Stolen and Forgiven (Branded Packs #1)(13)

He’d locked the one woman who would be his into a fate she had no way of escaping. Selfish did not begin to underscore his actions. Yet he couldn’t regret it. Not even then. Soon she would find her place within the Pack and learn who she was a shifter. His friends and people would welcome her or shun her, but they would learn to respect her as their Alpha's mate.

Soren cleared his throat and Holden looked into the eyes of his best friend. “The next part must be done now, Holden. She will need time to heal, and since she has not shifted yet, it will take her longer than others.”

Ariel let out a breath, the held out her arm. “I feel like I’m in another world or dreaming.” She licked her lips, bracing herself. “More like a nightmare, right?”

Soren held out the branding iron, hot from the fire and Holden gripped it. “I’m sorry,” Holden whispered.

“You have to do it?” she asked, her lips thinning.

He met her gaze. “Yes. I have to brand each and every one of my people.”

“Oh, Holden,” she whispered. “Those bastards deserve to rot in hell.”

From the snickers and hollers from the people around him, they’d heard it, too. He swallowed hard then met Soren’s gaze.

“Ariel is it?” Holden’s friend asked. “I’m going to hold you down so Holden doesn’t hurt you more than he needs to. You can scream and shout and do everything you need to. Okay?”

Holden held his breath as his best friend wrapped his arms around Ariel, holding her back to his chest. His wolf raged, not wanting to do this. Fuck he wanted to run away and take her and whomever else he could with him. That wasn’t an option, though, and he needed to do this to protect her.

“Breathe for me, siren,” he said softly. “Breathe.”

“I forgive you,” she whispered back.

He let out a sigh then touched the hot iron to her flesh. Ariel’s eyes widened, and she screamed. It pierced his heart, and his wolf slammed into him, wanting to kill whoever had dared hurt her. Only the fault lay in his hands, not another’s. It would always be in his hands. He was the Alpha. The one to protect. The one to brand.

He pulled back then blew on her burnt flesh. He would never forget the sound of her pain or the smell of her seared skin. He threw the iron to the grown and pulled Ariel to his chest and away from Soren. She whimpered in his arms, clutching her own arm to his chest. He ran his hand down her hair and murmured to her, trying to soothe her hurts.

It was just one more thing in a long line of regrets he had to bear. He knew it might be for the greater good, but he’d never let the memory of her pain leave him. He’d been the one to do this, the one to make her cry.

And this was only the beginning. Their true agony would be waiting for them. Of this, Holden was sure. Because no matter how hard he would try to hide her and keep his people safe, they were still prisoners.

They would never be safe.





Chapter 4


Less than a day in her new body, and Ariel had no idea who she was or why she’d given in so quickly. It made no sense. She shouldn’t have held out her arm, shouldn’t have allowed him to brand her as cattle. It was like an out-of-body experience. Holden had said it was to save her life and the life of his Pack.

She deliberately ignored his use of the word ‘our’ when it came to Pack and Holden. One minute she’d been a normal human, trying to earn a living and find her place in a post-Verona world. The next she’d been strapped to a metal table, screaming in agony. Take another breath and she’d been dying in a man’s arms. If she thought really hard about the memories and tried to clear the fog away, she could almost hear his voice, assuring her she’d be okay. Maybe it was just her trying to make up a memory of what he’d done. Now though, she wasn’t that woman dying in a forest. She’d woken up to find her whole world had not only changed, but she’d have to change with it.

The lies she’d been told her entire life about what the compound held and why they were there in the first place made her uneasy. It wasn’t that she was gullible—far from it—but she’d seen the evidence of what shifters truly were when she’d stood out on that porch, her arm out, ready to be branded. The men, women, and children who had stood there, staring at her with so many differing expressions on their faces, weren’t the monsters who filled so many humans’ nightmares. They weren’t the boogeymen in the closets used by human parents to keep human children in check—or even the boogeymen the SAU propaganda used on those human parents to keep them in check.

They were alive. They were collared. They were branded.

They’d been forgotten by so many people who once knew them as humans twenty-five years ago. But she knew she would never forget them, never forget the pain on their faces as they watched her being branded…never forget the anguish on Holden’s face when he’d been forced by the very humans he’d saved to do an unthinkable act.

All in the name of his people and their safety.

It killed her.

She fingered the unfamiliar collar at her neck and frowned. They lived with these every day, a solid, heavy reminder of their place in the world. Maybe one day she could forget the scarred flesh on her arm and cover it up, but she’d always feel the weight around her neck. How the hell had she ended up here?

If she had been a different person, she might not ever be able to forgive him for turning her in the first place. But she wasn’t that person. Instead, she was the woman who’d been through hell all on her own and had to learn to see things from numerous perspectives in order to stay alive.