Some Mate You Are...

----------------------Marvel's Point of View-----------------------------

The place where we had been staying was little more than a well-kept two-story cabin in the woods. Though it was, technically, three-stories if you included the small basement. Which I did, as it was where I had spent the majority of my time. Every morning, I would be let out of my cage and allowed to move about the rest of the house, though, Harm was never far behind me. I would clean and cook for him while he watched my every move like a hawk seeking its prey.

Thankfully, he had removed the shackles from my wrists. Even though it was only because they had bumped him uncomfortably when I was forced to give him his evening shoulder rub. After which he would require that I sat on his lap while we watched some ridiculous action movie that he had chosen for us. Normally, I did not mind action movies so much, but I found it difficult to enjoy anything that I now knew that Harm liked.

Fortunately, that was as far as things had gone with him up to this point. He would sometimes get a little handsy while I sat on his lap, but his advances had gone no further. I was dreading the day that he finally decided that he was not willing to wait any longer. And each night when he announced that it was time for bed, I would hold my breath until he led me down the basement stairs and locked me, securely, in my cell.

He had warned me many times that, eventually, I would begin sleeping in his room with him. He made it sound like some form of great reward that I would be receiving. If I behaved. If I did as I was told. Then he would allow me to share his bed. The notion was simply ridiculous. I was a mated wolf. No amount of attempted brainwashing or even the wolfsbane in my system would allow me to feel anything less than mortified at the thought of sleeping with this man.

Yet, every night as I lay in my cot, staring into the darkness through the bars around my cage, he would still play his recordings over the speakers. His voice grating against the very essence of my soul. Commanding that I give myself to him for all eternity.

At least, he had stopped playing the recording of Enzo saying that he was glad to be rid of me. I had heard that enough for a lifetime. At first, I had not believed it. Thinking that Harm must have found a way to alter the recording somehow. Enzo had said he loved me. Why would he be happy that I was gone? But as it played in my mind over and over again. As my ears were forced to memorize every word. My dreams were plagued with images of Enzo with other females; kissing them, caressing them, loving them the way that he had claimed to love me. And I began to lose my resolve.

I began to think about how hard he had tried to hide himself from me when he discovered that we were mates. How long he had kept that secret. And, how, even after the truth was revealed, he still kept me at bay. I had basically forced him to react when I had tried to move on with Alpha Timber. Enzo had never really wanted any of this. Never really wanted me. So, why should I be surprised that he was relieved by my departure?

Yet, the fact remained that we were still, technically, mated. And until we went through some kind of official rejection of our mating, I was not prepared to give myself to another. And even if I had been, it certainly would not have been my choice for it be Alpha Harm. I may have been attracted to him once but his crazed behavior and his desperation to have me, even though I belong to another, had made any attraction wither away like the final flickering of a candle’s flame. Even if he managed to convince me to respect him as my Alpha, I would never respect him as my mate. That was…if I was never able to get out of here.

As far as my escape attempts had gone, they were few. My ankles were still shackled except for when I was locked inside of my cell and that infernal collar remained, tightly, around my neck. On top of this, the doors to the exterior of the house had all been modified so that you required several keys to unlock them, not just from the outside, but from the inside as well. Harm had clearly thought this kidnapping through before he had committed it. The windows were bolted shut and no amount of prying, or “accidental” throwing of a frying pan into the glass, allowed for any chance at escape. Plus, as I mentioned before, Harm hardly left my side.

So, I waited. I knew that eventually, somehow, someway, I would make it out of there. I would rescue myself. Even if I had to pretend to be in love with him so that he would take me back to his pack, so that I could escape from there. No matter the task. I would make it through, and I would earn my freedom. I just had to be patient. I had to bide my time. And I had to play Harm’s game.

So far today had been like any other day since Harm had allowed me to begin spending time outside of the dungeon. He had fetched me in the morning, being certain to put on my ankle shackles, tightly, as always. He led me upstairs and told me what he wanted for breakfast, which I promptly prepared to the best of my cooking abilities and, admittedly, they were few. Therefore, he would constantly berate my cooking and assure me that the other she-wolves back at the Blood Moon Pack would have to teach me better when we arrived.

After breakfast, I would clean the upstairs. Then I would prepare a sandwich for his lunch and after lunch I would clean the downstairs. Following this, depending on how filthy he deemed me to be, was whether or not I got to have a shower that day. And on this day he had decided that I needed one.

This was where the day began to take an unusually uncomfortable turn.

Normally, when I showered, he allowed me privacy or at least the semblance of such. He had snuck back in to stare at the curtain a couple of times, but that was the worst that it had gotten, and he usually snuck back out before I would exit the shower stall as if he had never been in there at all. So I had tried not to allow it to worry me too much.

However, today, he followed me directly into the bathroom, shutting the door closed behind him. He sat on the toilet and watched me undress, causing me to hesitate. I could feel his eyes burning into my flesh as they traveled over my form, but there was nothing that I could do. When he told me to strip, I had no choice but to listen. If I complained, then he would not trust me as much. But I could not help worrying about what this was coming to.

Fortunately, he did not move an inch. His eyes never left my body, but neither did he move from his spot on the toilet. So, I did my best to remain calm as I turned on the shower and stepped into the tub. I went to close the curtain and that was when he uttered his next instruction…

“No.” He commanded, gruffly. “You will bathe with the curtain open this time.”

I did not know what to say. If I opened my mouth to speak, even with the best of intentions, who knows what I may end up saying. He could deem anything as an insult at any given time and I was not eager to experience the shock from my collar again. I thought it best to simply bite my tongue and nod my head in understanding instead.

I slowly began to clean myself as he watched making me feel perpetually unclean as I bathed. Every now and then Harm would make a comment, praising me for a thorough job. At one point, as I glanced his direction out of the corner of my eye, I could see him touching himself as he ogled me, and I had to fight back the urge to shudder in disgust.

Thankfully, when my shower was done, he simply stood back and handed me a towel along with the skimpiest piece of lingerie that I had worn yet. Which was basically a sheer, lace bra with a matching thong and skirt which could hardly be called such as it did not even completely hide the tiny thong when it was on.

After the shower experience, things went semi-back to normal as I was instructed to make dinner. I did. Which was once again berated for my lack of skill. Yet, he still insisted on continuing to have me cook every meal for him. Then after dinner, he opened a bottle of wine and poured us each a glass. This was another deviation from the norm, but I was grateful to be able to get some alcohol into me. Anything to numb my senses from this never ending nightmare.

We took the wine to his couch and, as was typically expected, he pulled me onto his lap. He started up some movie that I feigned interest in as I did with all of the others. His hands began to explore and at first it seemed like his typical exploration of my skin, but it quickly turned more aggressive. He groped at my ass, roughly. He squeezed my breasts, savagely. His mouth found its way to my neck for the very first time as he began to leave a trail of kisses and love bites there. I was growing increasingly uncomfortable, but I was not certain that there was anything that I could do. Was there any way that I could stop him without giving myself away?

Then as his hand began to travel up the inside of my thigh, I began to panic. And when it made contact with my center, barely covered by the thin, sheer, lace of an almost nonexistent thong. I about leapt out of my skin. He started to rub the exterior of the fabric and I knew that it was only a matter of time before he would push past that final material barrier as well. So, I did the only thing that I think to do…I spilled my glass of wine, throwing its contents everywhere.

That stopped him in his tracks. Though, only momentarily, as he chuckled, darkly, in my ear…

“Someone’s excited, aren’t they?”

"Sorry...we...uh...I should probably clean that up..." I stammered.

I went to get off his lap to tend to my mess, but he held me firmly against him. He placed a long, slow, slimy kiss on my neck before lifting me up into his arms as he rose from the couch.

“Leave it for now. Come on. Let’s go to bed.” He cooed.

I gulped down the terror in my throat as we left all of the wine behind, and I wracked my brain for what I could do to get out of this going any further. I even briefly considered trying to throw my body against him as he carried us up the stairs, my hope being that we would both fall and go tumbling back down to the bottom. However, I was not certain that it would do me much good if I got myself killed. I sought my freedom. I did not wish to die. Though death was sounding more appealing when the alternative was being raped by my captor.

But I did not act out in such a way. Instead, I tried to brace myself for what was to come, seeing no alternative in sight. Alpha Harm held all the cards. He held the keys to my freedom, very literally. And I had yet to determine where those keys were being hidden as he had kept that secret very closely guarded.

If I did this…if I gave him what he wanted, no matter how awful it may have been…then perhaps he would trust me more. Perhaps I could gain some kind of advantage if he believed that I was all in. I did not have to like it. And I certainly was not going to enjoy it. But if I shut off my mind, if I blocked it all out. Then maybe I could get through it. Maybe it would be enough to get the shackles off my ankles or the collar off my neck. I could only hope that some sort of silver lining would come of this. Something to make the suffering worthwhile.