Chapter 31 Wren
Wren
THE SONGBIRD
The room is cold. I can see my breath fogging in the air as I stand barefoot on the slick tile, my toes aching from the chill. The walls are grey, cracked, and stained. A single fluorescent light buzzes in the center overhead, flickering like they do in horror movies.
Where the hell am I?
Somewhere behind me, a child sobs high and broken, making my stomach ache. I take a step towards the sound, my feet sliding in something sticky, but when I look down, it’s gone.
Clean tile.
Always clean.
There’s a door at the end of the hall. It looks heavy, made of metal and painted the same dull grey as the walls. Maybe if I can just get to it, I can get out? But when I start to run towards it, it’s as if I never started running at all. Locked in the same place, staring at a large metal door.
My feet finally start moving, taking me closer to the door. My fingers grasp for the handle, desperate to get out, but once I finally get it open, it doesn’t lead to freedom.
It leads back into the same room.
“No, no, no…” my voice cracks. I stumble backward, shaking my head as tears burn my eyes. This isn’t right. It’s never fucking right!
“Please! Let me out!”
“You’re exactly where you’re supposed to be, Wrennie.”
That voice. Slithering over my skin like a slug, making my whole body lock up in response.
Why does this keep happening to me? Why can’t I get out?
A shadow moves in the far corner and I know he’s there. Watching me. Tall, faceless, a dark blur where his features should be. His features that look just like mine. But the gold watch on his wrist glints under the flickering light as he steps closer.
“You can run,” he coos, walking circles around me like I’m his favorite prey, “but you’ll never leave me.”
“Stay away from me!” I scream, but my voice sounds small and weak. Just like the child I used to be.
He laughs maliciously, the sound piercing my ears like shattered glass with jagged edges. “Oh, Wrennie. You don’t get to tell Daddy what to do.”
My stomach lurches, trying to expel the filth that lingers deep within me. I run as fast as I can, bare feet pounding against the tile, lungs burning. Door after door, my hands claw at the handles fighting to escape, but every door I open leads me right back to where I started.
“NO! LET ME OUT!”
The man tilts his head. He may be faceless, but I can feel his grin.
“You’ll always come back to me, little bird.”
Little bird.
No. That’s what Kage calls me. That’s safe. That’s not this. No!
Arms wrap around me, warm and solid, the cold grey room I was once in before is nowhere to be found.
“Baby, it’s me.”
The hum of the fluorescent light morphs into the sound of frantic heartbeats and heavy breathing in my ear as my body rocks gently against another.
“It’s just me, baby. You’re safe.”
“Safe,” I repeat, but I don’t feel safe.
Not when my pulse is still hammering and my skin sticky with sweat.
However, Kage and Nox are the closest thing I’ve had to ‘safe’ in a while, so I cling to him.
Clutching him close and sobbing into his neck, trying my best to separate the nightmare from reality.
It takes a while before the world around me sharpens enough to make sense. I’m in my room. My room in Nox and Kage’s house.
Nox crouches down beside me, brushing damp strands of hair away from my face. “Same nightmare?”
Nodding, I press my face into his chest, hoping the darkness has finally faded away.
“Talk to us, little bird,” Kage urges, tilting my chin so my eyes meet his. “We need to know what’s going on in that beautiful head of yours. You don’t have to go through this alone.”
My lips part but the words won’t come out. If I tell them…if I say it out loud, then maybe it becomes a reality. Maybe he becomes real.
“Please, Wrennie, I—”
“Don’t!” The scream rips out of me before I can fully stop it. My entire body jerks back, away from his touch. “Don’t fucking call me that!”
The room goes quiet, Kage freezing as guilt flashes across his face. He has no idea what he’s done, but I can’t bother to feel bad for him. Not when it comes to that name.
“S-sorry,” he stammers. “I’m sorry, baby, please. Please don’t shut us out.”
Shut them out?
That’s not what I want. That’s not what this is. But I can’t help the tightness and panic that wraps around my chest. I glance between them, the two men who have given me nothing but safety and security, and yet for some reason, I can’t make myself see them as such.
When I see Kage’s arms open in silent invitation, I crawl back into his embrace like I’m on autopilot. My sobs shake us both as I sob into his chest, his heart beating wildly against my ear.
“I don’t understand why,” I choke out. “Why do I keep dreaming about him? I thought it was finally over!”
“Who?” Nox’s response is sharp and demanding, but I can hear the fear beneath it. Seeing me like this scares him. Both of them. Kage’s entire body is locked and stiffened beneath me. They don’t know how to help me.
Shaking my head violently, I press my hands over my face like I used to do when I was a child, trying to hide from all the questions I don’t know how to answer.
“No. I can’t—I don’t remember. I don’t want to remember.”
You do remember. You just buried it.
Kage’s arms tighten around me, as if he’s trying to hold the pieces of me together through sheer force. His voice soothing as he runs his fingers through my hair. “You don’t have to hide it, little bird. Whatever it is, we’ll protect you. Always.”
His words should calm me, they always have, but this time it only twists the unease that’s coiled in my gut. The more they swear to protect me, the more I realize, I don’t really know what they’re trying to protect me from.
I can’t breathe. My lungs feel like they’re collapsing in on themselves, my thoughts scraping like broken glass against the inside of my skull. I want to believe him but the pressure behind my eyes is building, and somewhere deep inside, something is clawing to get out and my mind latches onto it.
“Chen,” I blurt, jerking back from Kage’s chest so I can look at both of them. “Where is he? Have you heard anything? Did you even call the police?”
The shift in their expressions is instant. Nox goes still, Kage staring at me like I’ve just said something dangerous.
“Wren…” Nox starts, his tone careful and calculated. “We’re taking care of it.”
“Why would you be taking care of it? Why aren’t the police taking care of it?” My voice is shaking now. “He was fucking attacked, Nox! He could be dead, and you’re just standing here acting like it’s just another thing on your damn to-do list!”
“We didn’t call the cops,” Kage admits bluntly.
My mouth falls open. “You what?! Why the hell not?!”
Nox grinds his teeth together, trying to piece the right words together, I’m sure. “Because this isn’t something the cops can handle. We called Jimmy. Trust us, Wren. It’s better this way.”
“No!” My laugh comes out like some kind of crazy person. “You keep saying that but you never actually tell me shit! Chen gets kidnapped, my apartment gets trashed, you show up in the middle of the night covered in blood, and you expect me not to question it? And who the fuck even is Jimmy?!”
Kage curses under his breath, dragging a hand across his buzzed head. Nox doesn’t even answer me. Of course he fucking doesn’t.
“Oh my god,” I whisper, the pieces crashing together in my head like they’re made of magnets. “Who am I even sleeping with? I don’t even know you!”
“Wren—” Nox’s voice trembles, but I’m already shaking my head, backing towards the far side of the bed.
“You’ve been lying to me this whole time,” I choke out, tears streaming down my face. “Both of you! You kept making these promises, but all you’ve done is kept me in the dark and gaslit me into thinking everything was fine!”
“We were trying to protect you,” Kage says. “Every choice we made was for you, little bird.”
“Don’t call me that right now. I can’t—just don’t.”
“Fuck this,” Kage bites out, spinning to face Nox. “She deserves to know.”
“Kage—” Nox warns, his voice dark. “You know what we have to do if she doesn’t understand.”
“She will understand,” Kage snarls. “I can feel it. She’s not like other people. She’ll get it.”
I look between them confused as all hell, my heart pounding so fucking hard, it hurts. “Understand what? What the hell are you two talking about?”
Neither of them moves or says anything, both staring down at the floor as if willing it to answer for them. The moment Kage looks up at me, I can see the choice he makes in his eyes before he even opens his mouth.
“We kill people, Wren.” His voice is calm. Too fucking calm and casual for the words that just spilled from his lips. “People who run the kind of sick, twisted shit that ruined me. We hunt them down, and we end them. Every last one.”
My knees almost give out as I just stare at him dumbfounded. “You…you what?”
“They’re all part of a ring,” Kage continues like he couldn’t stop himself if he tried. “A network of monsters who trade in flesh and pain for cash. We’ve been dismantling them one by one, and that night we picked you up at your apartment covered in blood? We weren’t hunting. Not deer, at least.”
I stagger back, my hand flying to cover my mouth, trying to muffle the scream that threatens to escape me. It gets stuck somewhere between my lungs and my throat, strangled by shock.
Nox’s gaze cuts to me, his expression filled with worry. “Kage, stop. Look at her. She’s panicking.”
“I’m not stopping,” Kage says, his voice laced with fury and desperation. “She deserves the truth. The ones we kill, they go after women, children, people like Chen. Those people don’t deserve to live, Wren. People who touch other people without their permission, don’t deserve to fucking live.”
His last sentence causes something inside me to snap, and I can feel the moment the darkest parts of me start to creep to the forefront. I should run, maybe even turn them in. But instead, I lift my chin, staring him down through my tears.
“Then let me help you,” I whisper, the words escaping in one shaky breath.
Both men freeze, Kage’s lips parting like he’s about to say something but doesn’t.
He almost looks as if he doesn’t know if he heard me correctly or not.
Nox’s eyes narrow with suspicion and a whole lot of caution.
I don’t blame him. Any sane person wouldn’t want to help kill someone, but clearly I’m not sane.
“You don’t know what you’re asking for, Wren,” Nox says, his voice laced with danger.
“Yes, I do,” I bite back. “These monsters…I had one too. He took everything from me a long time ago. They don’t get to keep taking.”
Kage’s whole body tenses, fists clenching on his lap as his nostrils flare.
“They hurt you?” he growls. His voice is so guttural, it’s almost unrecognizable. “Tell me who, Wren. I’ll fucking kill them.”
“Kage,” Nox warns, gripping his arm, but Kage shakes him off, his wild gaze locked on me.
“I knew it,” Kage says, a wicked grin curling on his lips. “I fucking knew there was darkness beneathe that pretty little exterior.”