Hunted by the Alpha novel · Chapter 10 of 24

Chapter 10: Silver in the Wine

"Why didn't you look for me in the right places?" I asked him.

It was midnight on the second night since the Run, in his bedroom, and the question had been burning in my chest for two days.

Corwin was sitting on the edge of the bed with his elbows on his knees.

Hettie was asleep down the hall, with Joss in the chair beside her bed reading a pack bylaw book aloud as a bedtime story.

"What do you mean?"

"You had a price on my name in three states. You knew my school, my car, my year. Six years, Corwin."

"Yes."

"I wasn't hiding. I put my real name on my loan forms."

He looked up.

"You went to a medical school forty minutes from your territory," I said. "I'd have been easy to find in a month. So why did it take you six years?"

His face went through several things I couldn't read.

"Because my uncle was the one who ran the search," he said slowly.

The room went cold.

"He offered. I was grieving, and he was good at it, and I handed him the file. Every year he came back with the same answer. Nothing. No girl, no trace, a dead end."

"But you found me in one night."

"I found you because you walked into my cold store."

He rubbed his face.

"Sherman told me you'd left the country," he said. "I didn't look in Duluth because I trusted him."

I thought of the silver sedan idling in the alley.

I thought of a polite voice saying, I heard there was a niece.

"He lied to you for six years," I said.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I don't know." His voice was raw. "But I'm going to find out."

The air between us settled.

It wasn't an answer to the whole question, but it was a start, and I felt something in my chest give a little.

I crossed the room and sat beside him and took his hand.

"That's all I needed to hear," I said.

"It's not enough."

"It's enough for tonight."

He lifted my hand and kissed my knuckles.

Then he stood, and went to the dresser for the water jug, and poured himself a glass.

He drank half of it standing, and stopped.

The glass slipped from his fingers and shattered on the floor.

"Corwin?"

He turned toward me, and his face had gone ashen, with black veins climbing along his throat and jaw.

"Silver," he said through his teeth. "It's in the water."

"Sit down. Sit down right now."

I grabbed him as his knees buckled and eased him onto the rug.

His skin was scalding.

← Chapter 9 · All chapters · Chapter 11 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend