A sound from inside. Muffled. Frightened.

"SELENE—"

Behind me, something dragged. Heavy. Deliberate.

I turned slowly.

Lucian had stopped in the middle of the corridor. He wasn’t rushing. He didn’t need to. His chest was heaving. His eyes were doing that wrong thing—that flickering, burning thing that said no one was home. A low sound came out of him continuously. Not quite a growl. More like something that had forgotten the words for anything else.

The cut on my leg was throbbing. Bleeding. I could feel it soaking into my sock.

I pressed myself against the door.

*Think. Think. He’s between you and the exit. Selene is behind you and can’t get out if you’re here. You need to move him. You need to—*

*Think, Aria.*

"Lucian." My voice came out steadier than I had any right to. "Lucian. Can you hear me?"

The growl shifted pitch.

Not good.

"I’m not going to hurt you." I took one careful step sideways, away from the door, giving him a clear line to nothing. Trying to look like something that wasn’t worth the effort. "I’m just here to help your mom. She’s worried about you."

His head tracked me. Followed the movement.

But he didn’t rush.

*Okay. Okay, that’s something.*

"She called for Kael." Another step. Testing. Slow. "Kael’s coming. He’s going to be here soon. You just have to hold on a little—"

He lunged.

Not at me.

Past me.

At the door.

I threw myself to the side—hit the floor hard, one knee and both palms—and scrambled, and his claws raked the door where my head had just been, and the wood splintered under the force of it and I could hear Selene screaming on the other side.

"SELENE DON’T OPEN IT—"

I rolled. Got my feet under me. Pushed upright.

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