by Jess Bryant
Unbelievable Faith
Book 2 in the Fated Mates Duet
Jess Bryant
Blue Lemon Press
Contents
Synopsis
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Epilogue
Bonus - Five Years Later
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also Available From Jess Bryant
Call Me, Irresistible
It Had To Be You
Unbelievable Faith
Fate can be cruel.
Luna DeLuca has lost everything except for her faith in herself. Kidnapped, tortured and threatened by a male that’s already killed half her family, she knows the only way to save the other half is by offering herself up to him. To save her sisters, she’s willing to do anything, even accept a claim from a male that isn’t her mate, a mark on her soul that will ruin her forever. But if that is what her family needs, what her pack needs, she’ll do it to save them all.
Fate can be twisted.
Michael Hudson thought his mission to save the neighboring Crescent pack was about helping out a friend. He thought it was about avenging an attack on his own. But the second he sets his eyes on the beautiful girl locked away in a dank basement he knows she’s why he was put on the face of this planet. She’s the reason he’s here. She’s everything. She’s his. His mate. His fate. His future. Only, she bears the scent of another and is nothing like what he imagined his fated mate to be.
But fate can also be kind.
As brave as she is, Luna’s wolf is submissive and submissive wolves aren’t meant to lead packs. They aren’t meant to be Queens. She knows that. So does Michael. But when he refuses to give up on her, refuses to walk away or back down, she begins to see why fate put them together. She softens him and he strengthens her and maybe, just maybe, if they believe enough in each other they can find their way to forever.
UNBELIEVABLE FAITH – BOOK 2 IN THE FATED MATES DUET
Copyright ©2018 by Jess Bryant.
Cover Art: K Creative Designs
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used factiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
For anyone that believes they were meant for something more… keep the faith.
Chapter 1
Every single person in the room was staring at her. Hell, how could they not? She knew she must be a sight. The princess of the Crescent pack brought to her knees. Brought lower even, because she’d been imprisoned, tortured and now, humiliated. She could feel the eyes of the others taking in every detail from her tangled, unwashed hair to the bruises that stained her wrists where the shackles she’d worn for what felt like eternity had cut into her. She felt dirty and unclean but she refused to bow her chin or lower her gaze.
Luna DeLuca still had her pride.
He’d tried to take that from her too. He’d tried to take it first with his cruel words and then with his threats and abuse. He’d taken everything else. Her family and friends, her home, her pack, he’d taken all of it away from her. He’d stripped her of her hope of rescue and even her will to live. He’d erased every chance for a happy future from her mind. But she refused to let him take her pride.
She would not bow. She would not cower. No matter what Maddox Clary did to her, she would not give him the satisfaction of breaking her.
He thought he had. She was giving him what he wanted after all. Her. She’d agreed to mate with him, to perform the ceremony and tie herself to the crazed, sociopath that had murdered her father, run off her brother and kidnapped her sisters. This ceremony had been what he wanted from her all along, to join with her royal blood and rule the pack. He needed her to soothe the fractures he’d caused when he overthrew her family for leadership and he was getting what he wanted. He thought he’d won.
She had held out as long as she could and she hadn’t given in easily. She’d accepted her imprisonment and put away any thoughts she may have had about escape. Binding herself to the man that had torn her family apart would ruin her, but it would keep her sisters alive and that was all that mattered. And no matter what it did to her, personally, to accept Maddox’s claim, she would deal with it with her chin high and her spine straight.
She wasn’t broken. She wasn’t destroyed. She was simply biding her time.
She would find a way out of this. Somehow, someway, she would find a way to avenge her parents. She would figure out how to free herself and her sisters from this awful, pitiful existence as prisoners and give them a better life, the life they deserved. Because she didn’t believe, she couldn’t believe, that this was all fate had in store for her.
She had faith that she was meant for more.
All her life, there were two things that kept her going, her family and her faith in the greater plan. In fate.
Maybe some people thought that was silly. Believing in something she couldn’t see. Believing that there was a higher power guiding her and a reason for everything that happened. Maybe for some people it was easier to think they were in control of their own life, their own choices, but as a born shifter, a werewolf, Luna had always known that she wasn’t.
Fate had a plan for her, a path she was destined to walk, and she believed.
Fate would provide her with a way to save her family. She was sure of it. Sometimes it just gave you the long road, or the hard road, to get there, and she knew all about that.
Luna had been born of one of the most powerful Alpha lines in shifter history. Her family had ruled the Crescent pack for generations. It had been passed down through her family without a single challenge to their leadership because they were strong, fierce but fair. Her siblings had all inherited the Alpha power that came with being DeLuca wolves.
But she hadn’t.
Luna had been born a Beta. A follower instead of a leader. And worse, her wolf wasn’t just weaker than her siblings, a worker instead of a fighter, her wolf was also submissive.
She was an anomaly. A wolf with royal blood but no Alpha power to reign. She was a princess in name only, a DeLuca that would never rule and never lead.
She’d come to terms with that. She’d learned to deal with the hand that fate had dealt her. So she wasn’t the strongest wolf in the pack? She compensated for it in every other way.
She’d trained beside her twin brother, Leo, since they were kids. She worked out with the Pack Enforcers to stay strong, flexible and alert. She’d enrolled in continuing education courses after high school, taking business classes on leadership so she could advise her father and brother when the time came. She’d learned to work with what fate had given her and she’d been content, happy even, with the life she had made for herself.
Only, a few months ago, everything she thought she knew about her future had changed.
Her youngest sister, Nova, had announced tha
t Luna would be a leader. Not in the Crescent pack but in another. Nova was a Seer, gifted with visions of the future, and she’d predicted that Luna would cross paths with her mate soon. Not a Crescent male but an Alpha nonetheless. She’d said Luna would help him lead his own pack and that they would be happy because it was a good match fate had given them. Nova had been sure that Luna would get her happily ever after with her very own prince charming, so much so that she’d told anyone who would listen about her prediction.
Luna had laughed it off. It was an absurd daydream of a little girl that wanted the best for her big sister. That was all. Luna couldn’t be the fated mate of an Alpha. She was submissive and a Pack Alpha needed a strong female at his side to help lead. Luna hadn’t taken the vision seriously for so much as a minute before dismissing it completely.
But Maddox had.
The handsome, charming wolf that had set his sights on her and spent ages trying to woo her to his side, had lost his damn mind when he heard she was fated to another. It hadn’t mattered that they both knew she wasn’t fated to him all along. They were both of age and the bond had never flickered between them, not once. It was why she’d turned down his advances again and again. His persistence had at first been flattering, then annoying and finally, as his mask of kindness and charm had fallen away, terrifying.
Maddox wanted her and he’d made it clear he would do whatever he had to in order to keep her, willingly or not.
It hadn’t occurred to her, at least not at first, that he was plotting more than just their mating. It should have. She wasn’t exactly a catch, royal DeLuca blood or no, being a submissive wolf. But that had never seemed to bother Maddox and it had taken her far too long to realize why.
He hadn’t wanted her despite her submissive wolf… he’d wanted her because of it.
He’d thought she would be an easy target. A submissive wolf he could easily sway with his Alpha power. She was supposed to have been his way in with the DeLuca family. God only knew what he’d had planned for her and her family if she’d agreed to mate with him then but she’d spent a lot of time thinking about how sneaky and stealthily he could’ve wormed his way in and hurt her father and brother after he threw her in a basement, handcuffed her to a wall with silver and set about destroying everyone and everything she loved.
Nova’s vision had changed everything. Maddox had known she wouldn’t agree to mate him. And he’d given up any and all plans to go about his coup under the radar.
Instead, he’d murdered her father in cold blood. Sure, he’d made it appear legal because of the challenge he’d issued to the reigning Pack Alpha but everyone knew her father had been ill. No self-respecting wolf challenged a Pack Alpha when he was weak but Maddox had and he’d won. He’d broken her father’s neck. He’d killed him while she screamed and cried and clawed to get free.
When the pack gathered around the fire to watch the challenge had begun to rumble about the way Maddox had seized power, he hadn’t hesitated. He’d ordered his allies to detain every one of her siblings and imprison anyone that spoke out against him. He’d initiated martial law with himself as judge, jury and executioner. She didn’t know how many of her loyal friends had been killed that night, or in the days and weeks since. All she knew for certain was that Maddox had her sisters, Maya and Nova, and she could only hope, pray, and believe that Leo had been strong enough, fast enough, to get off Crescent land before they trapped and killed him too.
She’d clung to that belief for months as Maddox held her captive. Clung to hope that Leo would come back for them even as she prayed he wouldn’t risk his own life for hers. Leo was the natural heir as the eldest male and born Alpha. Maddox would kill him on sight and she didn’t want that. She’d rather Leo run and find a new pack for himself, forget all about them, than die trying to save them. She’d thought that given enough time she could figure a way out of that basement and a way to save her sisters, but just last night Maddox had come downstairs and told her that her time was up.
Either Luna agreed to mate with him and help rebuild the Crescent pack he’d shattered with his cruel upheaval, or he would kill Maya and wait for Nova to come of age to claim her instead.
Just thinking about his kind of evil near her little sister, made Luna nauseous. Sweet, sheltered, hopeful Nova wouldn’t stand a chance against a monster like Maddox. The only reason he hadn’t hurt her already was because of her gift. A Seer was a powerful being in a pack and hurting Nova would destroy what little credibility he had. And Maya, her sister who was too strong, too proud and too stubborn to ever give in to him, would be the one killed just to prove a point. As fiery as her temper could be, Luna worried every waking moment that Maya was digging herself further into whatever hole he’d tossed her in. She wondered how many chances Maddox would give her before he snapped and hurt her or if he already had.
Which meant Luna had to protect them since they couldn’t protect themselves. She was the big sister. She was the one he wanted. She was the one that could save them and there was only one way to do that.
Give in. Give him what he wanted. Agree to mate him. To go against every belief she’d ever held and every bit of self-preservation she had left. It was the only way out of that basement. The only way to earn her freedom and that of her sisters. And she told herself that once she had that, once he was convinced she was broken and docile, she would have her chance to rip his heart out the same way he’d ripped out hers.
She was going to marry Maddox Clary, tonight, in the traditional ceremony. She was going to mate with him. She was going to keep her chin held high and her back straight and her eyes on the prize. She was going to smile and play along like she was the good, little, submissive wolf that he wanted her to be. And then, when he least expected it… she was going to kill him.
Chapter 2
“Hello, love.”
Luna fought to hide her disgust when Maddox called her that. She wasn’t sure why he did it. He didn’t love her. She didn’t think he knew how to love anyone, or anything, except maybe himself. But he called her by the endearment all the time and it always, always sent a shudder of revulsion through her.
He was coming closer to her now and her wolf shrank inside of her. Clawed deeper, wanting to get as far away from this man she saw as a threat as possible. Luna didn’t budge though. She didn’t blink or recoil. She kept her eyes on his and her face blank of the hatred she felt for him.
It wouldn’t do to let him see it now. He’d use it against her. He’d hurt her for daring to defy him in front of his lackeys. Worse, he might hurt Maya or Nova and she was only doing this to keep them safe. So she didn’t react, not even when he reached forward and tugged at a loose strand of hair that had fallen in her face.
“Are you ready for the ceremony?” His voice was smooth, rich and arrogant with the knowledge that he was getting what he wanted.
She gave a small dip of her chin, as close to a nod as she could manage.
Maddox only snorted and gave her hair another tug before releasing her and flicking his fingers as if wiping away something distasteful, “No. You’re not. But you will be. We’ll get you all cleaned up first. We can’t have the pack seeing you like this. I need you clean, bright and shiny like the princess you are if they’re going to believe you’re doing this for the right reasons.”
Luna grit her teeth but said nothing. The right reasons? Saving her sisters was the only reason. He was certifiably insane if he thought anyone in the pack would believe she was doing this out of some misplaced sense of love or devotion. Her nails dug into her palms where she clenched her fists so that she didn’t lash out as he confirmed everything she should have seen from the beginning.
He wanted her last name. He wanted her standing in the pack. He had absolutely no use for her outside of that.
He’d kept her chained in the basement. Barely fed. Unable to turn because of the silver cuffs that burned her skin. She was weak and dirty, her clothes ripped from her attempts to break free. He’d had h
er brought upstairs let his lackeys see her at her worst, probably to show off his power. But he wouldn’t want the rest of the pack to see how badly he’d treated her.
“Cleaned up?” Her throat was tight and raw, hoarse from disuse, but she couldn't seem to stop herself from yearning for what he was offering.
A shower, clean clothes, a toothbrush and mouthwash. They’d become the things she fantasized about late at night all alone in the basement. She couldn’t remember the last time she was allowed to shower and the promise of hot water seemed far too good to be true.
One side of his mouth tipped upwards knowingly but he glanced over her shoulder, “Terrance, go get Sasha.” His gaze flicked back to her, “She’ll stay with you while you shower and dress for the ceremony.”
“But…” She’d been hoping he would leave her alone, not wanting the other men to see her. She should have known Sasha Devlin would be on his side. That female was an evil bitch that had hated her for years. Why the hell didn’t he just mate Sasha and leave Luna the hell alone?
“Sorry, love, but I don’t trust you not to do something stupid if I leave you to your own devices.” He smirked and tugged her hair again, a gesture she now realized was meant to be playful, affectionate even, “Sasha will help you with anything you need and she’ll relay it to me if you try anything. Don’t try anything, Luna. I don’t want to have to hurt you or your sisters on our wedding night.”
