4
NAOMI
I looked down from the window, and instantly went dizzy.
The bathroom window was about eight floors down. How was I going to make such a jump without damaging a vital organ or part of my body?
When the door opened again, I was still accessing my escape options and almost fell down from the window in a bid to pretend I wasn't doing so.
"My goodness, Naomi!"
Agnes, the head of affairs raced towards me, taking me in her arms. Her eyes were wide with horror, and her lips trembled with a tremor that I knew only fear could produce.
"I'm alright. You don't have to hold me."
When she left me, she eyed me coldly, as if in disbelief that I had actually tried to escape.
"What?"
I asked her, indulging in what was starting to look like a stare down competition.
"You were by the window, my lady….Naomi." She corrected herself mid sentence, then shook her head again in disbelief. "Do you have an idea of what happens to me if you escape?"
I didn't reply, choosing to lower my eyes instead.
"Alpha Lockwood never forgets. And if there's anything he hates amongst his workers, it's inefficiency. He will have me beaten and thrown to his dogs."
I stared at her, somewhat shocked by the brutality of her words.
This was the second person that was talking about dogs in regards to Alpha Lockwood. Did he really have dogs that ate human flesh?
"Dogs?"
"Yes. You heard right. Alpha Lockwood has a pack of hounds that listen to him only. And these dogs will gladly tear at your flesh at their master's command."
As a princess and the first blood of my father's pack, I wasn't used to apologizing, but I reminded myself that I was very far away from home. There was no princess treatment here, in such a devilish place.
"I'm sorry…"
"Oh, it's fine. Just start bathing already. I'll wait for you outside." She began to move, then stopped, turning to look at me with scrutiny.
"Promise me you won't try to escape please. Jumping from such heights is death, Naomi. Please, promise me."
I scratched the back of my neck before replying, somewhat embarrassed by my lack of awareness.
"I promise."
I shook my head when she left and I finally began to bathe. That ruled out my first escape plan. There had to be another way.
*
"Come, young woman. The Alpha is in the throne room and would like to see you now."
It was the captain. When he wasn't with a gun, he seemed like a normal man, a less terrifying person. His beard and his baldness was what made him terrifying when he was holding a gun.
But now, dressed in shorts and a casual t-shirt, he looked like a regular man I would see on the streets.
Agnes had done her part.
She had dressed me in a better gown because mine had been soiled by dirt from the truck. It was a blue, midnight gown that grazed my ankles.
For a brief moment I felt nothing but the hot flash of anger and guilt as I thought about how I was all dressed whilst my parents and the pack I had grown up in was in shambles.
"Come on, we don't have all day."
I stood from the chair I had been sitting, glancing at Agnes, whose eyes hadn't left me for a second. She nodded at me, as if giving her blessing for me to follow the captain. I looked away, too angry to care about her kindness.
The Lockwood throne room was beautiful.
There were three chairs in the room, which was elevated to serve as a throne. On the biggest chair which had shiny diamonds was Alpha Lockwood, the same man who had snatched me from my parents.
He smiled as soon as he saw me, then turned to grin at the woman who sat next to him.
"Isn't she beautiful, Cecelia? Just look at her!"
From the crown on the head of the beautifully dressed woman next to him, things fell into place. She was queen Cecilia, the woman whom most people had said was the key to his victories and immense wealth.
He turned to me, then clapped.
"Naomi, you are a beauty to look at, I have to admit! I don't regret bringing you down to this palace. Not one bit."
He glared at me for a moment, as if he had just remembered something he had forgotten.
"I am so blinded by your beauty that I forget that you haven't bowed before me, young woman."
The Captain immediately stepped into place beside me, and yanked my arm, his brows furrowed.
"Bow before the Alpha. Now."
I did as he instructed, my heart burning with rage.
"Good, good."
He came down from the throne slowly, his eyes lighting up as he approached me. His hand once again went underneath my chin as he inspected my face.
When he left me, he went backwards, as if he was admiring something he had just created.
"Do you know I offered your father the choice of ruling with me if he agreed to give up his claim on the throne and join me against the other leaders of the pack? But as usual, he was proud. That is what will be the end of your father, his pride. He preferred to go to war with me than work with me."
I stared at him, my fists clenching and unclenching uncontrollably, the urge to slam it into his mouth and shut him up increasing by the minute.
"That's sad, the way things had to end. Well, sad for you, maybe. But not sad for me. Because you're going to be warming my bed tonight."
I nearly fell from the shock waves his words slammed into me.
I stared at Queen Cecilia in disbelief, wondering if she was going to just sit there while her husband took another woman to his bed.
But she looked at me, her eyes unwelcoming, not a single twinge of emotion on her face.
"What's going on here?"
I turned toward the new voice that was joining the conversation.
And at that moment, my heart seemed to stop totally because I was looking at the most handsome man I had ever seen.
It was Alan Lockwood, the first son and first blood of Alpha Lockwood. He had his father's eyes, but his were kinder. I turned away, knowing that I couldn't look at any Lockwood in a different light because I was supposed to hate them forever.