Chapter Forty-Six
Forty-Six
Elsie
My eyes swung down the hallway to meet Calvin’s as I closed Forge’s door behind me. His gaze drifted down my clothing and then snapped back up to my face. The shock and … well, horror in his expression didn’t bode well for this talk. I started toward him, doing my best to smile.
“Uh, hey. We need to talk,” I told him, hoping he kept his mouth shut until we got inside my room.
“What the hell are you thinking?” he asked a little too loudly.
I winced. Shut up, Calvin. Please.
I put a finger to my lips to shush him. “In my room,” I hissed, annoyed by his reaction.
He didn’t move out of my way when I reached him. Instead, he pointed a finger toward Forge’s door, still with the horrified look on his face. “Did you sleep in there?” he demanded. “Are those his clothes?” His tone was incredulous as he asked a question he already knew the answer to.
“Yes, and yes. Now be quiet and get in that room,” I told him, pointing at it.
“I thought you said you weren’t sleeping with him?” He threw up his hands. “Since when do we lie to each other? And why? Why would you do that? You’re a virgin!”
Okay, whoa. How had he known that? I’d not told him that bit of information. Also, if he would lower his freaking voice, that would be helpful.
“Calvin, you have got to stop talking and go in that room,” I urged him.
“Did you … have you been …” He stopped and shook his head. “I can’t. I just can’t believe you’d have sex with him. Or did you not? Jesus, Els, this is insane. You’re smarter than this.”
I was getting annoyed. He was acting as if I’d just walked out of the room of an escaped convict. It was his cousin, for crying out loud. One he had trusted enough to leave me under his roof. In the room down from his. I didn’t see how my sleeping with him was so offensive.
“Calvin, while I do not understand your over-the-top reaction to this, I do get that you are upset. I will discuss this with you in my room,” I said, shoving him back toward the door.
He barely stumbled backward. “No, we are going to find Oz. Pack what things you want to keep or leave it all here. I don’t care.
We can talk on the ride to the airport. It’s time I get you out of here.
” He ran his hand through his hair with a determined look on his face now.
“This is my fault. I put you here while you were emotional and not thinking clearly. I get it. But it’s time to go. You’re safe now.”
I opened my mouth to argue because I wasn’t getting in any car with him and leaving.
“Yeah, that’s not gonna be happening.” Forge’s voice might have sounded calm, but I recognized the threat laced in his words.
Shit! Dammit, Calvin, why could you not have shut up and gone into my freaking room?!
Calvin stalked past me, and I spun around to grab him, but he was too fast. What was he doing?!
“You slept with her! She is grieving, and you used her vulnerable state for your … your benefit!” Calvin shouted.
Oh God! I broke into a run to do something. I didn’t know what.
“Calvin!” I called out frantically. “That is not what happened. I am not vulnerable.”
Then he was there. In Forge’s face, pointing his finger at him. I was seconds away from screaming for Oz.
“Elsie is not some slut you can use—” Calvin’s words were cut off as Forge grabbed his collar and slammed his back against the wall.
“I will slice your fucking tongue out if you ever use that word and Elsie’s name in the same goddamn sentence again,” Forge sneered.
“She’s in your clothes!” Calvin said, but his tone had taken a turn. I heard the hesitancy in it.
“Forge! Stop!” I demanded.
That did no good. Forge leaned closer until he was in Calvin’s face. Then I saw it. The flash of metal. A strangled scream tore from me as Forge pressed a blade against Calvin’s throat.
“You’re not taking her from me. She’s not yours to control.” The cold tone he used wasn’t like anything I’d heard before.
“Forge!” I wailed.
“I will start with your fingers. Slicing them off one by one,” Forge said, tilting his head and looking down at Calvin’s hand. “Then move to your useless dick and then your tongue before I sink this blade into your neck.”
“HELP!” I screamed as I watched the nightmare unfolding before me.
Forge had morphed into a deranged monster right before my eyes. The man that Calvin had warned me about. The killer I hadn’t believed he could be.
“FORGE!”
Oz’s sharp command didn’t even faze him. He stayed like that with his knife to Calvin’s throat. The only family I had left in the world.
A sob tore from me, and Forge’s head snapped around, his eyes landing on me. The empty blackness only made me cry harder. Where was the man who had been in that room with me just minutes ago? The one I had fallen in love with.
He lowered the blade from Calvin’s neck, and Oz was behind him, locking his arms back and pulling him away. Calvin’s feet hit the ground with a thud as Forge let him go.
“Take her and go,” Oz told Calvin.
“NO!” Forge roared, fighting against his brother’s hold.
“Now,” Oz added.
Calvin’s gaze swung from Oz to me. The terror in his gaze as he waited for me to do something hurt my heart. I’d put him here. He’d gone through that because of me. But leaving meant …
I turned my tear-filled eyes to Forge. The brutal, disturbing gleam was gone. I could see the silent plea and the distress. I knew that I would fall apart over and over again as I replayed this moment in my head. It would haunt me for the rest of my life.
But I also knew I couldn’t stay. Not with a man who was going to kill my best friend.
His own cousin. The level of deranged that took would destroy us both in the end.
He didn’t love me. I was the one who would suffer the most because even now, I was still in love with him.
I’d become a possession for him. Something he wanted to keep until he no longer wanted it.
I was too broken already. I couldn’t fix him too. We were two wounded souls who would never work.
Dropping my gaze to the floor, I walked toward Calvin. I couldn’t look at Forge while I left.
“Elsie, no,” Forge pleaded.
Another sob shook me, but I kept walking. I had to. He wasn’t mentally well. Something had to be wrong with him.
When I reached Calvin, he took my arm, and a roar rattled the walls. I jumped, and Calvin almost broke into a run.
“NOOOO!” Forge’s voice tore through me, shredding all that was left of my heart.
“Hurry,” Calvin told me, and I had to jog to keep from being dragged behind him.
I could hear Oz talking to Forge, and I hoped he would be okay. One of us needed to be, and it would never be me.
Forge Savelle had been the cause of my greatest joy and the reason for my complete shattering.