phin

stled through the heavy doorway, flanked

attack dog. In my ten years as an empty shell, this wretched old woman had taken sadistic pleasure in tormenting me: gleefully handing Corda the silver-tippe

Martha's trembling fingers, cl

shadows beside the sl

of ragged gasps, slamming their foreheads against the st

o see a dead body; seeing Kerr upright and breathing meant Finch Manor's cowardly scheme-shoving a defen

er brain scrambled to invent an excuse. Her gaze darted from Kerr to

inting a bony, trembling finger at my face. "The Finch family had noth

ssing my arms

red cheeks. "She attacked Lady Corda in the middle of the night, stole the sacred burial shroud, and snuck into your tomb just to desecra

completely and ut

stics this old crone was pulling off

of Ironfang was as intellectually bankrupt a

hly unimpressed breath an

, if I were that desperate for a man, do you really think I'd pi

before his resurrected Alpha, panicked and lunged for

buddy," I

arters disarm drills I had mastered during my previous lifetime on Earth-combined with the explos

ch, seized his wrist with both hands, and pivoted hard on my heel. Using his own two-hundred-pound mo

d skittering across the flagstones. Before he could even draw breath, I stepped firmly on his

tip exactly half an inch f

ching her throat in absolute horror. "Witchcraft! Tre

nels while Corda built her fraudulent reputation on my late mother's medical manuscripts. And when the Alpha was reported dead, you threw me i

st the steel toward the darkness. "My Lord

lpha command rolled

artha flat onto the stone, sobbing in terror. He walked past the kneeling guards as

re fingers around the flat of my blade an

k with unspoken appraisal and

de work," he murmured, his voice sending a low vibration throug

Alpha," I replied smoothly, refusing to back do

the scullery cellar," he commanded the kneeling guards, his t

ath of relief, foolishly as

o replace Korda would likely be exposed. Given the Finch family's considerable influence, they would almost certainly silence me perma

, I felt that he didn't dis

shold, the torn collar of my burial shr

ic rippe

crest of a White Wolf, slipped from my inner lini