Sold To The Three Alphas Who Hate Me

Ashley

“Down, beta. I don’t want anything to mark that pretty face,” the man with the clipboard cautioned him. “Now she has a reputation for being feisty. The crowd is gonna like that. You got her, Sylvester?”

A man grunted behind me, and my dress was once again hiked to my armpits. “No bite marks. No stretch marks. You say she’s a virgin?”

“Pure as the day she was born.”

“We’ll start her at three thousand. You get sixty percent of what she goes for. Sylvester, turn her around.”

Sylvester turned me as the man with the clipboard retrieved a hot poker from the fire pit.

I tried to fight, but it was useless. The man swept my hair up, and torturous pain seared in the back of my neck as I was branded. A hand wrapped around my mouth as I screamed, and when I was put back on my feet, all my fight was gone.

I swayed, not even sure I could walk. The man tossed the brand back in the fire, and I whimpered.

“Number six,” he bellowed, and Sylvester pulled me toward the other women. In shock, I stared as he looped a thick, coarse rope around my wrist and tied me to a post.

The sun had risen slightly, but I had no idea how much time had passed. What started as a small group in front of the stage grew larger and larger until the first girl walked up. Then the second and the third. Each of them was bid on before they were handed to their winners.

When I reached the stage, I thrust my chin forward and glared at the crowd. Maybe if I seemed unlikable and difficult, nobody would want me.

“Alphas, do we have a special treat for you! Number six may be unschooled, but she is also unspoiled,” the speaker began.

“Save it,” a voice boomed. “Ten thousand.”

The audience fell silent, and I closed my eyes in horror.

“Ten thousand, going once. Going twice. Sold.”

Kieran

Six Months Later

“Gurrzly!” Betty screamed. “Want Gurrzly!”

Behind me, Lucien muttered something under his breath. We all loved Betty, but the toddler phase was challenging, to say the least.

When we reached the clearing, Conrad had immediately trotted off to find wood for a fire, leaving Lucien and me with Betty.

“I know, Betty, but we couldn’t find Gurrzly,” I said again, striving to find some patience. “But we got you a friend for Gurrzly when we do find him.”

The stupid brown teddy bear was never far from her, but it had disappeared right before we took this trip. Three alphas, experts in tracking, hadn’t been able to find it, and now we had a two-year-old who would spend most of our annual camping trip screaming about her teddy bear even though we’d gotten her a new pink one.

“Bears not pink!” she shouted, putting her hands on her hips and glaring at me.

Fuck me. Lucien let out a strangled groan, and I clenched my teeth. This was our first attempt to take Betty on a trip away from the hotel, and frankly, I was rethinking that decision.

These first few hours were not going well.

“I know bears in the wild aren’t pink, but your bear can be pink.” I looked her over and frowned. “Betty, where is your backpack?”

“Gurrzly has it.”

I’d seen her backpack. It was yellow with pink flowers all over it. She’d cried for days when she first saw it on the computer and screamed with delight when I finally bought it for her. She wore it every day, and I’d packed some of her essentials into it last night: a juice bottle, her toy phone, a notebook, and, most importantly, a GPS tracker.

“Betty, it can’t be with Gurrzly. I saw it this morning.”

She blinked innocent eyes at me. “Gurrzly took it.”

So she’d given her backpack to her stuffed bear and managed to hide both so well that we couldn’t find them. This meant that she’d known where her stuffed animal was all along, and it also meant that she no longer had a GPS tracker.

I turned to Lucien. “This was a mistake. We’re going back now.”

“No, we aren’t. The therapist said Betty needs to start spending time in the woods,” Lucien reminded me.

Fucking therapist, only she wasn’t just a fucking therapist—she was a godsend. Betty was an orphan and the only beta in our pack, and we had no idea what we were doing trying to raise her.

“We have plenty of woods around the hotel."

“Which I pointed out before you planned this excursion,” he muttered. “You were the one who said we had to leave the territory. You did extensive research into this park. It’s neutral territory. We’re safe. We’re alone. And it’s okay that she doesn’t have her backpack. We’ll keep an eye on her. We’re not going to lose her.”

“We can’t even find a teddy bear that a two-year-old hid,” I snarled.

“It’s in your closet,” Betty informed me.

I glared at Lucien, and his lips quirked in a smile. Damn it, was he enjoying this? “I’m going to kill you.”

“Betty.” Lucien bent down and swooped her up. “It sounds like Gurrzly went camping with your backpack, and this pink bear is all alone. She doesn’t even have a name.”

After a moment, Betty reached out for the bear, and I handed it to her. I held my breath as she studied it.

“Candy,” she announced. “This is Candy. She camp with us.”

Great. One crisis averted. I looked at Lucien. “You did pack her suitcase, didn’t you?”

“Yes, I did. Would you relax? We’ll have to put up some tents unless you just want to be wolves the whole time. Betty might like that."

We were trying to encourage a way to bring her wolf out, but it might be years before we saw it. The therapist right—most shifter children spent as much time outdoors as possible, even as infants. It helped them understand that the outside world was their home, so when their wolf did come out, they were comfortable running freely.

Pups in the house were disastrous, but some pups were too afraid to go outside.

“Let’s stick to the plan. Betty, can you and Candy help us set up our tents?”

A scream pierced the air, and my wolf surged to the surface. Lucien swept Betty up in his arms, and we turned.

“I’m on it,” Conrad said through the bond. A few minutes later, his fury came through. “Dead woman. Killer shifter. He’s on the run. I’m on it.”

“Catch him. We’ll get the woman.” Already, I was running through protocol in my head.

We weren’t on anyone’s territory, which meant there was no alpha in charge to deal with the killer, and we’d need to inform the woman’s alpha of her death. It was hard to identify the alpha of a dead woman, so our best bet was to catch the killer and get the king involved.