My wolf settled a little.
“Show me,” I growled.
She led me past a row of curtains.
And when I saw Jessica, everything in me shattered.
She looked dead.
White as snow. Lips pale. Eyes closed. Chest rising only barely. Sweat across her forehead like she had been burning with fever.
Her arm wrapped in blood-soaked bandages that barely hid the mangled shape underneath.
My knees almost gave out.
For a second, I was dragged back ten years. Her body limp in my arms, covered in blood. Her pulse faint. Her wolf silent.
And now it was happening all over again.
“What the hell happened to you, Jess?” My voice cracked.
I lifted her gently, but she felt fragile. Limp. Like touching her wrong would make her bones snap. She was cold.
I looked at her hand, and I stumbled backward.
It wasn’t a hand anymore. It was ruined, beyond repair. Even my wolf hesitated at the sight of it. I doubted her own wolf could heal something this brutal.
The kind of injury that meant she would never mix perfumes again. Never hold the tiny beakers she loved. Never write formulas. Never create anything again.
“No,” I whispered. “No. No. Goddess, no!”
I sank beside her, my chest aching. My wolf howled in despair.
Jessica lived for her work. Her hands were her life. Her craft. Her passion. Her identity.
Someone had destroyed that.
Destroyed her.
I stood up and grabbed my phone. “Kain. Find out who did this. I want their heads. Not tomorrow. Not next hour. Now!”
His voice tightened. “Yes, Alpha.”
I hung up and turned to the redhead.
“You.”
I stalked toward her.
Before she could react, I wrapped my hand around her neck and slammed her against the wall. The drywall cracked.
Her feet kicked weakly.
“Are you the one who did this?” I snarled. “Did you hit her on the road?”
She choked, shaking her head. “No… no, Alpha.”
“Pray you’re telling the truth. If I find out you had anything to do with this, you’ll beg me for a quick death.”
She wheezed out, “I saw her on the roadside. I recognized her from the ID. Your name was in her emergency contact.”
That part was true. I insisted on it myself, made sure her Luna Pharmaceuticals ID listed my name in bold as her emergency contact. I remembered standing over the HR clerk, demanding the font be large enough that anyone could read it at a glance. I did it to keep her safe, because she never thought about protecting herself.
I dropped the reddeaded woman, and she hit the floor coughing.
My breaths felt like fire.
I looked back at Jessica.
“Why do you always get hurt?” I whispered. “Why do you make me worry like this?”
Minutes later, my phone buzzed.
Kain.
“Alpha, we hacked into the nearest CCTV. The whole thing was recorded. I’m sending it now.”
The call ended.
A video file arrived, and I tapped it open.
Jessica’s scream tore through the speakers.
My blood froze.
The footage showed her in a car, struggling, crying, begging. A man shouting. Then blow after blow. Blood everywhere.
My hands shook with fury.
Then the man dragged her unconscious body out and left her on the burning road.
I zoomed in.
When I saw the man’s face, my vision went red.
“Jude,” I growled.
My own warrior.
My trusted man.
“You son of a bitch. I’ll kill you!”
I called Kain. “Bring Jude to the basement. Chain him up. Don’t touch even a strand of his hair. I’ll deal with him.”
“Yes, Alpha.”
I ended the call and glared at the redhead. “Stay here. If I find even one hint you’re involved, you’re dead.”
Then I stormed out.
I arrived an hour.
Jude hung from chains bolted into the ceiling. His face swollen. His breathing weak.
I didn’t wait and grabbed him by the throat and slammed him into the wall. Bone cracked.
“What did you do to my woman?” I roared. “The most important person in my damn company!”
I punched him. Hard.
Blood flew.
He spat, barely conscious.
“Tell me why you hurt Jessica before I rip your spine out!”
Jude broke down, dropping to his knees.
“Alpha… I didn’t want to. Luna Suzette ordered me to.”
Everything in me froze.
“What did you just say?” My voice dropped to something cold enough to kill.
Jude sobbed. “She ripped her gown and took a picture of us. She threatened to tell you I assaulted her if I didn’t obey. She commanded me to crush Miss Jessica’s hand. She said if she couldn’t be the Alchemist, then Jessica shouldn’t be either. Alpha, I swear, I never wanted to do any of it.”
My breath vanished.
Suzette ordered this?
My legs gave out, and I sank to the floor. Empty.
Kain approached softly, offering help, but I forced myself up and said, “Throw him in the dungeon. No food. No water.” Then I stared at Jude with hateful eyes and added, “And when he finally dies, throw him in the same pit the lunatic rogue was dumped.”
Kain nodded. “Yes, Alpha.”
As they dragged Jude away, I recalled Jessica’s face flashed before me, her bright smile in the lab, the light in her eyes when she mixed her creations.
And now her destroyed hand.
Was it true?
Did my mate hurt Jessica again? for the second time around?
I would find out…
Johan’s POV
When I arrived, I found Suzette sitting up in bed, phone pressed to her ear, voice frantic. “What did you say? He is torturing Jude? Did Jude mention that I was the mastermind?”
I froze. For a second I didn’t even recognize her voice.
She wasn’t the Luna I married.
She was a stranger.
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