Bloodline Alchemy: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 6) - Lan Chan (libby ebook reader txt) 📗

knew he was trying to dig at me but that didn’t stop the indignation. “They were going to wipe my thoughts!”

“I gave you a solution.”

Why wasn’t there anybody around? I needed a third-party opinion on this lunacy. Feeling trapped, I deflated. “Okay,” I said. “Fine. I’m sorry. You gave me a solution and I didn’t take it. It’s too late to change things now.”

The crunch of hard-packed earth as he turned was all the warning I got before he appeared in front of me. There wasn’t even time to think about erecting a circle. He grabbed me by the waist and pressed me up against the trunk of a silver gum. His palms slapped down on either side of my head. Rage lapped at me from the entire length of his heated body. The mating link went ballistic. It clawed at the blood barrier like a carnivorous animal, demanding freedom, wanting to drown in the waves of dominance.

Dipping his head, Max rasped in my ear. “Sorry doesn’t cut it.”

The effort not to swoon took up all my focus. Grasping onto my kitchen magic, I countered the burst of his overwhelming husky scent with memories of damp grass and sweet peas. Of sapphire-blue eyes and an unbreakable soul bleeding in my arms. I had a job to do, and it didn’t involve getting naked with Max. My purpose slammed back into place, pushing back at the need that ate at me.

“Sorry is all you’re going to get,” I said, shoving at him. He wouldn’t budge.

“Try again.” He moved a fraction closer, the muscles of his chest unyielding beneath my palms. I felt his heartbeat like thunder in my hands. It pulsed up my arms and thudded between my ears as though he’d reached through my skin and caressed me. I...this was not good.

“You’re demented. I said no.”

He dropped his head farther so that his breath heated my cheek. “So I heard.”

What. The. Hell.

“You’re supposed to back off. Pack law dicta–”

He bit me.

Right at the juncture between my collarbone and my ear. Unbearable heat throbbed between my legs and savaged its way into my gut. He used blunt, human teeth, but the possessive aggression in it caused my nerves to spasm. My legs felt weak. Before they could give way, he slid his arm around my waist, holding me securely against the tree as he eased his mouth away with a languid flick of his tongue. Desperate in the way of a trapped animal, I latched on to anything that would help me hold him at bay.

The memory came unbidden, a weapon I kept to help me weather this emotional storm. Lex had just won the Unity Games. The elite guards had bundled her off for medical inspection before they began the award ceremony. The seed of a connection hummed in my chest. Feeling elated, I had left Lex sitting contentedly with a glass of ambrosia and had gone in search of Max to make sure he was healing from the wounds inflicted by Chanelle.

Raised voices carried through the tunnel as I neared the stadium’s infirmary. Max’s low rumble and Chanelle’s high-pitched snarl. Something in me had urged me to use caution. Throwing an invisibility circle around myself, I had flattened myself against the wall away from any draft and pricked my ears to listen.

“...seriously deranged,” Chanelle laughed. “I thought you would have done better but you’re just like the rest of them.”

Something shuffled in the room. “Give it a rest, Nelle,” Kai’s voice warned. “You lost. Don’t be sore about it.”

She whined in the back of her throat. “You went easy on her. On all of them. That’s just shameful.”

Max huffed. “You want to talk about shame? How dirty were you thinking of playing this?”

“At least I didn’t lose my head over some insignificant human!” she shouted.

“Watch your mouth,” Max shot back, his tone much quieter. Deceptively calm.

Chanelle laughed. “Or what? What are you going to do, Maximus? It’s pitiful that Max Thompson, future lion clan alpha, is being led by the balls by a little human. Does she realise what mating with you will entail? Have you told her what she’s in for? Or has she got you so thoroughly tamed that you’ll make yourself lesser so you don’t frighten her?”

“Nelle!” Kai yelled. “Shut up!”

I had felt it then. The first wave of an anger so deep it was a physical thing that permeated the walls and scraped up my skin. Chanelle battered it aside like she did with anyone she considered insignificant.

“What happened, Max?” she said, her tone now cajoling. “You know what you need. After ascension, your Thracian bloodline will be freed. It won’t allow for a submissive mate, and you know you’ll lose your mind if she’s in danger. Look at what happened in the arena. If you hadn’t lost your head, you would have seen it was impossible to hurt her from inside the ring. All I had to do was point in her direction. She’s human. They’re immensely breakable, and your Sophie in particular is soft as hell.”

Feet scraped against cement as though she was pacing. “I know everyone loves to see me as the villain but I’m saying this for your own good.”

And then, he said the words that would forever be etched in my mind. “Sophie will understand.”

Sophie will understand. Said with the iron-clad assurance of an alpha. Like it was the only possible outcome. Sophie would understand because she had to. Sophie always did what she was told. Because I had no choice in the matter. Mating with him meant submission to his will. Like hell I would understand.

Chanelle’s laughter dripped with sarcasm. “Uh huh. Humans don’t seem to have a great track record of being subservient. Especially ones of African descent.” She cackled. “You know what would be the icing on the cake? If the mating link manifested between the two of you. Your Thracian heritage will make you crazy. And when she inevitably puts herself in danger, you’ll lose your