*Trigger warning for this book. Murder and talk of sexual assault*

I stood in blackness, darker than anything I have seen or felt before, it pulsed through me. It was me.

My parent's bodies under my feet were twisted and bloodied, indicating a death that was anything but painless; I knew they fought back until the very end.

Blood was the only thing that I could smell; its thick tang coated the air, coated my hands. I knew they were there, but my head was clouded, my vision blurry from the moment I stumbled upon them.

Looking for them for solace, to help me, but it was too late, and I could do nothing to help them.

I fell to my knees, accepting my fate. I reached for their hands, still warm from the life that was just taken from them.

I couldn’t cry. I couldn’t feel.

I sat there waiting to die with them, wanting to die with them.

I had nothing to live for, no one else to live for. Everyone was gone.

I couldn’t feel anything, but the hollowness, the complete emptiness that shook me to my core.

Footsteps sounded, and I felt something that might have been relief. My nightmare would be ended, and I could rejoin my family and my pack in the next life alongside the Moon Goddess.

Strong arms pulled me off them, away from my parents.

I screamed for them, but I didn’t hear it; I only knew I did because my throat was on fire.

I kicked and fought whoever was taking me away with my last strength. They ripped me from the death that I didn’t want until tonight when everything I knew, everything I loved, was stolen away from me.

My knees ached as I was thrown onto the cold ground. Senses that felt numb and far away.

“Here she is, Alpha. In one piece as you requested.” A cold hand pulled my hair back, baring my face to him.

“Good, keep her that way,” I swayed even on my knees. The last thing I remembered was his cruel blue eyes, devoid of any emotion except a flicker of amusement at my suffering.

The hollowness in me burst into flames and turned into raging, unshakable hate that was too soon quelled by the darkness I slipped into.

Four years Later

“Aren’t you looking lovely? Is that for me, because you shouldn’t have?” Dominick leaned against the large entryway attempting to block my way, I tried to brush past him, but Hunter showed up right behind him.

“Going somewhere? Hunter leaned against the other side, a dangerous glimmer dancing in his cold blue eyes, “We wanted to have a closer look at what will be ours in a few short weeks. Oblige us, won't you?” He reached out to touch me but pulled back at the last second, I fought a smirk, looking to my feet instead.

Were they not sick of hearing their idle threats? They couldn’t touch me anyways, not until I was eighteen. Commanded by their father, their Alpha, an Alpha who would never be mine.

Hunter kicked off the wall and stepped towards me; Dominick followed him. Dominick might have been older, but Hunter was by far the cruelest and the most wicked of the three brothers.

They both got their dad's light brown hair, dull, and lifeless, like them.

They started circling me slowly, like animals that had already caught their prey and were just toying with it now. I knew how this would go, how it always went, and I settled into my character effortlessly.