99 Times for Alpha’s Bestie novel Chapter 73

Before I could blink, Lucien seized my collar, yanking me like a sack of grain toward the Grizzly bear’s cage.

I sweet lump of brown fur looked inviting to reach out and touch until the illusion shattered, and the giant lump of fur stirred awake, and an angry, hungry Grizzly bear rose to his feet.

Lucien kept it as a means of torture for rogues who crossed the territory line.

The enclosure was massive; it gave rogues injected with wolfsbane the illusion that they could escape the gigantic bear’s clutches, but no one ever managed to get back out. It also didn’t help that the Bear had silver-dipped claws, meant to permanently weaken the wolf within entirely, if not kill it.

Lucien suddenly wrenched an omega’s wrist, forcing the man’s hand into the cage without mercy.

“Please, no, Alpha. Please, have mercy, Please!” The omega’s face turned ghostly.

Next thing I knew, I was forced to stand there in horror and watch as the bear clamped its massive jaws down onto the omega’s hand with brutal precision.

The poor omega screamed in agony, but the bear did not relent. It continued to tug the omega’s arm through the cage bars, granting it more flesh to take hold of.

“Alpha Thorne, stop! The Crown of Thorne pack can’t bear another death!” Bart’s face turned ashen, his knees hitting the ground with a thud as he clung to Lucien’s leg.

A warrior assigned as the bear keeper charged in, jabbing at the beast back with a pole.

The omega’s hand tore free, flesh hanging in tatters, bone glinting obscenely beneath the blood.

“Move! Bandage him now!” Bart roared.

The courtyard had become a scene of pandemonium. Omega’s prostrated themselves, foreheads pounding the earth like mortars, voices trembling. Submission was collective by all around Lucien and me.

Is this who he’s truly become?

My face drained of colour.

Lucien’s blade-sharp gaze pinned me. He wasn’t finished.

He gripped my neck, forcing my face toward the cage that was still stained with the omega’s blood, and the bear sat close by, cleaning its face.

“Still want back into the Crown of Thornes pack? Then, it is time to cleanse your sins in there.” He nodded toward the cage, “My pets make excellent baptismal attendants. If you survive, I’ll swear you back into the pack without question. Clean slate. How about that, Claire?”

Ice slithered down my spine.

I choked down my terror, snapping my gaze up to meet his.

“Lucien,” I bit out, “You’re really ordering this? Is this what you really want?”

His grip slackened slightly. A scoff. “Try me, Claire. You actually think I give a damn what happens to you inside this cage?”

I heard almost a chuffing sound vibrate under the bear’s lips, as if the bear was warning me not to come inside and challenge fate.

I could smell the putrid stench of death from the area. How did I miss it earlier?

“If jumping in is what you truly want, then so be it. We once made a promise always to make the other happy, and if this makes you happy, Lucien, then I’ll do it. Unlike some, I don’t break my promises.”

A flicker of surprise flashed in Lucien’s eyes before being smothered by deeper scorn. “Good. Then-”

Before he could finish, a sharp pain lanced through his wrist, causing his grip to loosen instinctively.

The distraction of Lucien looking down at his empty hold gave me the time needed to open the unlocked cage door and step inside with the Grizzly bear.

Lucien froze, horror locking his limbs. His hand still hung midair, now branded with twin arcs of bloody teeth marks.

His expression read that he couldn’t believe I actually walked into a cage that terrifies all those who come near it.

“Have you lost your damn mind?” he roared.

Then came the nightmare.

The lurking bear, scenting fresh prey, shot through the wide-open hunting area like a torpedo, jaws gaping, teeth bared, charging straight for me.

Once inside the cage, you realize how confining it truly is.

Panting and shaking as I evaded the swing of the hungry bear, I managed a broken smirk.

“Lucien, does this make you happy now? You want me dead, don’t you? How about I put on a show for your enjoyment, Lucien? After all, you’ve become quite the monster, haven’t you?”

“Are you f*****g insane! A goddamn lunatic, get out of there, Claire!” Lucien’s vision blurred with rage and something else. I wanted to believe it was a terror so visceral it burned through him.

The bear was upon me.

Without a second thought, he yanked the lock off the door and charged in after me.

Time froze.

The omegas watching this play out stood petrified, as if turned to stone.

“Move! NOW! Save them, save them!” Bart’s belated scream shattered the silence.

Chaos erupted. The Omegas scrambled to the entrance of the cage, holding poles and aiming their tranquillizer guns at anything within reach that would slow the bear down.

Angered by the darts piercing its skin, the bear finally lunged. The area around me was frozen, moving in slow motion, the bear’s fangs glinting like knives.

“You absolute madwoman!” Lucien roared, throwing himself between me and the snapping jaws. “It was a goddamn joke! How dare you take me seriously?!”

A bear’s sharp claws cut into my thigh until Lucien yanked me back at the last millisecond.

“You didn’t sound like you were joking earlier. Doesn’t this make you happy, Lucien?” My lips twitched upward weakly.

“For f**k’s sake-!” Lucien’s curse dissolved into a pained groan.

The sound of fabric and flesh tearing. A bear’s jaws clamped onto Lucien’s abdomen, fangs shredding through muscle.

Before I could think, I lunged in front of him, right arm raised as a human shield. forearm.

Attention turned from the slowly healing Lucien on the ground, and the beast’s jaws crushed my White-hot agony, searing and all-consuming, ripped through my nerves. My scream shattered the air.

“Claire!” Lucien’s pupils dilated violently. With bare fists, he mustered every shred of strength and smashed the Grizzly bear in the nose, stunning the feral beast.

The beast recoiled with a furious growl, finally releasing its grip.

At the cage entrance, the Omegas jabbed with poles, fired tranquillizers, dove into the fray, a desperate battle stretching eternally before the bear collapsed into a deep drug-induced sleep.

When they finally dragged me and Lucien out of the cage, we were both drenched in one another’s blood.

Lucien’s wound, though long, wasn’t deep. His wolf quickly healed them.

But my arm was mutilated beyond recognition, so horrific it drew gasps from bystanders.

My vision swam as I crumpled against Lucien’s chest, utterly spent.

“By the Goddess… you stupid, stupid girl! Why must you push so hard?” Lucien’s entire body went rigid with shock.

My teeth chattered from the agony, every shallow breath sending white-hot pain lancing through my body. My body was slipping into shock. As I drifted in and out of awareness, my trembling fingers instinctively rose to smooth the deep crease between Lucien’s eyebrows.

“Lucien- I guess I’ll be revisiting the hospital. That place really can’t get enough of me—”

My freezing fingers seemed to trigger something primal, crashing through Lucien’s defences.

Without hesitation, he pulled me tight against his chest and scooped me up in his arms, his voice raw with panic as he roared.

“CAR! NOW!”

The omegas scattered like leaves in a storm, clearing a frantic path as he charged forward toward the waiting vehicle.