Thirty-eight minutes…
“Don’t!”
Ezriel shouts my name from outside the garage. My phone jerks out of my hand, pulled by his telekinesis, but I dart forward and grab it again before it can go out the door. My muscles strain as I fight against his magic. I hit the play button.
“Fuck, look how hard her nipples are,”
the man behind the camera says as he reaches forward to touch my wife. “All that adrenaline has got her wet.”
I’m going to kill him first. Skin off every piece of flesh that touches her. My blood boils as Antonio raises his free hand and shifts his forefinger into the claw of his werewolf form.
The phone starts to be pulled from my grip, Enoch now helping his brother steal it from me.
Snarling, I wrap my other hand around it, my eyes glued to the screen. Antonio starts to carve into her flesh. Into my flesh. My fucking heart.
As she raises a hand to cover her face, my brothers race towards me, eating up the yard in long strides. Stormie is running with them, and the air crackles with magic.
With rage.
I’m going to kill him.
I’m going to kill everyone in that fucking town.
Khalid said there were kids, but I don’t care.
Antonio took my baby from me.
My wife.
Anyone who stands with him deserves to die.
Micha is shaking as he cuts into her. I’m shaking right along with her, my body vibrating with an energy I need to release. I can’t stand still. Can’t fucking wait for my Mother to get back. For Zita to get into position.
I want so badly to gather my wife in my arms, to bring her home before the rest of this video happens.
But I can’t.
It’s already passed.
Four hours. Thirty-eight minutes.
She suffered all of that because of me.
I fucking failed her.
Antonio pulls back his hand as he finishes carving into her belly. I drag my attention from my wife’s face, her pain and drop it to what he’s taken so much care to write.
Screaming, I drop to my knees as an explosion of energy rips its way out of me. Shadows pour out from under me, crawling across the ground like fingers of death. I’ve wanted magic all my life, devoted hours of every day for years as a kid, trying to trigger my ascension or bond with a wand. But all I can focus on right now are the words he carved into her.
Property of Antonio Garcia
The phone moves in closer. “Look at that, Varius. Your whore has a new master.”
It swivels around, letting me look from every angle. “If you wanted to keep your toy,” the man chuckles, “you should’ve kept a better eye on it.”
Antonio releases Micha’s neck. Then he lines his claw up with the tattoo on her pussy. On my mark. My vow of love and dedication. My ring before we married. Before I could even admit to myself that I wanted her regardless of her ability to carry to term. Micha Shadow isn’t a fucking toy. She’s my wife.
And now Antonio is trying to take her from me.
He slices a line across my name, ripping out my heart.
Micha’s mouth opens as she tries to scream. Her throat is so damaged, she can barely make a sound. Yet, still she tries, her grief too great to keep in, and seeing that level of pain on the woman I love destroys the last of my control.
My magic explodes.
My shadows shoot through the entirety of the garage, then race down the stairs, billowing out like fog from my feet. Screams ricochet up from the cells. My brothers reach the door, only to backpedal quickly as my shadows climb up off the floor. The Craving hits me just as strongly as when I was starving, but it’s darker now. It isn’t after blood. It’s after –
“Stormie!”
Khalid shouts as the screams coming up from down below intensify. Then they stop.
Leno screams again, his voice cracked.
Breaking.
Shrill and terrified.
“Don’t!”
Enoch shouts as he turns his head to Stormie as she approaches me. They’ve recently become engaged for a political alliance, but he’s in loved with her. He takes a step towards her, but she throws up a light-pink shield around herself, then steps into my shadows, going where he cannot.
The smell of her fear teases the Craving. It wants me to turn to her, to focus my power on consuming her life, but all my attention is still on my phone, on the torture my wife is going through. Alone.
Four hours. Thirty-eight minutes.
I need to get to her now.
Climbing to my feet, I walk towards the door. Stormie wraps me in her magic before I can take two steps. I slam my shoulder against her wall of pink, furious and desperate to get to Micha. The fucking wall holds. Her magic hums with power as it feeds on mine, coaxing me to release more. The more I do, the stronger it gets, the weaker I become. My shadows fill the bubble as I continue to pulse, and I start to panic as it gets harder and harder to see my phone. To see Micha. To be with her in the only way I can.
I’m bathed in total darkness. Even the screen’s light is gone. But I can still hear that man talking, and now I can hear my wife getting slapped around. How many men have abused her in those four hours and thirty-eight minutes?
Exhaustion hits me like a fucking semi running a red light. I struggle to keep my eyes open as my shadows start to disappear, my magic drained by Stormie’s shield.
My limbs feel like lead is coursing through my veins, and I sway on my feet. My eyes stay latched onto the screen. The phone has been passed to Antonio, and the man who was behind the camera is now in view. I finally have a face to go with the voice of the man I’m going to kill.
And a body.
And a cock.
My heart bursts. My power pulses beneath my skin, wild and furious but too drained to be released. Just bleeding eternally. I can’t help her. I can’t stop this.
They’re holding her down, forcing her legs apart, and he is lining up his cock with her pussy.
“I knew you’d like this,” he lies.
She doesn’t like any part of this. That’s so fucking clear.
Once I get my hands on him, I’m taking his off. Piece by piece, I’ll butcher him slowly over four years, thirty-eight days.
“You have a fucking ugly cunt. It would be better to fuck a pig, but you’re just begging me to take you, aren’t you, whore?”
I’m going to feed him to the fucking pigs he loves.
“Give me the phone, Varius,”
Khalid says as he moves in front of me. Stormie’s bubble is gone, as are my shadows.
I pull away from him, my eyes unwavering. I can’t stop watching it. I can’t leave her alone.
“And I’m nothing if not a nice guy.”
He thrusts into her.
She arches in agony.
Rudy snatches the phone out of my grasp, my fingers too weak to hold it.
I scream at him, but he just tosses the phone aside, then throws his arms around me. He hugs me. Holds me back.
I try to push him away, not wanting to take any comfort when Micha doesn’t have any.
But he doesn’t let me go.
He clings on.
Squeezes me tighter.
I slowly become aware of my surroundings, of Louise, a healer, having arrived at the Shadow House. Of Leno crying, begging her to help him.
Guilt crushes me. I try to apologize, but he ignores me completely, all of his focus elsewhere.
Needing to do something helpful, I push Rudy away. He lets me go this time. I’m not mindless with rage anymore. I’m wielding it like a fucking weapon.
“Phone,”
I demand as I hold out my hand.
Enoch studies me for a moment before retrieving it with his telekinesis.
Stepping away so I don’t break Louise’s concentration, I look down at my phone. The video has been paused with the fucker’s cock halfway in my wife. Dark energy claws at my skin, demanding vengeance and violence. My rage burns cold, and I tear my eyes from the video, looking below it instead.
Posted one hour ago.