Chapter 42. Pain and Power

GRAYSON

“You’re a Mortar?” I said.

Adalee smiled brightly and took a step back. “Congrats, Alpha,” she said. Then the smile suddenly fell from her face. “You’re not as stupid as you look.”

That was the final straw. No pack member of mine would speak to me like that—vampire or not. I was her alpha!

I lurched the top half of my body forward, planning on latching my jaw onto her neck and not releasing it until she begged for mercy. But right as I moved—before I could even touch her—she stopped me with a single word:

“Pain.”

My body immediately fell to the forest floor as an anguishing pain shot through it. I yelled out, clutching at my chest and head, trying to find any sort of relief. It felt as if each bone in my body was breaking while thousands of knives were stabbing into me.

I was sure I was going to die. This was what it had to feel like.

“Stop,” Adalee’s voice said.

The pain suddenly stopped. I gasped and groaned as air fina