Chapter 10 #2
“Hunter, you’re killing her!” Ash jumped on his back, fisting his hair.
“Your brother is a cancer,” he seethed through gritted teeth. “A poison on this earth.”
“I… know.” The words pushed painfully past bruised her larynx as her eyes closed.
He snarled then Stone shouted something in Russian and her body crupled to the floor. Air rushed into her lungs like fire. Painful coughs sputtered past her ravaged throat. Her vision tunneled into a narrow keyhole of black as tears blurred her vision.
Stone tried to help her stand, but her legs collapsed. “Goddamn it, Hunter, you could have killed her!”
“Big loss.”
Stone helped her sit up as Ash’s large hand rested on her back. She heaved for breath. Hunter might have let her go, but she still felt his grip around her throat. Her body still radiated with the fear he instilled.
“There are other ways to deal with this,” Ash snapped.
Hunter seethed but something in Ash’s voice held him back. They exchanged a look that spoke of years of shared pain and protection, decades of trauma that dated back long before Jordan slithered into their lives.
Hunter wanted to take his vengeance out on her. Marigold knew then that this man had killed. Her life meant nothing to him, and she was his next target.
Gripping Stone’s arm, she pulled herself up off the ground so as not to look weak. “If you kill me, you’d be doing Jordan a favor.”
The room silenced as her body swayed under the remaining dizziness. Clinging to Stone’s shirt, she used his body as a shield. Ash’s hand slipped into hers, offering additional support.
“Hear her out.”
They looked at her expectantly. May the truth set her free. “Jordan convinced my father to have me committed.”
Hunter glared at her with unfiltered distrust and barely contained rage.. “Committed how?”
She looked to Stone and Ash, but neither was her friend. Her protectors were not willing to risk themselves.
Fine. She was more than used to handling things on her own. And she’d learned long ago that men were always in it for themselves before anyone else.
Lifting her trembling chin, she stared into fathomless eyes.
“It was a private facility. They called it behavioral modification.” The truth tasted like bitter shame, burning her mouth like acid.
“They left me there for months, claiming I was hysterical, unstable, and delusional. But that wasn’t true. ”
“Is anything out of your mouth true, little liar?”
“I know what my brother really is. And when I told the truth, they punished me.”
“Why didn’t they believe you?”
“They swore Jordan would never hurt anyone. They thought I was making up lies because of jealousy. They said only a sick person would make such heinous accusations about family.”
“You said he was your half-brother.”
“Yes. But to my father, he’s the first born son. I’m nothing compared to Jordan in his eyes.”
“Charming.” Ash watched her like an equation he needed to solve.
“Yes,” she agreed with a bitter cold. “Misogyny runs deep in the Calder lines.”
“And what about your mother?”
Pain engulfed her heart. She bowed her head. “My mother passed away while I was committed.”
A moment of silence passed as she fumbled with the bottomless regret of missing those last goodbyes. Big breath in… Deep down, she believed her mother fought to keep her out of that place, but she was no match for her father. And in the end, the fight might have been what killed her.
“Yet here you are,” Hunter sneered. “Free, on the same island your brother had no business visiting, lying about your identity, trespassing through our home, and stealing our things.”
“You don’t understand—”
“Because you’ve been feeding us bullshit lies since you arrived!” Hunter roared as he slammed his fist into the wall.
“I had to lie!” This time, she didn’t cower.
“They had no plans of letting me out of that place! They would have let me rot inside those white walls. Do you know what it’s like to have your freedom stripped away so completely that you can’t even choose your meals?
I had to swallow whatever pills they fed me, wear soft clothing, stare through barred windows.
And when I tried to reason with them, they doubled my dosage and turned me into a walking zombie.
If I threw up the meds to keep my senses, they… ”
“What?” Stone asked. “What else did they do?”
She rubbed her temples, remembering the way they strapped her down and made her bite into the rubber mouth guard.
“There’s nothing wrong with me.” Her voice turned small as she rubbed away the feeling of having her wrist strapped down.
The sensation of five orderlies pinning her to a gurney as she fought with all her might.
The indignity of having her clothing tugged and her privates exposed, all so they could get her to submit. And then came the shocks.
The first was always the worst, when the body was still engaged in the fight and every muscle went taut. It was an unwinnable battle, yet she instinctually fought them every time—until she couldn’t.
Sometimes she felt them removing the head gear and pulling away the mouth guard. Other times she saw them as if through a dream as they lifted the padded cot onto another surface and wheeled her back to her room.
Afterwards, she was always still. Not numb, but too overtaxed to truly feel the reality of life for a bit.
Her tongue was too tired to move, and her eyes stayed unfocused for days.
It was as if her spirit were forced outside of her body and her flesh only held bone to cage whatever remained of her mind.
She didn’t have the words to make them understand everything she’d survived. “It was hell on earth.”
“How did you escape?” At Ash’s quiet question, she straightened and blinked back to the present, forcing those horrific memories away and digging deep for courage.
“I was visiting family, home for the weekend.”
“I didn’t know hell sanctioned field trips.”
She glared at Hunter. He was right, of course, but that wasn’t the point. “Only for well-behaved patients.” Which she was not. “Jordan brought a friend home that weekend. A girl.” She couldn’t claim the girl was a woman. “She looked barely sixteen.”
Hunter hissed what could only be a swear word in Russian, as Stone turned away, rubbing the back of his neck. Ash was the only one not to break eye contact. He wanted the truth and intended to have all of it.
“I tried to help her,” she confessed truthfully. “You have to believe I’m not like him.”
“How did you try?”
“When Jordan was preoccupied, I told her to leave, but she had no interest in going anywhere. She wanted to be with him. Jordan caught me trying to force her out the door and lost it. He called my dad, then they contacted the facility. They were already looking for me.”
“Because you weren’t allowed to leave in the first place.”
“Correct. Jordan…” Those final moments had been her last familiar glimpse of her family. “He said that would be the last time I ever saw home. He promised to have me committed for the rest of my life.”
The walls were closing in on her. Just the thought of wasting away in that place for a lifetime left her claustrophobic and terrified. She still wasn’t safe. These men could turn her in, send her back to that waking hell, and sentence her to rot for the rest of her life.
She was suddenly very tired, as if she hadn’t slept in months.
“So you ran,” Stone said, with something approaching understanding in his voice.
“Wouldn’t you?” She met his emerald eyes without flinching, and he gave a subtle nod.
“Why did you come here, to Kassel?”
“I needed to go somewhere they wouldn’t think to look.
I’d heard how exclusive the Isles of Kassel were, and when I found the invitation it seemed almost serendipitous.
I’d once heard Jordan mention that he couldn’t go back, but I had no idea why.
I just figured anywhere he wasn’t welcome was safe. ”
Ash studied her, rubbing his chin. “Care to explain who Mary Langford is?”
“She’s the daughter of a member of Parliament.”
“I ran her name. She’s never been a guest here. Her invitation wasn’t issued by us. Who invited her?”
“I don’t know. I never met her face-to-face. There was a gala at the country club the night I ran. I went there, hoping Jordan wouldn’t make a scene if he followed me. I stole her coat and purse when I was looking for a disguise in the coat check—”
“Clever little thief,” Ash said with a smirk.
“Yes, I can be. Anyone can be, if their circumstances are bad enough. I used her phone to arrange a flight with her documentation. No one ever questioned me. I didn’t see the invitation to Kassel until I was in the air on her family’s private jet.”
“So you stole a coat, a phone, her ID, and an aircraft. Impressive,” Stone chuckled.
“This isn’t fucking funny,” Hunter snarled. “Where did you get the boat?”
She hesitated, not wanting to get the only person who helped her in trouble.
“I asked you a fucking question!”
“A woman.” She jolted with panic, trying to recall the order of events. “It all happened so fast. Agents were waiting at the tarmac when we landed. I wouldn’t have escaped if not for her.”
“Who was she?”
“A flight attendant. Someone who works for the Langfords, I suppose. She recognized my desperation and took pity on me. She told me where the boat was docked and where to find the hidden supplies.”
“You risked your life.”
“Maybe. But I’m alive. I don’t think they know where I am. Unless you plan to report me.”
Hunter growled. The truth hadn’t softened him one bit. “Your family’s debt is yours to bear.”
“But I didn’t do anything!”
“Your blood destroyed ours!” Hunter roared. “There will be consequences!”
“Hunter,” Ash snapped. “Take it easy. She obviously didn’t know what Jordan was doing. And when she found out, she tried to stop him.”
“Not good enough! He should know the pain we suffered, be forced to watch his sister break the way we watched ours.”
Marigold’s heart leapt in fear. “If you hurt me, he won’t care. You’d be doing him a favor. I’m a threat to Jordan. I know the truth about the real monster he is. He wants me gone.”
“Then we’ll send you back to him.”
“No—”
“Don’t tell me no!” Hunter snarled. Stone caught his shoulder before he could touch her again.
“You have to relax, man.”
Her vision blurred with unshed tears. “I may share Jordan’s DNA, but I’m nothing like him.”
“Prove it,” Ash challenged, giving her a look that said she needed to convince them quickly, because there was no reeling Hunter in. “Tell us how to find your brother.”
Her shoulders curled inward, and her spine pressed into the wall. They were asking her to go against her family.
She didn’t care about betraying Jordon, but her father would never forgive her for turning against her own blood—despite all the times they turned against her, dismissing her truth as lies and abandoning her in that hellhole of a facility to rot until they fully fried her brains and turned her into a breathing corpse.
“I can try,” she finally said in a small voice.
Hunter’s smile was sharp as a blade. “Your brother has been very good at disappearing these past three months. Trying won’t be good enough. Either tell us how to get to him, or we send you back to the clinic and use you as bait.”
“He would never visit me—”
“He’d have no choice. Your condition would be too critical to ignore.”
“Fucking hell, Hunter,” Ash snapped, pulling her protectively to his side.
Marigold’s heart hammered against her ribs. “I don’t know anything about his personal life. Jordan’s always been an extremely private person.”
“You know things we don’t. The kind of car he drives. Who his friends are. Where he spends his free time.”
“I really don’t.”
“You’re lying again.”
She might know some things, but not much. “I can tell you what I know, but, like I said, Jordan has always been a private person.”
“We’ll want to know everything you know.” Stone said, stepping closer to look her in the eyes. “His habits. His friends. His weaknesses. Every dirty secret you have is now ours.”
“Just like you’re ours.” Hunter reminded, looming over her as she stood shoulder to shoulder with Ash and Stone. “Understand?”
This was her only choice—if one could even call it a choice.
But even as she nodded, Marigold couldn’t shake the feeling that she’d just signed a different kind of devil’s bargain.
These men didn’t just want information—they wanted blood.
Her family’s blood. She was now their greatest asset and an accomplice to whatever they planned.