Chapter Thirty-Two
Isla
I ordered an Uber with shaking fingers, my breath coming in short, anxious puffs as I paced the driveway.
The space that had felt like home with all that junk food suddenly felt too big.
My phone buzzed with Noah's location pin, and I stared at it in disbelief. Part of me still couldn't process that Noah was somehow involved in whatever trouble Crew had gotten himself into.
But he'd sounded calm on the phone. That was the Noah I remembered, wasn't it?
"Everything okay, miss?" the Uber driver asked as I slid into the backseat, catching my reflection in his rearview mirror. My face was pale, and my eyes were wide with worry.
"Fine," I lied, my voice tight. “I just need to get there quickly, please."
The city blurred past in streaks of brick and glass, familiar neighborhoods transforming into something alien under my anxiety .
I kept checking my phone, but no new messages from Crew or Noah came in.
The silence felt ominous, feeding the knot of dread in my stomach.
As we drove deeper into the outskirts, the buildings gave way to trees, the roads narrowing until we were winding through dense woods.
Oak Park sprawled across acres of grass and trees, but its familiar sight didn’t ease anything in me.
The driver pulled into a small gravel lot bordered by towering trees. The air smelled of pond and damp earth, heavy with the promise of rain.
Two vehicles sat in the dim light, a black car I didn't recognize, and Noah's familiar white sedan.
"You can let me out here," I told the driver.
My heart pounded painfully against my ribs as I climbed out and spotted figures standing near the tree line.
Noah stood near his car, his familiar frame unmistakable even at a distance. He was dressed in khakis and a blue button-down, always put-together.
His sandy hair was neatly styled, his posture relaxed as if he were simply enjoying an afternoon in the park.
Beyond him, closer to the trees, I could see Crew and the two men from the video.
My brother's face was tight with anger, his shoulders held in the iron grip of the larger man.
The world narrowed to a single point of focus—my brother, caught in a situation I didn't understand but instinctively knew was dangerous.
"Crew!" I called, breaking into a run across the uneven ground.
"Isla, don't!" Crew shouted back, struggling against the man's grip. "It's a trap! Get out of here!"
His words didn't register properly—all I could see was my little brother being held by strangers, and I needed to reach him.
I pushed harder, my cardigan slipping off one shoulder as I crunched over roots and rocks in my desperation.
"Isla, stop," Noah called, moving to intercept me, his longer legs eating up the distance between us.
I tried to dodge around him, single-minded in my determination to get to Crew.
"Let him go!" I shouted at the men holding my brother. "What do you want? I can pay you?—"
“RUN!” Crew yelled, struggling against his captors with renewed fury. "Isla, just fucking run ! Call Adrian!”
I was almost to him when stronger arms suddenly wrapped around my waist from behind, yanking me backward with enough force to knock the breath from my lungs.
I screamed, more from shock than pain, as I was pulled back on my feet, body slammed flush against a chest that felt wrong.
"Let me go!" I gasped, twisting in the iron grip. "Noah, what are you doing?"
"What I should have done a year ago," his voice hissed in my ear, and the venom in it turned my blood to ice.
This wasn't the Noah I knew—the sometimes annoying but ultimately harmless ex-boyfriend.
This was someone else wearing his face, someone whose grip felt like shackles.
"You think you can humiliate me?" he continued, his arms tightening like steel bands around my ribcage.
"Post pictures with that tattooed freak for the whole world to see? When you didn’t even do that with me?”
The photo. He'd seen the photo from Adrian's fight, the one where Adrian's hand wrapped around my throat in the ring.
The possessive claim that had made my followers swoon had triggered this?
"Noah, please," I gasped, still fighting to break free. "You're acting insane.”
"Good," he snarled, beginning to drag me toward his car. "Do you have any idea what it felt like? Seeing you with him? Knowing everyone was laughing at me?"
This wasn't about Crew. This wasn't about helping anyone. This was about Noah's wounded pride.
The realization hit me—I’d walked straight into a trap, and now we were both in danger.
"Your brother was just bait," Noah said, his voice eerily calm now, almost conversational as he manhandled me away from the scene.
"Amazing how easy it was. One fake text pretending to be your new freaky boyfriend, and he came running."
The casual admission made my stomach lurch.
"You bastard," I spat, redoubling my efforts to escape. But Noah was stronger than I knew, more determined, driven by a year's worth of festering resentment.
"Let Isla go!" Crew roared, his voice breaking as he watched Noah force me toward the car.
The raw terror in my brother's eyes cut deeper than any physical pain as he fought and fought, but couldn’t beat two larger men.
Noah ignored him completely, focused entirely on getting me into his car.
His hands were gripping my arms, covering my mouth when I tried to scream, holding me against his chest as he dragged me backwards.
This wasn't the careful, considerate man I'd dated. This was someone who'd snapped completely.
"We're going to take a little trip," he whispered against my ear, his breath hot and wrong. "Somewhere your psychotic boyfriend can't find us. Somewhere we can fix whatever’s wrong with you.”
The implication in his words sent nausea rolling through me. I fought harder, kicking backward, trying to twist from his grip.
"I'll never go anywhere with you! Adrian will find me, and he’ll kill you for this!”
Noah laughed, the sound cold and unfamiliar, nothing like the warm chuckle I remembered from our better days .
"The great Catalyst? Where is he now, then? You shouldn’t date demons.”
We were almost at his car now, and panic flooded through me as I realized he was going to succeed. He was stronger than me.
The men holding Crew were watching with detached interest, making no move to help either of us.
"Please," I begged, changing tactics, forcing my body to go still against him. "Noah, this isn't you. Let me go, and we can talk. Just you and me."
His grip loosened fractionally at my softer tone, and I felt a surge of hope.
"You want to talk now?" he asked, suspicion warring with desire in his voice.
"Yes," I lied, forcing my body to relax against him. "Just... not like this. Not with Crew involved."
His eyes turned wild again, a stranger's eyes in a face I once thought I knew.
“Too bad. You’re not you, either. Dating a fucking psychopath,” he snarled, fingers digging into my arms as he spun me around, pressing me against the side of his car.
"Get in the car," he hissed, reaching behind me to wrench open the back door. "Now."
I tried to scream again, but his hand muffled the sound.
With brutal efficiency, he began shoving me into the backseat, one arm wrapped around my waist while the other maintained its grip over my mouth.
Tears streamed down my face as I realized I was losing this fight.
Crew had gone quiet, but I couldn't turn to see him, couldn't call out to reassure him that I knew Adrian would find me—that Adrian would fix this.
All I could focus on was Noah's hands on me, the car door open behind me, and the sickening knowledge of what would happen once I was inside.
And then, like a miracle, Noah's grip vanished.
A shadow moved at the edge of my vision—massive, fast, lethal.
Noah's shadow disappeared as something slammed into him with the force of a train, sending him sprawling across the grass behind me with a strangled cry.
I stumbled forward, catching myself against the car, and turned to see a sight that froze the blood in my veins.
Noah was on the ground, his face contorted in agony, a strangled noise escaping his throat.
Standing over him, a face a mask of cold fury I'd never seen before, was Adrian.
He looked like death incarnate, his jade knife buried to the hilt in my ex-boyfriend's shoulder. His knife that was inside of me…
Blood bloomed across Noah's shirt, dark and spreading, while he writhed on the ground in agony.
But it was Adrian's face that truly shocked me. I’d never seen him like this.
Gone was every trace of the playful, goofy man who fed his piranhas and wore ridiculous crop tops.
This was something that had been hiding beneath human skin.
"Hello, Noah," he said, his voice terrifyingly calm despite the rage burning in his green eyes. "I believe you have something that belongs to me."
Noah tried to speak, to plead, but Adrian twisted the knife, and he screamed instead. The sound echoed across the empty park like a wounded animal's cry.
"Did you really think you could take her?" Adrian asked, pulling the knife out with deliberate slowness before driving it into Noah's other shoulder. "Did you think I wouldn't find you?"
He didn't even glance in my direction as he reached down and lifted Noah by his throat, the muscles in his arm flexing as he dangled my ex-boyfriend off the ground with disturbing ease.
Noah's feet kicked uselessly in the air, his hands clawing at Adrian's iron grip.
Blood dripped from his wounds, spattering the grass below in crimson droplets. Each drop hit the ground with a sickening rhythm that matched my thundering heartbeat.
My eyes darted frantically around the scene, suddenly registering the rest of our surroundings.
Connor and Jax stood several yards away with Crew safely between them.
My brother's eyes were wide with shock as he stared at me, but he appeared unharmed, thank God.
The two men who had been holding him lay unmoving on the ground nearby, their stillness telling its own story of what Connor and Jax had done to them.
Connor's hand rested firmly on Crew's shoulder, keeping him in place despite my brother's obvious desire to run to me.
I turned back in horror as Adrian finally dropped Noah, stepping back as my ex crumpled to the ground, unconscious or too weak to move.
And then, Adrian looked to me.
His green eyes were dark and wild, devoid of the warmth and playfulness I'd grown accustomed to.
Blood—Noah's blood— was splattered on his shirt and face.
He looked like something feral, something untamed, something that wanted to rip the body in front of him to shreds.
I felt like prey.
Adrian stepped toward me slowly, his movements fluid and predatory as he stepped over Noah's crumpled form.
The knife still hung loosely in his grip, dripping red onto the grass, but I couldn't tear my eyes away from his face, from the stranger staring at me through Adrian's familiar features.
For a moment, something flickered in his eyes—relief, possession, fierce and territorial. But underneath it all was a question: Why didn't you trust me?
"Angel," he growled, taking a step toward me, his bloody hand still gripping the bloodied knife.
I couldn't answer. Couldn't explain .
Couldn't do anything but react to the terror of seeing what I'd caused, what my silence had wrought.
My body reacted before my mind could process what was happening.
I turned.
And I ran.