Chapter Twenty One
Taia
“What the fuck are they doing to him?” I growl as I grip the blanket. First, it was forced pleasure, then horrific pain, then more forced pleasure. We’ve gone back and forth for twelve hours now, six of which I spent in the woods before talking myself into coming out to find the guys.
“Just breathe,” Vaughn says, gently rubbing my back.
“No, I want to fucking kill them!” I snap.
“Any word from Micah?” Diego asks.
“No,” Laurent sighs. Caine is pacing the room, and anger is radiating off him.
“It’s been fucking twelve hours!” Caine booms. “Where the fuck did he go? Soren is taken, and he’s just gone?”
“Stop. This isn’t helping her,” Vaughn says.
“He’s helping,” I whisper.
“What?” Laurent asks.
“When I was hiding in the woods,” I sniff, sitting up when the feelings pass. “I peeked out and… Micah was up there looking into the woods after they shot Soren.”
“Goddamnit!” Caine roars.
“I’m sorry,” I say tearfully. “I wanted to help but I…”
“No, no, no,” Vaughn says, cupping my face. “Soren did the right thing by having you hide. This is how you’re helping him. Okay? We will find your mate, I swear to it.”
“I miss him.” I choke out a sob, and they all sit on the bed and surround me with a hug. I pray that Soren can feel this comfort. Wherever he is, I won’t stop until I find him.
When enough time passes that I think I can manage to get up, we all walk downstairs. Laurent starts by making me something to eat while I am placed on the couch. I am wearing one of Soren’s shirts, and his scent is keeping me sane.
Laurent sets a plate of food in my lap, and I stare at it almost like I have forgotten what to do next. It’s simple items—toast, eggs, sliced fruit—but I just sit here. “Eat,” he says gently.
“I’m going to throw my food at the next fucking person who tells me to eat, or calm down, or breathe,” I threaten.
“Good thing it’s not silver,” Vaughn says with the smallest of smiles.
I relax a bit because he’s trying. They are all trying.
I have to remember that Soren is their friend also.
They’ve been together for so long, and they are now losing Micah.
They are feeling things, too, so I have to give them grace.
I guess I could make all of this about me, but what does that solve?
This house feels wrong without Soren’s constantly irritated presence filling every room. No growling or muttering obscenities. There aren’t heavy footsteps stomping across the wood floor. No empty threats that we all know he never means.
Just… silence. Cold, empty silence.
Underneath all of the anger, all I have is his suffering. Pain, forced pleasure, pain, and more forced pleasure. It’s like they’re taking turns breaking him apart and forcing his body to betray him, but why?
I grip the blanket around my shoulders and force myself to pick up a slice of buttered toast. I am shaking so badly that crumbs fall on his shirt.
Soren’s shirt.
His scent.
My throat tightens, and my eyes burn. I take a bite and chew, but the bread turns to paste in my mouth. I don’t want it. My stomach doesn’t want it, but if I am going to get Soren back, I have to take care of myself. I can’t be stubborn and collapse because I stop eating.
Henry would like that too much. Micah too. That thought makes me swallow that bite and take another. And another.
Laurent, Caine, and Vaughn sit with me as I eat, and no one talks. No one touches me. We all know we need this moment to reset before we go to war. I just want him back.
“Have you heard anything?” I ask finally.
“About what?” Caine asks.
“Micah…” I ask, and the room goes quiet.
“No,” Diego says. “His phone is off, location is disabled, and everything is wiped.”
“Of course it is,” I mutter. “Sneaky little bitch.”
Vaughn huffs a laugh, but it dies quickly. I set the plate down because I can’t force another bite. “We don’t know that,” Laurent says, and I turn to give him a deadpan expression. “Yeah, I fucking know.”
“Soren trusted him,” I say, the ache in my chest feeling like someone is twisting a knife. I curl deeper into the blanket and press my face into Soren’s shirt. I let myself breathe him in. Leather, smoke, blood. Something dark, clean, and painfully him.
A tremor moves through my body—not mine, his—and I suck in a breath as heat crawls up my spine. My thighs clench on instinct, and humiliation floods me a second later.
“No,” I whine to myself.
“What?” Vaughn asks, sitting up to face me.
“Nothing.”
“Talia…” he says gently.
“I said nothing!” I snap.
“You are absolutely not fine,” Diego says.
“Good fucking observation,” I say harshly. “I’m going to lie down.”
“You shouldn’t be alone,” Vaughn tells me carefully.
“No,” I say. “If I have to feel what they are doing to him, I need to be alone. I can’t sit here with you all staring at me.”
“He wouldn’t want you alone,” Caine offers, and he’s right.
“Yeah, well… He’s not here,” I say. My words land like a gunshot, and the room is silent again. I turn and climb the stairs before I can apologize.
The room smells like us. Like blood, sex, sleep, and every fragile little piece of peace we were stupid enough to build here.
The bed is still messy, and his pillow is still dented from where he lay next to me.
My dress from the picnic is draped carefully over the chair because he told me he liked it, so I want to take care of it. I walk to it and touch the soft fabric.
The stupid, beautiful dress.
The stupid, perfect date.
The stupid, incredible way he looked at me like I was more than the awful things that have happened to me.
A sob breaks out before I can stop it. I press my fist to my mouth and sink onto the edge of the bed. I can still see him falling. I can picture the way his head exploded.
No. He’s alive. I know he is, and that’s the cruelest part of all of this. If he were gone, maybe there would be silence. Maybe the bond would snap, and the pain I feel would be different. Maybe I would fall into whatever hollow place mates go with their other half is ripped away from them.
This? This is worse, because every few minutes, his body reminds mine that he is out there somewhere, hurting. Needing me. Somewhere I can’t reach yet.
Yet.
That is what is holding me together. I will find him. I will save him. I will bring him back to me.
I crawl into bed and pull his pillow against my chest. I press my face into it, breathing him in until my lungs ache.
“I’m coming for you,” I whisper. “I don’t know how yet, but I’m going to save you.” The bond pulses, and for a second, I swear I feel him. No pain or pleasure, but him. A faint, distant warmth brushes against the inside of my ribs. My eyes fly open, and I stare into the dark. “Soren?”
Nothing. I sit up, clutching the pillow as if it can answer me. “Soren?” I whisper again. The room stays silent. Of course, it does. I laugh once, and it comes out broken. “Great. Now I’m talking to the magical vampire in my chest. Very normal. Very sane.”
Exhaustion drags at me, but I’m afraid to sleep. What if something happens? What if the bond changes? What if he needs me and I’m unconscious like some useless…
Pain explodes in my abdomen. I choke on a scream and fold forward, clutching my stomach. It feels like something hot and serrated is being dragged through me, slow and deliberate. My body locks, and every muscle goes rigid.
“Oh God,” I gasp. “Soren.”
The pain twists deeper, and I bite down on the pillow to keep from screaming loudly enough to bring the guys running. I don’t want them in here. I don’t want anyone in here. If Soren has to endure this alone, then I can, too.
That’s stupid.
Truly the dumbest shit I’ve done.
But it’s my choice.
The pain shifts, spreading lower, turning into something vile. My skin goes hot, and my stomach rolls when forced pleasure blooms in my belly, taking over the agony. This is somehow worse, though.
“I’m going to kill them,” I growl into the pillow when, yet again, it feels like something large is being shoved into my ass, only it’s not mine.
It’s him. Someone is raping my mate, and unbridled rage starts to boil.
This is easily the tenth time, and that’s not counting the individual orgasms they have forced out of him.
Soren is trapped inside his own body while someone invades him, and I can feel how helpless he feels. I can feel his loneliness.
All the rage has dissolved away, and it’s just fear. He’s afraid, and I can’t help him. That thought breaks me.
Soren, who snapped necks like it was an average Tuesday. Soren, who threatened everyone in the room for looking at me for too long. Soren, who said and did terrible things because softness scared him more than violence ever could. Until now. Unless they stole it all away from him. From me.
My monster.
My peace.
My mate.
A sob tears out of me, muffled by the pillow. “I’m here,” I whisper, even though he can’t hear me. “I’m here. I’m still here.”
The pain spikes again. This time, I can’t swallow the scream. It rips out of me, raw and broken. I immediately slap my hand over my mouth when I hear movement downstairs. Fast. Too fast.
“No,” I choke out. “No, no, no. Stay down there.”
Footsteps hit the stairs anyway, so I roll off the bed and stumble toward the bathroom. I lock the door behind me even though it won’t make a damn bit of difference if they decide to break it down to check on me.
“Talia?” Vaughn calls from the bedroom.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re a shitty liar,” Laurent says.
“Go away.”
“No,” Vaughn answers.
“Please,” I choke out, and it’s followed by silence.
“We’re right here,” Vaughn says, softer this time.
“I said go away!” I yell at them.
“We heard you.”
“Then why won’t you go away?” I ask tearfully.
“He’d kill us if we left you alone,” Diego answers.
That makes me laugh and cry at the same time. “He’s not here to kill you.”
“No, but you are,” Vaughn says.
Another wave hits, and I slam my head back against the cabinet, my teeth clenched so hard that my jaw aches.
“Talia,” Caine says softly.
“Don’t come in,” I gasp. “Please…”
“We won’t…” Laurent promises.
I curl onto my side on the cool tile, Soren’s shirt twisted in my fists.
The cold floor presses against my cheek while my body burns from the inside out.
I try to breathe through it. I try to be quiet.
I try to send whatever I can through the bond.
Comfort. Rage. Love. Anything to make him feel even slightly better.
I don’t know if he can feel any of it, but I try.
“I love you,” I whisper. “I love you, you stupid, stubborn, impossible asshole. So you better hold on. You hear me? You don’t get to leave me after making me love you. That’s not how forever works.”
The bond gives another weak pulse. Or maybe I imagine it. Either way, I cling to it.
Time stops meaning anything. Pain comes in waves until I can’t tell where one ends and another begins. Forced pleasure. Burning agony. Nausea. Distant terror. His body betraying him. All while my body echoes it.
Underneath all of it, there is a thin thread of him hanging on.
Still there.
Still mine.
Still alive.
Eventually, the shakes slow, but they don’t stop. They never stop. They’re dull enough that I can breathe without shaking apart. I hear the others outside the door.
“Talia?” Vaughn calls.
“I’m here,” I say, my voice broken and raw from screaming.
“You scared the shit out of us,” Laurent says, and his tone tells me he’s not lying.
“Good. Keeps you young,” I mumble.
“Asshole,” Caine says, making a sound that is almost like a strangled laugh.
“I learned from the best,” I say, my eyes growing heavier. This tile is uncomfortable, my body aches, and my throat feels torn from the pain ripping through me in waves of screams.
I’m too tired to move, but too scared to sleep. I press my palm against my chest where the bond lives, and close my eyes. “I’m coming, Soren,” I whisper, one last time. The pain hums beneath my skin like a warning of what is to come before the exhaustion drags me under.