Chapter Eight
Jay
I’ve spent the past few hours curled in a fetal position, hyperventilation and sobbing.
I curl into myself further and something pokes into my hip. “Ow!” I hiss, uncurling myself enough retrieve the small pocketknife from my pocket.
Yes!
I forgot I still had it. I could kiss myself right now.
You could end it all, my depression taunts. The suggestion is somewhat tempting. I’d be free, but then that’s one more person Casey will have lost.
I know I said I’m not violent. I’m traumatized. There’s a difference. And when I get triggered—
Slowly, I rub my thumb over the flat part of the silver blade. My thumb gently presses its edge, leaving an indent as I hope it will relieve the urge to cut. It doesn’t. The pressure isn’t enough, and when it’s not completely alleviating, it amplifies my anxiety and need for relief.
Just this once . . . I think to myself and swipe the pad of my thumb over the blade. Like a papercut, it stings only enough to soothe away the thoughts. Finally, I can think clearly.
I roll out my shoulders and manually crack my neck, hyping myself up for a pep talk.
Alright, remember. You are not your trauma. What happened to you is only one chapter, not the whole story. Your issues are part of you but not all of you. You are a survivor who fought because you refused to let that be your ending.
I inhale the positive and exhale the negative. Okay, now to figure out how to get out of here.
I take a few steps to the window, standing as close to the wall as I can. High up on the wall is a squared window with metal bars. I don’t think I can reach it—maybe . . . ?
I grunt and jump, stretching one arm above me and posting the other on the wall, so I don’t face-plant.
Nope. Maybe I can . . .
I grow my talons and try to sink them into the wall. Bad idea. Instantly, I break a nail and clutch my now throbbing finger. “Ow!”
Popping it in my mouth, I suck on it to soothe it. Why is that always the first thing we do when it does nothing? Sure enough, the pain is still there. But I don’t want to dwell on it. At any moment someone could come, and I am not dying down here.
I’d have to saw through the bars without opposable thumbs. It’s a problem of being able to fit through a small window in wolf form. So, that’s out of the question.
“There has to be a way out of here.”
I scan my cell and land on the bucket meant to be my toilet.
I lift a brow.
“That could work.”
It’s deep enough that it could give me a boost. I rush to retrieve it and flip it upside down.
Good thing I haven’t used it yet.
I perch one foot and shift my weight, testing it’s stability. Seems sturdy enough.
Feet planted, I brace one palm and crawl my other fingertips up the wall, teeth clenched on the blade.
On my tiptoes, I stretch as far as I can, but I’m still too far.
Jumping, I grab for the bar and try to hold myself with one arm while sawing with the other.
Close to an actual grip, my fingertips just barely brush against the bar, and I lose my footing on the way down.
I cry out, crashing to the floor, the bucket flips, and the knife clanks to the floor. I land on my side.
“Agh.” I clutch my shoulder as I roll on the floor biting back a scream and settling for a deep groan.
I lie there for a few minutes, waiting for the pain to subside while I contemplate what the actual fuck is my life.
A light appears in the stairwell, halting my train of thought. The sound of footsteps and a horrible scraping sound, like metal on stone, follows.
Someone’s coming.
I shove the knife in my back pocket and stand to see who it is.
Caleb has to duck as he descends from the stairs. Now hiding in the shadows, I can’t see him, but Caleb’s sultry voice is hard to mistake as anyone else. “Are you enjoying the amenities?”
“Amenities?” I look around the room, confused. Then I notice what he is referring to. I chuck my thumb over my shoulder like a hitchhiker, sticking my chin out like a chicken. “Do you mean the bucket?”
His silence confirms he means my glorified toilet.
I shrug, not wanting to give him the satisfaction that any of this is getting to me. “Beats defecating in the woods, I guess.” A chair in his hand screeches as he drags it across the floor, making me jump. He stops at my cell, positions his chair facing my bars, then plops down, bread in hand.
I scrunch my nose in disgust. “You’re going to eat down here?”
He tosses and flips the bread with one hand, watching it. “No. This is an incentive for you.”
“To do what?”
“To talk.”
I’m about to tell him I’m not hungry, but I’m quickly silenced by the growling of my stomach.
Caleb hears it, too, lifting a brow. “Let’s get started. Why did you attack Bloodhound?”
“I didn’t attack you. I just got too close and your men pounced on m—”
“Not yesterday,” he says. “Your attack five months ago.”
My jaw drops. “Your attack,” he said.
It wasn’t just me. I consider his question a moment, then decide what’s done is done, and the leaders who would have not wanted us silent are dead.
And I’m hungry.
“Because Colin wanted Alaina.”
He tears a piece of bread off, places it onto a plate and sets the plate on the floor. He kicks it, and it slides smoothly under the bars to me.
I devour the bread and push the plate back, ready for more.
He tears another piece. “How many of you are there?”
“I don’t know. Hundreds, maybe? Some of us split after Colin’s death.”
Again, we slide the plate back and forth. Each question I answer, he rewards me with bread.
“Split where?”
“Some of them went back to their former packs asking to be let back in. Others killed themselves, scared of retaliation. Some stayed. Others . . . I don’t know.”
“Next question.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a plastic bag with raspberries in it. My favorite. “Who killed the alpha?”
My eyes go wide, and my breath hitches. I wait for an explanation, a whole speech of how he knew it was me, but instead, he’s mute.
He waits patiently, though his jaw ticks.
Do I deny it? Do I tell him? I guess there’s no harm in it. They’re going to kill me anyway, the right thing to do would be to confess.
I take a deep breath, look him dead in the face and shrug. “I don’t know.”
I’m guilty, not stupid.
He slumps in his seat, draping his arm lazily over the back. I’m pretty sure his eyes flash gold, and that he’s not buying it. He waits for me to say more, and my stomach growls again.
Hard to ignore, I want to tell my stomach to hush and join me in my silence. But he’s relentless. I sigh. I can’t tell him everything, but maybe I can tell him enough, so we’re both satisfied.
“Okay, look,” I say. “I don’t know who did it, but I can tell you the what and the why.”
Caleb leans forward, resting his elbows on his thighs. “Go on.”
I swallow hard. I haven’t talked about this to anyone in a long time. The words are there, but when I open my mouth, there’s nothing.
Impatient, his lip twitches. He drops the berries and some bread onto a plate, then slides it over. When I push it back, he dumps the rest of the contents onto the plate.
My mouth waters and stomach growls. Probably because the only consumption happening is my conscious eating away at me.
“Why would someone kill him?”
I bite my bottom lip, looking down at my fingers and fidget.
My explanation, much like my thoughts, are disorganized as I speak.
“I heard they—the rogue—when they were fighting—it was two versus two—and he was going to kill a friend and the other—the other rogue, I mean—they did what they had to do.”
He pauses. When I don’t continue, he jiggles the plate, goading me.
I take a deep breath to try to slow myself down, but the panic from that day creeps in.
“Alaina was being taken by Olivia, and the alpha had one of us by the neck. For a man no one thought he’d fight so hard.
He was strong. He wanted to live . . .” My eyes sink to the floor, ashamed.
Remembering where I am, I blink rapidly out of my somber. “. . . So I’ve heard,” I add.
Caleb’s face drops to the floor and peers up at me through his brow.
He nods as if accepting my answer but glares at me with hatred.
I thought revealing some of the truth would relieve me of some of the guilt, but it still weighs heavily.
I have to stop myself from apologizing.
What do you say to make amends for a murder?
And with the glare he gives me, no way would he ever accept it. He says nothing. He does nothing. Instead, he bites the inside of his cheek. After several moments of this uncomfortable stare down, he gathers the rest of the food and leaves.
***
One unfortunate yet inevitable use of the bucket and several failed escape plans later, and I give up.
I’ve exhausted every idea I can think of that doesn’t involve more bloodshed.
There’s no crack, no ledge, no hole, nothing to work an angle with.
It’s like they don’t want me to escape or something, I say sarcastically.
Rude.
They’re forcing my hand. I’m going to have to fight to get out of here.
While I drum up the logistics of my plan, commotion draws my attention.
I whirl around. It’s coming from outside my window.
To catch a view, I retreat to the opposite wall, but all that’s visible are a pair of boots braced against the metal bars, as if someone is leaning on the wall above my window.
“Look what we found,” a man declares in a singsong tone.
By the sound of it, he sounds rather young. Late twenties maybe. His boots come into view, along with bare feet covered in dirt. I assume they belong to a woman because even with dirt, no way would a man’s toes look that clean.
A thump as smooth-skinned knees of the woman hit the grass in front of the leaner’s boot.
He moves, and the view of the bottom of his foot goes away and widens his stance enough, so I can see between his legs. He chuckles a throaty laugh. “Well, would you look at that. You’re a pretty thing . . . for a rogue.”
Fear ensues, and my heart races rapidly. Doubt creeps in, and I double—triple—check that these grown woman’s legs aren’t my Casey’s. Once I’ve convinced my brain that what I’m seeing is true and not Casey, I’m able to listen over my beating heart.
“. . . Doesn’t match the description.”
I catch only the tail end, but if it’s what I think I experienced, they must be trying to determine if she’s Caleb’s mate. By the sound of it, she’s not.
And I think I know what’s next.
I gasp when I don’t turn away quickly enough. Silence follows her scream, and his grunt and the head of a young woman about my age and with similar features falls to the ground. Her mouth is still quivering, but her olive eyes are void of any life.
I clutch my hands over my mouth and stomach. Fear overcomes my entire nervous system, and I swallow my own bile. Tears pool in my eyes as I shake my head violently back and forth, hoping that wasn’t real.
“Ugh, I’ve got rogue blood on me. I just got this shirt, too,” the other one says, repulsed and lacking humanity.
The way he speaks of this woman with such disdain in his voice is horrifyingly evil. He places things above the person, and it has to be one of the most disgusting things I’ve ever heard.
“Oh well. Better them than us, right?” the young one says, and it strikes my very core. Anger boils inside me. Their preemptive violence is one Thomas Hobbes would argue to be rational. “Hold on.” Few seconds of silence later, and he says. “The boss wants us to check on the prisoner.”
My wolf sits up, the hair standing up on her back and alerts me, incoming threat. And I gear up for a fight, not against them, but to hold back my wolf.