The Heir She Loved (Shadows of Sin #4)

23 Everett

October 13th, 2022

It’s been a month since we brought her home, and for the first two weeks she had sat in a hospital room we had set up in a small warehouse along the outside of the city limits. Doctor Rameriz, along with a psychologist, had been in and out talking to her nonstop, running tests, making sure she was as okay as she could be given the situation.

She had suffered from a horrible UTI and nasty infections across all her wounds, of which they had all been taken care of and were now completely healed. She had full functionality of everything. All of her fingers and toes worked perfectly. They had managed to take so much from her, but they failed in taking her ability to write.

Internally, she was okay too, despite what they had done to her. Her heart and lungs were still healthy. Her liver and kidneys took a little damage, but nothing that couldn’t be fixed, and her uterus was undamaged. Her anus however, was a different story. It took a lot of damage, and there had been significant scar tissue that they had to go in and remove. Knowing what they did to her. Knowing that it wasn’t just torture, but that they had been preparing her for a buyer.

It made me want to burn the entire world to the ground.

The only problem that the psychologist and the doctor couldn’t figure out how to fix was that she wouldn’t talk.

After we brought her back that day, she hadn’t said a word, hadn’t moved. She just laid there, in an almost catatonic state, staring out the window while Merlin sat on her shoulder and Lucy laid on the end of her bed.

The only time she moved, the only time she made a noise, was when somebody mentioned removing Merlin for sanitary reasons or when someone or something blocked her view of the window. Other than that, not a word.

I had been sitting in a chair on the opposite side of her, only leaving every once in a while, unless something came up and I had to leave for a few hours after she was put to sleep, and I continuously wondered if she even knew I was here. She hadn’t looked over here once since we brought her in. Not even when I tried speaking to her. Now it just seemed better if she didn’t know.

But even with that tracker now stitched into her neck, I had a harder time than I wanted to admit leaving this room.

We had slaughtered everyone at that compound mercilessly. Even Azrael, whose agenda had apparently grown since that day, had joined in on the fun, ripping apart the Delepski family without hinderance. Jack, Zo, and Grey were currently in Russia, taking care of the remaining members, and Azrael and I had tortured Alexei, Isaak, and Lillian until they told us everything they had done to my girl. After about a week, we finally killed them and set fire to the compound, making sure there was a protective barrier between it and the trees before we did.

There was nothing left of that place. Nothing left of that room where they had brutally raped and tortured my fucking girl.

My hands tightened around the arms of the chair. The Doctor said there was no telling what she would remember. Rae still didn’t remember everything that happened to her during those four months her father had kept her, but Jack and Azrael knew. Azrael had found the tape and, out of the kindness of his heart, had let Jack watch it.

Rae knew they had it, but she wanted nothing to do with it. She knew who she was, who she wanted to be, she didn’t need to dive into her past to figure anything out.

But I wasn’t sure if Olivia would feel the same way.

Rae suggested playing it day by day. There was no telling how she would react to this trauma. She may shift into someone unrecognizable, but the thing was, she was always recognizable to me. It didn’t matter what this world did to her, I could see her. I would always see her.

But even at the mention of going back to her place, she didn’t react, she just laid there. Just stared.

Other than hunting those people down, torturing those responsible, I had been learning to fill the time, to better understand what I could do to help her. Learning everything I possibly could that might help her through this. I had started recording everything I found, writing letters to her to try and decipher where I could start. I was never unsure of myself. I never had doubts. I was never afraid, but now?

I had lost her. I listened to her die over and over again, only to find out she had died almost two dozen times. I had heard her screams, I heard her say goodbye.

I couldn’t lose her again, I wouldn’t.

But how could I help her? I wasn’t the cuddling type. I didn’t know what to do if I did hold her. Maybe I would go back to the basics. Pushing her buttons until she fought back, but I didn’t want to push her too far. Everything she went through, what kind of triggers did she have now? Did she even want to be touched? Did she want to be fucked? Did she want to fight and push buttons and challenge me?

Or had they just…had they shattered her completely?

I needed to regain control but so did she, and sometimes control wasn’t about ordering and demanding, and punishing when she broke the rules. Sometimes control was about leadership.

Maybe right now she didn’t need a fight. Maybe she didn’t even have the energy to push buttons and challenge me. Maybe she wasn’t hard on the outside and soft when I dug far enough down, maybe now she was made of feathers, and the fire I knew so well was just a little ember that I had to claw my way towards and reignite.

It was backwards, who we were, I understood that. Fighting and pushing and fucking like animals, that was our love language. It had been, at least, but now we had to relearn together. Maybe we would find our way back to that or maybe…maybe it was time for me to learn something completely new.

Our explosions and chaos and fire could still be just that, it might just look different, and that was okay. Fuck, I’d become Greyson if it meant getting her back.

Her strength was depleted though, and right now, it was my job to get it back. Whatever it took.

The warehouse we were in was a second home now. We had filled it with tables and computers to search for the Delepski family without having to leave her. We had couches and chairs, a coffee stand, lamps, some cots; everything a person needed to make this place feel like home.

Emily and Rae had been sitting with Olivia every day, talking to her about their stories, their lives, about everything and anything, even reading to her, in hopes that she would find her way out of this, but still nothing.

However, today the Doctor told us that there was no reason why she couldn’t go home, so we were going to take her back.

She had gained some weight by way of IV and by Evelyn feeding her what she could before Olivia decided that she was full. So, despite everything she had gone through, and her lying in bed all this time, she should have the strength to walk out.

But she didn’t react when the Doctor told her all of that, she just kept staring out that window. Watching, waiting. Sometimes I found myself staring out that window too, trying to figure out what exactly she was looking at. What had captured her attention so fully that she couldn’t manage to pull her eyes away, but it was just a normal city street. Average traffic, a few trees, nothing extraordinary.

She was in that room for so long though, maybe all she was looking at was freedom.

Was keeping her in here just forcing her into another cage? I had thought about it on more than one occasion, but the last time I had brought it up, it was met with silence. No reaction, just…staring.

So I couldn’t be sure.

I couldn’t be sure about anything.

We all hated head games, guessing games. We all hated puzzles unless we were the ones creating them, and now? Fuck, I didn’t care how long it took to solve this, I would enjoy every step so long as it brought me closer to her.

Evelyn walked with a bag in her hand. “Okay, I got her favorites,”

she said. “Get on out of here so I can change her.”

I glanced at the duffle in her hand and then back towards the doorway where Rae and Emily were standing before turning back to her. I tried to touch her once. One time after that day we brought her here.

She had pulled away from me.

But Evelyn, Emily, and Rae? Their hands were safe. Their hands weren’t calloused or large. Lillian had beat the shit out of her, and she still preferred a woman’s touch over the touch of a man. I couldn’t blame her for that. I would never blame her for that.

I pushed myself to a stand, Lucy’s attention shifting towards me as my eyes found Olivia’s face. Smooth, expressionless. Her eyes trained on that window.

I would fix this. Whatever it took, I would fix this.