Marked Mate

18

SCARLETT

My heart felt like it was exploding in my chest as I stared at the page with teary eyes. I shook, the book vibrating in my hands, the ladder beneath my feet swaying with my jittery movements. Clambering down off the piece of equipment, I attempted to steady myself, leaning back against the dusty desk.

George Peters...

Caroline Ford...

Marissa Thompson...

Lincoln Avery...

Robert Parkins...

The list of names went on and on, dripping down the page - much like my tears - and following over onto the next one. And the next one. And the next one.

A list of gifted wolves successfully trapped and handed over to the Enclave Clan.

As I read the heading, a wave of nausea wafted through me, and I resisted the sudden urge to vomit on the study floor. What the hell was this book doing here in Roman's father's study? My mind ran rampant.

There had to be almost fifty names inside - with many blank pages left at the end. Whoever had written these names in here wasn't done. There were plenty more gifted wolves they wanted to hand over to Nyx.

"Shit," I hissed to myself, bracing my head down on the desk and squeezing my eyes shut painfully. More tears rimmed my eyes, but I forced them down. The last thing I needed was for Roman to come in and find me crying over the gifted wolves his father had sentenced to a life of pain and torment.

He had clearly struck some kind of deal with Nyx, and I couldn't help but fear that Roman was in on it. Had he been hiding how involved in all of this he was? He appeared to hate Nyx and his clan, but perhaps there was something going on in between the lines that I hadn't picked up on - something that Roman didn't want anyone to know.

My mate. Hunting gifted wolves. No. He couldn't be.

The world wouldn't be that cruel, would it?

"Get yourself together, Scarlett," I spat at myself, slamming the book shut and dropping it down on the dirty desk as if it had burned me, as if the hardback cover morphed into tongues of flames that lapped at my skin.

If there was a sign from the universe that Roman and I were never going to live a normal life, then this was it. Staring at me square in the face clear as day. There was no denying that I was in serious danger here.

There was only one thing that I could do - and that was to leave.

Roman couldn't find out what I was. There was no way that he didn't know anything about his father's work, right? The book appeared like it hadn't been touched in a while, but that didn't mean I was going to disregard it.

"Scarlett!"

My mate's voice struck through me like an icicle, piercing my soul and causing my blood to freeze inside of my veins. Panicking, I climbed the ladder, dumping the book back on top of the shelf. Dust flew back at me causing me to splutter, but I managed to compose myself just as Roman waltzed through the door.

"Are you okay? Did you find anything?"

I gulped. I definitely found something.

"Um, yeah," I said, yanking out a cookbook on Italian food - the first in reach. "I like the look of this one."

Roman's green eyes skated across my face, narrowing, and he released a small chuckle before taking a step forward. "You have dust all over your face."

"Do I?" My eyebrows flew into my hairline, and I rubbed at my cheeks with my sleeve, not caring that I was probably rubbing off all my foundation. "It's dusty in here." My eyes flickered up towards the top of the shelf where the book sat, but I quickly averted them, hoping Roman hadn't noticed.