Chapter 238
A second after the attack, Alice, mortified at the sight of blood, came back to herself and stumbled backwards. One of Julian’s older female family members caught her. Alice turned into her, frightened
and hiding her face.
“What the fuck?! ” Tony shouted. “Get that little shit away from me! Look what she did p>
At the same time, Julian rushed forward, bodily placing himself between Tony and Alice. “Don’t touch my daughter!” he roared, his voice bellowing with some of the fury of the wolf within him.
“She’s the one who attacked me!” Tony said.
I hurried forward too, when the shock of the moment wore off, moving straight to Alice. She peaked over and saw me, and then dashed over to me, crying, “Mommy p>
The older family member let Alice go at once, likely recognizing that the frightened little girl needed her
mother.
This kind of thing had happened before, but not since Alice got her necklace. That she lashed out, shifting enough to hurt someone, told me that her necklace was much weaker than it had been before. Since Chase had broken it and it had been restrung, I knew it wasn’t as effective as it had once been, but I didn’t realize it was as weak as this, to allow for this kind of thing to happen here.
The two men continued shouting at each other, with other members of the family getting involved now, making a cacophony of angry voices.
As Alice and I had gone through this before, when she didn’t have a necklace to help her, I knew that the noise would only make things worse. Alice needed somewhere calm and quiet to help refocus.
Lifting her sobbing form up into my arms, I hurried, carrying her away and into one of the empty patient rooms. I closed the door behind us before leading her one of the beds. Gently, I placed her down and then
⚫ examined her for wounds.
Her fingers were bloody, and I didn’t know if it was from Tony or herself, when her skin had torn to make
room for the claws.
“I’m going to get a wet paper towel,” I said, signaling my every move. “The sink is right there p>
After Alice nodded, I stood and walked over to the sink in the corner of the room. I wet a paper towel then returned to Alice’s side. Gently, I cleaned off the blood. Underneath, I saw no sign of any wounds, which
was a relief.
The one and seemingly only benefit of the early manifestation of Alice’s wolf was the ability to quickly heal. I was grateful for it now, even as I cursed the wolf that haunted her into doing these things to begin
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Chapter 239
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with.
It was normal for a child to lose their temper. She was young, still trying to sort out her boundaries and her emotions. She didn’t have the experience to know how to control herself. That would come in time.
As Alice’s own shock wore off, she said, “I didn’t mean to hurt him, Mommy.” Her hands were shaking so I
held them both in mine.
“I know you didn’t, honey,” I said. “It was an accident, that’s all. He’s a wolf, too, so he’ll heal fast enough p>
“I keep doing these things… Hurting people p>
The smallness of her voice broke my heart.
“It’s not your fault,” I said, trying to comfort her, but she aggressively shook her head.
“I got mad and hurt him, ” she said. “I did that p>
“It was your wolf,” I said.
“But I did it, Mommy. Me p>
Alice pulled her hands away from mine and touched her necklace. We both looked down at it. Just
looking at it, with the way it seemed less impressive than it had when I had first seen it, I knew the
power within was dimming.
And I knew it would only get worse.
Julian’s POV
I was going to tear Tony’s throat out. That seemed like the only next logical step to my rage–filled mind.
After all, not only had this vile man pushed my little girl, then he shouted at her.
Yes, in between those two things, Alice had accidentally shifted and tore at Tony’s arm, but it had been
barely a scratch, really. If Tony had spent more time training for the fights he should be taking part in to
.defend his pack, and less time pampered in his places of luxury, he would be able to more easily shrug off
a wound like that.
Instead, he was acting as if Alice had tried to rip his arm off.
If he wanted to really know what that felt like, I would be happy to show him.
“You didn’t warn us your brat was feral,” Tony growled. “ If you had done what you were supposed to and married a woman of good breeding, maybe you wouldn’t have a child that was so wild p>
“Keep talking,” I said in response, my voice low. Inside my wolf through itself against the walls of my mind, begging to take control. “See where it gets you p>
“Both of you, stop this,” said Uncle Peter, but Tony and I both ignored him.
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“ You should have married Olivia,” Tony said. “Then we wouldn’t be in this mess at all p>
“ Olivia?” I repeated with disgust. The absurdity of this claim drew my attention away from my anger for a moment. “Have you had your head in the sand, cousin? Do you have any idea what that woman did
behind my back p>
“ You accused her of trying to kill Amber, but we don’t know that for fact,” Tony said.
I growled in response to that, but that wasn’t what I was talking about.
“Olivia could not be faithful if her life depended on it,” I said. “ If I had married her, she would have made a
mockery of the entire family and the Luna title as a whole. Those affairs would have made themselves
public eventually, as well as her inability to have children because of it p>
Some of my family gasped. Had they truly not known this? Did they not read the papers? Or had they
purposefully chosen to keep their heads in the sand?
“And then, yes, in her jealousy, she tried to have Amber killed. She also sent Chase after Alice, removing
the necklace that protects her from her wolf, which has already appeared at such a young age, a terrible
medical condition, that forced her to shift. That necklace is now damaged because of that action, which
was what caused her to lash out p>
“You have no proof,” Tony said.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Why are you defending her so hard p>
He scoffed. “We used to be friends with her when we were kids. Have you so easily forgotten those days?
You really believe she changed so much from then to now? ”
“I know she did,” I said. “I had seen it myself, and been a victim of it. She is not the same girl she used to
be, Tony. ”
In a way, his words eased some of the anger within me. We had all been friends since we were young.
Without having seen Olivia’s wickedness for himself, Tony wanted to believe that she was still that
But she wasn’t. At all.
“Actually,” Penny said suddenly. “That woman we hired to be Olivia… Did anyone else think she was a little too similar p>
I glanced at Penny, surprised that she had seen it too. Some other members of the family nodded.
“Honestly,” Penny continued. “I thought that was Olivia p>
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