Eternal Hunger by Laura Wright Page A

like a bull in the winter night. “I’m a selfish prick.”
    Sara looked up at him, her beautiful dark blue eyes confused. “What are you talking about?”
    “I shouldn’t have brought you here.” The brands on his cheeks burned with an irritating pain. The need to keep Sara close and protected was nothing to this new need he had to keep her far away from the conversation he was about to engage in with his mother and her mate. “But it’s too late for regrets.”
    “I thought you said I have nothing to worry about, nothing to fear,” she said.
    He looked down at her, feeling like a gigantic ass for scaring her. “And you don’t,” he said assertively. “They won’t touch you.”
    “Alexander . . .”
    “Come, Sara, let’s finish this and get out.” He walked, Sara beside him, toward the threesome. Just moments before he reached the porch, his mother leaned down and whispered something to Evaline, his little sister, and she turned and ran into the house.
    Alexander pretended not to care. She was his half sister and he’d met her only once when he was a balas . No doubt she’d been poisoned against him by the paven who stood before him now.
    Theydon was at least six inches shorter than him and possessed half the muscle mass, but the cruelty and evil he’d shown to Alexander as a balas still burned brightly in the older paven ’s blue eyes. The instinct to kill was strong within Alexander—to protect the young veana inside the house and the beautiful human who stood beside him outside of it. But this was not the time for vengeance. The future of his brothers was crucial and he needed information.
    “Alexander.” Theydon’s raspy tone curled around Alexander’s neck and squeezed.
    “In the flesh,” he said with true menace.
    “We thought you were—”
    “Dead,” Alexander finished for him, casting a quick glance at his mother. “Sorry to disappoint you.”
    Theydon stepped in front of his veana . “You don’t belong here, sacro. What do you want?”
    Alexander flinched at the ancient word for “filth”—the word Theydon had called him whenever he’d begged for blood through the bars of his cage. His fingers itched to wrap around the old paven ’s neck.
    “Why have you interrupted our nightly meditation—or are you just here to torment your mother?”
    “I’ll leave her torment to you.”
    His mother shook her head. “Really, Alexander, coming here after all this time, dressed that way, and bringing that ‘thing.’ ”
    “Impure sacro ,” muttered Theydon.
    “You may address me in whatever way you choose,” Alexander warned the old paven , “but say another word about my woman and I will rip your head from your shoulders, regardless of the sacred ground and consequences from the Order.”
    His mother gasped, put her head down, and started whispering an ancient plea to the Order.
    Theydon put his hand on her shoulder. “Madeline—”
    “He wishes to shame me. It has always been his greatest gift.”
    “His only gift. It is his father’s blood that acts this way, not yours. Breeding Male witte .”
    Alexander smiled darkly. Yes, his father was an “animal.” “And that animal is in me now, Theydon. So take care.”
    Madeline’s brown eyes lifted to the brands on Alexander’s cheeks. “You have gone through morpho.”
    “Yes.”
    Disgust saturated her gaze. “Yes. Your size, your eyes, the marks on your face and wrists—the look of the monster, the rapist . . . Though you will not become a Breeding Male, your father is within you.”
    Alexander heard Sara gasp beside him and he dropped his arm from her waist and went searching for her hand. It was the bond he needed, the strength he needed to stop himself from killing the pair before him. When he found her warm, willing palm, he squeezed it gently.
    Theydon gestured to Madeline. “Go inside the house, Madeline . I will deal with your unwanted balas .”
    With one last look at Alexander, Madeline turned and hurried up