Unwanted Mate Of The Lycan Kings (by jessica hall) novel Chapter 82

~Zeke~

My very essence called out to my mate. All along, the woman we’d been fighting turned out to be the one we were searching for without even realizing it. Now, I am left desolate, empty. Stripped bare of everything, my wolf is gone; Zirah hates me, and for good reason. My entire life has fallen in tatters around me, and all because I destroyed the one woman I was supposed to love.

“We still have the maze trials…” Lyon trails off, and my eyes move to him, where he is nursing the rum bottle in the crook of his arm. “She will not play a game now, Lyon. Not when she is the prize,” I tell him, climbing off the chaise and wandering over to him. I steal the bottle from his arm, taking a sip from it, then another and another until my throat is raw and burning, just like the blood boiling in my veins.

“Regan will convince her,” Lyon states, and I can hear the hint of animosity in his tone. He’s jealous. We both are. We can feel he is with her, feel the blood tie we share with him change. It’s weakened. But the fact it remains at all is proof she hasn’t broken the curse completely on him. If she had, he wouldn’t be tethered to us anymore, only her, and we’d be dead. So she hasn’t let him mark her, but it explains why her blood when we tried to mark her, was like poison to us.

I fall back onto my chaise in the billiard room, and Lyon wanders over to the bar to fetch another bottle. He sways on his feet when I hear footsteps drawing nearer. Lyon looks in the door's direction, and for a split second, I hold out hope that it is her. Instead, I am greeted with the look of my bewildered father as he stumbles into the room. A one-track mind. It is almost as if he doesn’t see us in the room as he moves toward the bar. Followed seconds later by Malachi and James. I smirk, spotting James wandering into the room while looking bored and fed up.

“That is the last thing you need, you old fart,” he growls, snatching the bottle from my father’s hand. Malachi rolls his eyes, falling onto the chaise beside me; I hold the bottle out to him while I watch Uncle James fight with my father over a liquor bottle. Malachi takes the rum from me, downing half the bottle in three huge gulps. He offers it back to me, and I hold it up. “I guess I’ll get another then.” I pass it back to him and Lyon reaches above his head at the bar, chucking me a fresh bottle and saving me from having to get up while my father and uncle continue to squabble.

“Well, what do you suggest, James? I watch the fucking walls waiting for my death, the fucking grim reaper!” my father snarls, snatching the bottle from him. My uncle chucks his arms up in the air in frustration. “You are too stubborn for your own good, Theo!” Not even Malachi gets away with calling him that; that was my mother’s nickname for him.

Yet, turning my head, I find Malachi staring absentmindedly at the bottle clutched between his hands. I glance at Lyon, who dips his head at Malachi in a silent message, asking what is wrong with him. I shrug, unsure myself.

Turning my attention to Malachi, I nudge him, and he startles. “These two already have you wanting to neck yourself,” I chuckle.

“No, I just can’t get over Shelley’s betrayal,”

“The witch/nanny from hell?” I ask.

Malachi sits back heavily. “He takes everything from me,” he grumbles, tipping the bottle to his lips as he glares at my father, I too glance at him.

“Pretty sure Zirah killed her,” I remind him.

“No, he did. Taking your mother from me wasn’t enough. He had to take her too.”

“Oh, will you stop with your fucking pity party? She played us both!” My father snarls at him, Malachi immediately blows up, jumping to his feet.