Chapter 19 - Liv
CHAPTER 19 - LIV
Trigger warning: captivity of main character.
Iron bars and darkness. One prison swapped for another. Damn Dash for kidnapping me and locking me in here. All under his so-called guise of keeping me safe.
Father would be livid when he found out what Dash did to me. We could kiss goodbye to any alliance between the packs. Goodbye to Pack Hester’s survival, because TJ would not take the blows lying down any more than he’d accept I was Lunar bonded to Dash. Goodbye to any hope of freedom.
Wood creaked as someone shifted the secret panel upstairs to access the cellar. Thundering motorcycles outside a moment earlier notified me of Dash’s return. Heat swirled in my belly, ready to let him or whoever came down those stairs have it. Steady steps suggested it was my fake Lunar mate. I guessed right by the wild and turbulent scent preceding his arrival.
Stormy eyes landed on me, and I ignored the distant pull of our wolves begging us to join together as one soul. Dash’s hair was crushed and sweaty as if he’d been riding his bike again, which explained his absence for several hours.
Ready to serve him my mind, I got off the rickety old bed and took two short steps to the cell’s door. The motion took me a bit of effort because of tired, stiff joints. “How long am I staying here?”
“Until the threat passes.” He crushed a plastic bag in his hands.
Danger he invited to both of our packs’ door by interfering and enraging TJ further. The damn nerve of this guy and his twisted way of keeping me safe.
I crossed my arms over my chest. “You mean until our packs are dead?”
Dash remained silent, standing by the staircase, studying me with impossibly stubborn gray eyes I had little chance of convincing otherwise.
What was it with the men in my life making decisions for me and not with me? Father had the right with his pack status, but rules granted me a say as heir.
“I’ve exchanged one cage for another.” I gripped the bars, the burn on my palm from the iron in them unlocking my muscles and joints and forcing me off them. “Fuck. Iron bars?” No wonder I felt weakened holed up in here.
Humans used certain metals against magical creatures to repel magick, burn gantii like me, or poison us. Magnetism in iron messed with the electromagnetic properties of our tissue and repulsed our blood cells, which weren’t iron-based like humans were. Chaos if we needed a blood transfusion. Silver was lethal, but iron got us good, putting us out of action for days if we ingested a significant dose or got stabbed with a blade.
“I don’t want to cage you, Liv.” Dash’s body shuddered as he stepped closer and entered the force field of the iron.
Time to plead my case. Reason with his human side and hope he didn’t switch to his animal. Trouble ensued when he let his animal dominate. “Then let me go. Last night, you said you didn’t want TJ to kidnap me and hold me captive like they did to Whitney. You’re being a damn hypocrite!”
Dammit. My Alpha temper got away with me on the last line.
My captor dropped the plastic bag an inch from the bars. “I bought you some clothes. Try them on while I get you burn cream.”
Prying answers from him was hopeless. Reasoning with him futile. The only way to get out of here was by using a diversion and escaping. Chances that decreased the longer I stayed in the cell.
“Then I’m staying here for a while?” He never specified how long. Until the wedding? Longer? Permanently? My tongue thickened, and it hurt to swallow.
Yet again, he remained tight-lipped, retreating back up the steps, leaving me to stew. Whatever he planned, expecting him to put my well-being before his pack, motorcycle club, or Whitney was fruitless. The next phase of Operation Madness ended in one destination: heartbreak for everyone.
I carefully stretched my arm through the bars, snatching the bag and admiring the selection inside. My heart cooed at the five t-shirts, a new pair of jeans, and the jacket in my size. Fourteen. He remembered.
The hussy down below gave a saucy sigh at the lacy thong at the bottom, lumped with the sports socks. I removed it and held it apart between my forefingers, cringing at the thin string at the rear door that served to pass as underwear.
Dash came back with a tray of food, a bottle of water, and burn cream, setting it down where the bag used to sit. He backed away quickly to avoid the effect of the iron, though not out of the firing range of the underwear I threw at him, hitting him in the face.
“I’m not wearing this. Thongs are ride up my ass, and barely cover anything.” I ignored the way his gaze dipped to my breasts, and the heat that kicked up in my stomach.
Grinning like a smug bastard, he tucked the panties into his cut pocket. “Shame. I was hoping to see you in it.” Cocky much?
“Self-righteous son of a?—”
“Careful,” he tutted me. “I’ll leave you with just this thong and nothing else to wear.”
Breath punched out of me. This was the Dash I knew. Brash. Bold. Flirty. Twice as sinful as the devil. Fantasies played out in my mind over his last two words. Him draping me over his lap to ignite the flame in my buttocks from spanking me. My pussy slick and hot for him, a repeat of what happened earlier when he threw me over his shoulder. The bastard slipping his finger inside me, thrusting in and out, his thumb finding my clit and giving me what I needed. Just like all those years before.
Fuck, Liv. Thoughts like that belonged in fantasies only. Dash made it clear he didn’t want me, and I swore to cut him out of my heart, move on and not be trapped in the past. My body clenched in denial, knowing the impossibility of that task when my wolf and I belonged to him. His name carved into our heart. My goddamn pussy shaped to fit his knot.
The only way to win with Dash was to beat him at his own game. “They’ll look good on you. You can wear them over your jeans for your next ride. Give all your men a show. Maybe a striptease for that asshole, Steele.”
Thunder crashed in Dash’s chest. “Do not call him that.”
Steele deserved the title for rejecting Heather… a trait with the Lumbry men. The only way to stop me from using it was to cut out my tongue.
Giving the smug Alpha a big fuck you, I got up and rubbed my ass along the bars, pretending to be a stripper. “Come here, Dash, baby.” I put on my deepest, growliest biker voice. “I’ve got a twenty for your panties.” I shoved my fingers in my mouth and whistled.
Dash’s dark, pissed off eyes tripped for a second and lightened, his lips twitching with a smirk.
He approached the cell slowly, like a cheetah stalking a gazelle. “I’ll have to think of a suitable punishment for that mouth.”
I blasted off the first thing that came to it. A witty, blistering remark I fired at the assholes who disrespected the female Alpha. “It’s either you or TJ, huh? Break me. Abuse me. Do what you want with me. My life is forfeit, regardless.”
“I never want to hear that asshole’s name on your lips again.” Dash’s growl hit me with full force, attempting to bring my temper down.
“Fine by me.” Voicing it burned to my very bones.
“You belong to me, Liv, but you can’t belong to me.” What the hell did that even mean?
I reached through the bars to get the bread he gave me with the shitty tinned soup he reheated. “Cryptic, as usual.”
Dash cracked his knuckles. “I hurt people, Liv. It’s why I didn’t turn up to the Harvest Dance. You’re better off without me. I’ll only hurt you.”
I wanted to scream at him to let me be the judge of that. I was sick and tired of my fate belonging to others. What about what I wanted? For once, I wanted to be wild like Dash, disregard the rules, do my own damn thing, and fall where I landed, good or bad. Pass the damn torch of the heir to my brother and shun pack rules.
“You already hurt me.” I bit back the word asshole knowing it wouldn’t help the situation.
His eyes clamped shut. “I never meant to. I’m sorry.”
Too little too late. At least he apologized. A small consolation.
I wanted him gone, to break down into a thousand pieces and rebuild myself all over again. “I thought you said you didn’t have time for a relationship. Yet you have plenty of time to spend with me now. How would Whitney feel about that?”
He cocked a gun finger at me and played up the bad boy image. “You got me.” He threw his palms up. “Guilty as charged.”
Goddamn player. Manwhore. Biker slut. Heartless bastard.
Heat crawled over my skin as a blotchy rash took hold of my chest. “Not in the mood for your twisted games, Dash. Give the thong to your girlfriend or one of the cheap whores that frequent your club that you and your men fuck and throw away.”
Dash’s handsome face morphed into a dark storm. “Enjoy your lunch.” He stormed out of the basement, boots thumping angrily with each wooden step to the top, then slammed the panel into place.
Darkness shrouded me. Silence. Emptiness. Loneliness. My future from herein out.