Come Here, Kitten (God of War Book 1), стр. 43
Elijah would not die.
When I made it inside, I shut and locked the door, taking out the key from the knob and putting it into my pocket. This way, nobody would be able to get in to stop me from doing whatever I had to do to get Elijah out of the dungeon.
I walked down the cold stone steps and into the dimly lit, rusty cells. It reeked of blood and rotting corpses and—I scrunched up my nose—shit. And while the smell was overwhelming, I followed Elijah’s scent.
In the back of the prison, Ares stood menacingly over Elijah’s body, blood dripping from his fingers. When I saw the silver chains clasped around Elijah’s wrist and neck, both of his eyes swollen shut, blood spewing from open wounds on his abdomen, I screamed for my life, for Elijah, for Jeremy.
Ares didn’t flinch, didn’t move, didn’t even react to my shouting, so I tried to find the one person who would.
“Mars,” I whispered.
Ares gazed at me, eyes widening in fury, and tried to grab my wrist, but I pushed him away and collapsed onto the ground with Elijah.
“What—what did you do to him?” I took Elijah’s head in my lap, brushing the hair out of his face. I could barely recognize him. “Wh—”
“Mars is gone, Kitten.” He grabbed my wrist and pulled me off the ground, holding me there like he was about to clasp a silver chain on me too.
I tried not to be intimidated by him. Mars was in there somewhere. He needed to be. He needed to see me, to see how much of a mess I was, to love me for my secret.
“You will stop this now, Mars,” I said. “Let me clean Elijah up. I can talk to him about the stone. I can see if he knows where it is.”
“No.” Ares curled a hand around my throat and forced me to look up at him. “Why do you want to protect him? What is your fascination with a man who isn’t your mate?”
“Ares …” I gently grasped his wrist, hoping that it would calm him down.
When I told him about the stone, I didn’t want him to be angry. Maybe I could talk some sense into him and convince him not to hurt me. His mate. His only mate.
“Answer me, Aurora!” He seethed, eyes blazing gold.
“He-he—”
“Do you like him?” he asked. “Does my mate like another wolf and not me?”
“Ares, what are you—”
“It’s a simple yes or no answer. Don’t complicate it.”
“Don’t talk down to me,” I said, pushing him away.
He stumbled back for the briefest moment, and I took the chance to fall back onto the ground with Elijah and cradle him in my arms. No, I didn’t like Elijah or Tony or any other guy for that matter.
For some stupid, crazy reason, I liked Ares and Mars … but … they wouldn’t like me.
Ares growled, gazing down at Elijah’s head in my lap, and yanked me up again. This time, harder. He wrapped a hand around my throat and pushed me all the way to the cold cement wall. “You’re mine, Aurora.”
I squirmed against him, trying to push him away, but he held me tighter to him, his hand closing around my throat.
“Only mine,” he said with more authority.
My heart raced in my chest as I watched his canines lengthen from under his lips.
“And you’ll always be mine.”
Then, he pushed my head to the side and sank his canines deep into my neck.
Chapter 23
Aurora
My whole body shook with pleasure, my eyes rolling back in my head. I could feel his canines inside of me, sliding deeper and deeper into my flesh as he claimed me as his mate. My wolf let out a lascivious purr, and I dug my fingers into his shoulders.
He had marked me. My mate had just marked me.
Though my wolf loved every single second of it, I didn’t. Mars wasn’t the one to mark me like he’d wanted to, like he had told me the other night. Ares had marked me out of pure possessiveness and jealousy. Taking everything away from Mars.
I slammed my hands into his chest, but my fingers curled into his muscles instead of pushing him away from me. He relaxed under my touch, his whole body slouching forward. A satisfied moan escaped his mouth, his breath warming my neck.
When he pulled his teeth out of me, he was back as Mars. Not angry Ares. Not that terrifying god of war. Just plain old Mars. My Mars.
He gazed longingly at me and then at my neck, and his eyes widened. “Oh my Goddess.” He gently held my face, staring at my mark as if he had no recollection of actually doing it. “You’re marked. I … Ares marked you.”
Just like that, Ares was gone. But I knew that with one wrong move, Ares would appear again, and this time, since he had claimed me, he’d think that I would willingly submit to him.
Mars’s lips quivered, and I swore that if he wasn’t holding my face, he would’ve fallen to the ground. “I-I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” he said as if he was lost for words.
He searched my face for something, and I tried to hold back the tears.
Tears that Ares had taken my moment from me. Tears that Ares was going to kill me.
Elijah grunted and turned onto his side on the cold cement.
Mars’s eyes flashed gold. “I’m so s-s—” He grasped my face harder, shaking his head and trying to stay in control of Ares. “I didn’t me-me-mean to,” he stuttered.
Though he had just marked me, my heart hurt for him. Mars was fighting that innate evil inside of him. He was fighting a demon that he would lose against time and time again. He was fighting Ares—the