CHAPTER 10: CHAPTER 10 DANGEROUS COMBINATION

KIERAN’S POV

"No, Celeste, thumb over knuckle," Ethan reiterated for the fifth time, adjusting his sister’s fist. "If you punch like that, you’ll break your fingers."

Celeste huffed, her lips forming into a pout. "Whatever, I still don’t know why I even have to do this."

Ethan exhaled and exchanged a mildly exasperated look with me. "We’ve been over this before. With all the attacks on the pack, you have to get stronger. I indulged you in the past when you refused to train, but not anymore. We even came here to train in neutral territory so you wouldn’t feel inferior to other pack members."

Celeste rolled her eyes. "I don’t care. Training sucks. And I have you two strong Alphas to protect me anyway."

"Babe," I said, stepping forward. "You know Ethan and I will always protect you, but it’s good for you to at least be able to hold your own in the event of the worst-case scenario."

She sighed and stepped towards me. "But you mean it, right?" She looked up at me with her gorgeous blue eyes. "You’ll always be there to protect me?"

I kissed her hair. She’d come back to me, and I’d be damned if I ever let anything happen to her. "Always."

"Okay, okay," Ethan clapped his hands, drawing our attention back to him. "If we can just get your stance right, Celeste, we can move on. We can’t spend all day here."

"Right." She held up a fist, the thumb tucked inside her palm. "Like this?"

Ethan clenched his jaw, and I pressed my mouth together to stifle my amusement.

I moved across the room and leaned against the glass door dividing the training rooms.

"Stop, stop!"

My ears pricked, and I turned toward the glass door. The female voice on the other side of the glass door sounded familiar.

Whoever was in the adjoining training room had been going hard at it since we arrived, but this was the first time I heard a voice.

I heard a muffled male voice speak. The reply from the female was equal parts sharp and exhausted.

I knew the strangers next door were none of my business, but for some reason, I couldn’t pull my attention away.

The female voice sounded so, so familiar.

"At least Sera’s lucky," Celeste grumbled as Ethan corrected her stance. "Nobody’s ever going to force a wolfless werewolf to train."

My eyes widened as everything clicked into place. It couldn’t possibly be, but...

I slid the glass door open, and—rage, potent unlike anything I’d ever felt before, slammed into me with staggering force.

Sera was lying spread-eagled on her back, and above her, his head so close to hers, like he was about to kiss her, was a stranger. No, not a stranger—the man who had saved her at Edward’s funeral.

"What the fuck!" The words tore out of me before I even registered them.

Sera immediately shot up, her head bumping into the man’s nose.

"Ow!"

He cupped her face, and impossibly, the rage doubled. They were both drenched in sweat, and their scents mingled in the air. Ashar growled, and I felt every muscle in my body tense.

Celeste turned to me, and her eyes widened with shock.

The bastard’s hand was still cupping her face, and I had the sudden, jarring urge to rip his heart out.

I had no idea why I was feeling this way, especially when the love of my life was a mere two feet away.

Sera’s shocked expression quickly faded, replaced with that chilly countenance she’d picked up since the funeral that was really starting to piss me off.

"Kie?" Celeste’s hand on my back should have loosened the tension in my muscles, but instead, they tightened even more.

"What’s wro—"

I didn’t turn to her, but I saw in Sera’s face the moment Celeste noticed her.

The man stood, finally taking his hand off Sera’s face. But immediately, he held a hand out to her, which she took without hesitation, turning her gaze away from us. I ground my teeth hard as he pulled her up.

"Thanks," she smiled at him.

"Why are both of you—" Ethan, too, stopped in his tracks when he saw his other sister.

Sera’s sigh was unbothered, mildly annoyed, as if a bunch of neighborhood dogs had come skipping into her manicured lawn.

"I’m going to hit the showers," she said to the man, ignoring all of us altogether.

He braced his hand on her arm, and I had to grip the edge of the glass door to stop myself from flying across the room and ripping his hand off her and then off his body.

"Is that what we’re doing now?" Ethan’s cutting voice stalled their steps. "You’re not even going to spare your family a greeting?"

Sera turned back to us with a sardonic laugh. "Family?" She pointed to me, and for some reason, my breath hitched. "He’s not my family anymore." Her finger slid from me and waggled between Celeste and Ethan. "And you two never really were to begin with."

Celeste bristled. "You absolutely have no grounds to be so rude all the damn time."

"Can it, princess," Sera snapped back without missing a beat. "I just went through physical torture; I don’t need the mental torture of listening to you talk."

Celeste choked back a shocked gasp, and her tightened grip on the back of my shirt snapped me out of my momentary shock. Who was this stranger, and what had she done with the meek, demure Seraphina I’d been married to for ten years?

"Don’t talk to her that way," I growled, stepping forward, blocking Celeste from Sera’s view.

Sera scoffed and took a step forward. "Or what?"

My eyebrow rose to my hairline. Was she... issuing a challenge? Who was this?

The man reached out and grabbed Sera’s hand. "Hey," he said in a calm voice. "Let’s all just—"

"Stay out of this," I growled, glaring at their joined hands. "This is a family affair. No one needs you meddling—whoever the fuck you are."

The man chuckled and took a step forward, standing next to Sera. "I’m Alpha Lucian Reed of Shadowveil pack and the President of the organization that owns this building we’re standing in."

I finally had an identity for this meddlesome stranger, and I didn’t like it one bit. But if he thought his credentials were going to make me cower, he had another thing coming. Every male in here was a fucking Alpha.

"And like Sera said," he continued, "none of you are truly her family. She belongs to none of you. In fact, we might find that down the road, I become more like family to her than any of you."

My brain short-circuited, not quite processing what he just said. Sera, too, looked at him, her eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

He smiled at her and brought her hand to his lips. "I plan to court her," he announced to the room, but his gaze was trained on her. "So I better start protecting her interests now."

Okay, I was wrong earlier. This right now was the most rage I’d ever felt in my life.

Lucian Reed’s declaration stunned everyone into silence, including Sera. And with a smirk, he turned around and walked out, pulling her along with him.

The soft thud of the door of their training room seemed to vibrate through me.

"What the fuck?" Celeste whispered.

She leaned into me, her hand rubbing up and down my chest. "Can you believe them? What kind of stunt is she trying to pull?"

But I wasn’t hearing her, not really.

All I could see as I stared at the door was Lucian and Sera’s intertwined hands. All I could feel was that confusing rage coursing through my blood.

I remembered what Gavin, my best friend and Beta, had said when I confided in him about Sera’s coldness and my confusing reaction to her withdrawal and finding Lucian at her place last week.

"She’ll always be the mother of your child, and it’s natural to care for her in that regard," he’d said. "But be careful not to jeopardize your second chance with Celeste. Remember, she’s who you really want."

I knew Gavin spoke sense, but the way I was feeling didn’t seem to follow that logic.

"Come on," Ethan mumbled. "Let’s get back to it."

I didn’t move when Celeste tugged me back.

"Kie?"

"I’ll be right back."

My feet were moving before I turned to see their reactions.

Maybe the way I was feeling wasn’t completely illogical, I reasoned as I stepped out of the training room and headed toward the locker room. We didn’t know this Lucian from anywhere, and Sera needed to be cautious of him.

I was only seeking her out to warn her. She was, after all, the mother of my son. If anything were to happen to her, it would greatly affect Daniel.

Sera spun with a gasp when I opened the door of the locker room. She was the only one in the room, standing before an open locker. Her shirt was off, bundled in her hands, revealing a spandex sports bra that pushed her cleavage out.

I froze like I’d slammed into a wall.

There was something seriously, seriously wrong with me. Seraphina and I had had sex before. I had needs, and I loathed the idea of marital infidelity—it was why I divorced Sera before courting Celeste again.

I’d seen her naked tits before, but now... Watching her cleavage rise and fall as her chest heaved and her skin glistened with sweat—it was like I was seeing it all for the first time, and the effect it had on me was as alarming as it was confusing.

"You can’t date him." The words came out of my mouth before I could consider how they made me sound—jealous, whiny, possessive.

Sera frowned for a moment; then, she let out a breathy laugh that echoed in the empty locker room.

She held up her left hand. The bare part of her finger where her wedding band had rested for ten years was noticeably lighter than the rest of her skin.

"Is there a divorce ring I can wear to remind you that you have absolutely no claim over me, and I can date whoever I want?" she asked.

’No,’ Ashar growled possessively. ’Mine.’

The dangerous combination of anger, lust, and possessiveness pushed my body forward, and the next thing I knew, I had Sera pinned to the locker behind her.

She gasped, her eyes widening as I leaned down, my eyes trained on her lips.

Mine.