Chapter 13 Melanie
Melanie
Aboom echoed through the kitchens, and all three of us flinched as the huge door to the refrigerator room rattled, and pain burst through our shoulders.
Caspian roared from the other side of the door, and the agony increased.
I could tell from the way Caspian paced that the room he was trapped in was at least five metres squared.
What Sin said was true; the closer we got, the more it hurt, and now Kai and I leant against one of the hard counters of the restaurant kitchen just to keep ourselves upright.
“What are we supposed to do now?” I asked. Because my single urge, the one thing pounding through me along with Caspian’s pain, was that I needed to be with him. We all did. He needed his mates, and I felt like I was going to pass out if I didn’t touch him soon.
“It’s an easy enough mechanism,” Sin said as he tried the handle. But with the padlock in place, it rattled and wouldn’t move. “Did you keep any of your pins?” he asked Kai, but he shook his head.
He nuzzled me for the hundredth time since we had stood up in the corridor. “Are you still here?” he murmured.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I promised him as I squeezed my arm around his back.
I could think more clearly, even though Caspian’s rage was like a drug. I wanted to feed on it, to bring it inside my body, to heal him and protect him, and show him I was his omega.
“He’s doing it again,” Kai growled. “Don’t let him suck you in, Brandy. You don’t have to be his saviour. Don’t let him twist your mind; just stay with me.”
Even though his voice was hard, his fear hadn’t faded.
Once this was all over, if it was ever over, I needed to lie down with Kai and hold him until he knew he didn’t need to be scared that I would leave him. As long as the four of us were together, we could do it.
But the pull of Caspian’s bite was so strong that I wanted to go to the fridge door, to open it up, to jump into the room with the snarling beast.
I’d read so many things about how dangerous rogue alphas could be.
It was basically my hobby. Considering how Caspian had treated me since we first met, I couldn’t believe that I would be safe if I listened to my omega instincts and went to him.
Even if I was bonded to him, there were so many stories of alphas killing their omegas in rut, let alone a rogue state.
Kai released me. “I’ll go find the key or something else,” he said, his panic flaring up again.
“Are you still with us?” he asked, turning to me.
“You don’t need to keep asking.” I gave him a weak smile, but he must have known that I couldn’t hold out for much longer without them.
“I’ll be back, I promise,” he said, rubbing his cheek against mine before he kissed me. “I love you,” he whispered again, shooting off before I could reply.
There was another bang, another roar, another snarl, and I whimpered.
Sin jerked, his hand still pressed against the reinforced door of the refrigerator, sending his aura through it to calm Caspian down.
“Come here, Melanie,” Sin said, holding out his other hand.
I wasn’t even sure if I could make it five paces across the room to him. But I needed my alphas. Even if Sin hadn’t bitten me yet, he was mine as well.
Summoning the strength Kai was so sure I had, I pushed myself off of the counter, running towards him before the pain became too much. Even with everything happening with Caspian, my stomach stabbed mercilessly.
I fell into his arms, and he sighed in relief as he tugged me closer. “How are you doing? Has the pain become manageable?”
“I don’t know if manageable is the right word here,” I murmured to him, pressing my face to his shoulder.
It was constant. There were no spikes or pulses. Just this endless wavelength where everything was untamed and out of control, and Caspian’s entire body screamed with it. But the closer I got to him, the easier it was to breathe, like my heart was being built up again.
I looked at the thick steel door of the fridge, hoping that Caspian was still safe inside. Apart from aching fists and toes, it didn’t feel like he was wounded anywhere.
It had to be cold in there, but I didn’t know if that was a good or bad thing. It could be that he was so pent up with the fire of his rogue state that cool air helped keep him calm.
“Well, isn’t this sweet?” The one voice I didn’t want to hear bounced around the kitchen, and Sin and I instantly froze.
She didn’t hear my gasp, but I heard her smirk before Zania strode towards us, along with the click of her heels that echoed on the tiled floor. “I thought you would have run away in shame after your performance in the restaurant.”
My lips instantly pulled back over my teeth, and a growl rumbled from me as I turned to face her.
“I was hoping you’d be so embarrassed that you’d run away as well,” she said.
Zania paused just two steps away from us, folding her arms, posing in her black dress with a haughty look on her face.
Her hyacinth scent swept out over us, and nausea instantly hit me, followed by a roar from the other side of the door. I cried out, shuddering, panting, bursting as the door suddenly rattled. Caspian threw his right fist into it, the pain flooding up to my shoulder.
My jaw grit and I hissed as my left foot crumpled, and the door shook again as Caspian kicked it.
“This is rather pathetic to watch,” she said as her sneer deepened. “This must be so difficult for you, especially considering that you stole a bite from my son. But if you cleave now, you can save yourself,” Zania said with an easy shrug.
“W-what?” I gasped, my hand pressing hard against my stomach like that would somehow ease the pain from her mate’s kick. I didn’t know if Kai really killed them, but she must have felt it in some way. She couldn’t act so confident when she’d just lost her pack.
“Oh, didn’t you know? They must have kept that little nugget from you as they dragged you down the hall while you were screaming in pain.” She smirked at Sin, but I wouldn’t take my eyes off of her. It could all be a trick just to make me doubt them.
“If you cleave and break the bond while the bite is still fresh, then you won’t have to suffer anymore. Doesn’t that sound nice? To be free from all the pain that’s shattering your mind?”
“It’s not—”
“Don’t talk back to me! Don’t pretend you don’t know what’s happening to you,” her shrill voice showed a crack in her mask.
“I can even see it on your face. If you don’t cleave, you’re going to be left with a broken aura and trapped in your body, unable to move for the rest of your life. And it will all be their fault.”
Like my mum, and the way she was stuck in that room in Greensprings, all because of one stroke. I had the chance to stop it, to change the outcome.
But as soon as I found the bond that tied me to Caspian and tugged on it, he yelled out from the other side of the door, and a whimper pulled from me.
Zania was the one who locked her son in there; she was the one causing us all this pain.
I didn’t get the full story because there was only so much information I could find about them, but it wasn’t the first time Caspian had gone rogue.
So, she should have known that he was prone to it, and that the way he had been since he showed up to the restaurant should have been enough to tell her he had been close.
So, no matter what she said about Sin and Kai being to blame for the way I was collapsing, it was clearly her who caused it all.
“Even if it is true, do you really think I’m going to listen to the words of someone who spits out insults all the time? Why should I listen to you?”
“It’s either cleave from my son, or go insane. The choice is obvious.”
I took a leaf out of Kai’s book and used his argument to make it seem like I had any idea of what I was talking about.
“Zania,” I said, feeling filthy even just saying her name. “I’ve just bonded the Risler pack. Why the hell would I cleave? Even if Caspian loses his mind, think how much money I’ll get just from his bite. I’d be crazy to give that up.” I said.
Her smirk vanished, her nostrils flaring. “How dare you! There’s no way you could ever think of entering society with my son. I’ll forbid it, I’ll disown him, and you won’t see anything from me.”
I shrugged my shoulders as Caspian slammed himself against the refrigerator door, and I hid my pain.
“Sure, try it. Let’s see how that goes. And then we can disappear and never set foot in this country again, just like you asked me to. You’ll never see your precious son, and we won’t ever have to deal with you.”
Her growl shuddered through me, and it felt like I had actually made a dent.
“How would your pride take it if your son would rather run off to another country with a Knottinghill whore than be anywhere near you?”
There was another crack as her face twisted, her arms unfolding as she took another step towards us.
Her hyacinth scent thickened as anger set in, nearly choking me. I squeezed Sin’s arm, hoping his presence would still keep me safe from her.
“And what about your mother?” she asked, a slow smile spreading across her face.
“Excuse me?”
“You might think that my son can protect you, but what happens if someone visits your mother’s room late at night? And all those little wires and tubes keeping her alive are mysteriously disconnected.”
The world instantly went stark and silent as the implication of what she was saying sunk in.
My eyelids fluttered as I forced myself to stay calm, but it felt like she could see my panic.
I knew Caspian could feel me, too, and another roar tore from behind us. There was more banging and muffled yelling as Caspian reacted to my stab of fear.
It shouldn’t have been hard to find out about my mum if she did some digging into me. She threatened my life, so why wouldn’t she threaten hers? But it was such a mistake. Because I already had Caspian’s rage feeding me, so I wouldn’t let her win so easily.
He was here with me now. They all were, and I’d worked to get to something like this, where I could face her again.
But this time it was with pride.
Because she had crossed the line. And I wasn’t backing down in fear. I wouldn’t scream and cry and beg anyone else for help.
“I could say the same for you,” I replied, hiding my shaking fists behind my back. “What if Sin opens the fridge and the son you drove rogue goes for you?”
She chuckled as she looked at me. “You’ve been around him for less than a month, and you think that you know my son?
Get over yourself. As if you would understand how valuable the Risler bloodline is to all of us.
If you really understood what was happening, you would see he only bit you because he pitied you. ”
I arched a brow, not quite sure if I heard her properly. Because the Caspian I had seen so far didn’t seem to care about anything like that. Even though he’d done so much to turn me away from them, I never once heard him say anything about bloodlines or whatever craziness she was spouting.
“It’s pathetic that you even dared step into my circle, let alone speak back to me. And it’s utterly foul that my son even touched you. You should be honoured to even be in the same room as me and Caspian.”
Everything was getting too tense. In his rogue state, Caspian reached for the three of us, crashing through his madness to feed my fury over her threat to my family, all while asking us to help him. And I wouldn’t abandon them. Especially when Zania looked down at me so triumphantly.
I wouldn’t let her rule my life. Whether I wanted revenge or she controlled us through forcing me to sever our bond, I wouldn’t let it happen.
I sucked in a breath as Kai appeared in the doorway behind her.
I didn’t know how I knew. Maybe it was the bond, or how Kai smirked, maybe it was the way Sin suddenly let me go, gently nudging me forward to stand on my own.
My Kai drew his fist back, and Sin threw up a gloved hand, snatching the keys out of the air as they soared over Zania’s head.
The energy that had drained from me, the endless pounding rage that came from Caspian, and from being beaten down my whole life, it all surged, screaming from me.
“Now!” I shouted, leaping towards Zania.
There was a click as the padlock unlocked, and my heart burst in my chest as Kai thrust his hands forward.
Zania stumbled, tipping toward me as I stretched out my arms.
I couldn’t think as I grabbed her. We moved in sync as Kai jumped forward, and the handle of the fridge let out a high creak as Sin unlocked the door. Caspian’s roar boomed out behind me the second I grabbed Zania’s arms.
One foot down, I kicked off the floor, spinning up both as the wide jaws of the refrigerator unit opened.
The momentum carried, and I released her at just the right moment to send her flying backwards.
The shock on her face was as vivid as mine as she tumbled backwards.
“Enjoy your bloodline, bitch,” I gasped as Sin heaved his weight, she vanished into the darkness, and the door slammed closed.