by Brynn Burke
No Mother.
No Father.
I’m alone.
All alone.
* * *
I abhor reliving memories of my past. I guess it’s the downfall to my abilities. My memories… I remember everything. Every little detail. There is no getting rid of the things I’ve seen or done. It’s sort of like a photographic memory… I seem to be able to rid other people’s memories from my head… just not my own.
That was one the worst day of my life. My mother didn’t deserve what was done to her. Her being human…
Maybe that’s why I sympathize so much with them. Maybe my profession was my own way of seeking justice for the wrong doings done to the humans by supernatural king.
I never confronted my father, never felt the need to. I know what was done and nothing is going to change the fact that my beautiful mother is gone, never to return.
I know deep down that Archer is vile, has no heart, and gets his rocks off by tormenting the weak. I also know that my mother was not his true mate… no one could kill their true mate, let alone hurt them in anyway.
Never in my life have I thought about someone, anyone, besides myself. I know what type of man I am. I am selfish and greedy bastard. Taking what I want, when I want it and I feel no remorse about doing it. I also know that the type of life I live is dangerous and it is one of the main reasons I have never let anyone in.
I mean, I fucking kill for a living.
I hunt down men and women who have done unspeakable things. I’m not saying there has been no retaliation, either. Of course, there have been family and friends of the supernaturals I have taken out who want to defend their honor. Truthfully, there’s no point. The person is dead. They need to get over it but instead they come after me and I have no choice but to defend myself. That usually ends with their deaths. I’m not a monster, but that’s what killing makes me feel like. I hate what my life has become but at the end of the day I am getting the revenge all those innocent humans deserve.
I stand up and start pacing. My whole body feels this need to find the girl whose name I didn’t even know. One of the downfalls to my gift is that I witness their actions… I just can’t hear what is being said or what they are thinking.
Negative thoughts are riding me, plaguing me. I knew only what my father told me.
She was taken by someone but who?
Was it someone else who intends to cause her further harm? So many questions that can’t be obtained by sitting here in this room twiddling my thumbs, sitting on my ass, doing nothing.
Mind made up, I hurry to the other double bed in the hotel room and grab my leather jacket, throwing it on. Then I rush over to the little two-seater table and grab my room key and the keys to my bike.
As soon as the warm summer air hits my face I take in a deep breath, close my eyes and I picture her. My internal map pops up inside my mind and a blazing purple beacon pinpoints me to her exact location.
The beacon is moving rather quickly so I know she is in some sort of vehicle. She has a few hours on me, possibly four, and heading north.
This is a first. Never has anyone shown up as the color purple. I don’t know if it’s because she’s s my mate, or something else entirely… but I don’t have time to question any of that at this particular moment.
I open my eyes and hop on my bike. Taking my bike to get to her will take longer than using my vampire speed but dawn is quickly approaching in a few hours, and as far as humans are concerned, we don’t exist. We need to continue being a myth, a mere fable, creatures derived of the night. They aren’t ready for us to be real.
I drive continuously. Hard and fast, not bothering to even stop for gas. Luckily, I have a full tank from this morning.
The need to catch up to the girl is riding me hard.
After about three hours I pull off to the side of the road, turning off the engine, closing my eyes… I bring up my internal map and see that they are just a few miles up ahead. Her beacon’s not moving, it’s prone.
I quickly start the engine back up and take off at the speed of light, not giving a rat’s ass that my wheels skid on the gravel road causing my vehicle to slide. Something is off. Something just doesn’t feel right… Why the heck are they not moving?
As the distance closes in, I see it. I see the truck I knew all too well.
I should have freaking known.
Wyatt…
Elliot…
What the fuck are you two doing with my god damn mate?
3
Wyatt
I try and concentrate, to reign the beast in, but whatever Oksana did… there is no use… I am completely stuck in wolf form.
She seems to be able to control me.
Well, not me per se, but the animal within.
I look over to Elliot and see a panic expression in both his eyes and body. I believe he sees the same flashing across my own face.
His pupils are dilated, hair sticking straight up on his back… honestly, he looks sort of like a wet cat. His lower body is wedged up underneath the steering wheel, and his top half twisted awkwardly over the center console. I let out a snort which is like a chuckle in wolf form.
Elliot really doesn’t appreciate my sense of humor right now because he starts to growl, nose scrunched, baring his fangs at me and snaps them shut. A warning if I’ve ever seen one.
I open up the connection between us and let out a boisterous laugh. I swear if looks could kill, I’d drop dead right here, right now.
“I’m sorry, Elliot, but if you could see yourself the way I do, you’d be laughing too.”
“It sure as fuck isn’t funny, Wyatt. You have space back there,” He nods his large head in my direction from the back seat. “I am fucking stuck and I have a kink in my hip. Goddammit.” He says and then follows it with a small snarl. He starts to maneuver his body, attempting to get free for a few moments. He’s trying to kick his legs and turn his body in all sorts of directions in order to get free.
Deep down I am smirking in my head, I love this.
I stretch my body out and lay down on the back seat, resting my head on my paws. The fact that he is stuck and I’m not is odd to me. It’s usually the other way around so I find all this quite entertaining.
Elliot must have noticed my movement because he just looks at me, squinting his eyes.
“How the hell did this fucking happen? What the fuck did she do? This is starting to really piss me off!” He ends his sentence on yet another growl.
Damn, someone sure is testy.
I have no idea what Oksana has done to make us be stuck in this form. It was like… when her wolf peeks it’s head, she can control us. Make us do things we wouldn’t normally do. The only thing I could think of…
No.
It’s not possible.
Could she be?
Never have I heard of a female werewolf being an Alpha, more dominant than a male.
Actually… I’ve never heard of a female werewolf at all. So, all of this is kind of new to both my brother and I.
After thinking about all that, I let all the amusement I just recently had with Elliot fade out. This is a very serious predicament we currently facing, both stuck in wolf form, stuck in the vehicle with no way out.
Trust me… I’ve tried.
The nails on my paws are too long to latch onto the door handle.
Instead of being my normal brooding self, I make a joke and laugh. It’s not like me, not at all, but for the first time in a very long time I feel different. Different as in I feel free and alive. I haven’t thought about my past, I haven’t thought about anything that makes me lose my shit. I am just me and it’s a great feeling. I’m at peace, if only the walls of the truck didn’t feel like they were closing in on me.
Maybe all this has something to do with her, Oksana.
Has she calmed my beast?
Calmed me in general?
Is she the reason for my sudden change?
I can’t question any of
this anymore. I need out of the truck and I needed to find her. Archer is still after her and who knows what else will follow. Knowing what I do of Archer, there’s bound to be a boatload of forces on her trail.
Since I have quite a bit more space in the back seat than Elliot has up front, I try again to find a way out of this metal cage. I use my paws like before thinking maybe it was just the angle… nope… still can’t get a good grasp. I try using my mouth… but my snout is too long, and my teeth don’t reach the handle. I can’t even break the window because Elliot and I installed bulletproof glass in our vehicles. On top of the already strong glass, we know a witch who put a protection spell on both of our cars, the protection charm is the strongest there is. This witch isn’t all that terrible, plus it helped we saved her familiar, which is her most precious companion. Let’s just say she is very grateful for that, and she will do anything we ask of her now. It’s usually not much, just little spells and incantations in order for us to protect ourselves in certain circumstances.
I hear a loud fierce growl that raises the hair on my neck coming from my brother, pausing my work of trying to escape.
“What the fuck, Elliot?” I say to him snapping my head in his direction, but he ignores me and continues his growling.
I look toward the direction he is focusing on, through the window. The door swings open and standing there with a smirk on his face is no other than Killian.
The hired assassin, who has been nothing but a pain in our asses for the last decade.
Aw, hell.
“Tweddle-Dee…” He says looking at me.
“Tweddle-Dum…” He turns his head in Elliot’s direction.
“What in the fucking world are you two doing here, in the middle of nowhere looking all hideous like that?... And if I may ask…” He trails off looking around the truck.
“Where the fuck is my mate?”
4
Hadley
I put the key in the lock hearing the click as the door unlocks to my apartment. I hurry and rush in. It’s been a very long shift and I can honestly say… these next few days off are much needed. I’m not doing anything except sleeping, eating and watching a shit ton of movies. Maybe I’ll even spoil myself and get takeout. I usually tend to stay away from fatty foods, but the mood I have been in lately… it’s well deserved.
Being a cop is a tedious job. I do the same thing day in and day out. I am always on patrol around the city or doing lame ass paperwork. I deal with asshole policemen who think they are better than me because of the simple fact that I am a woman, and don’t have a micro-dick like most of them do. It’s starting to piss me off more and more these days. You’d think after six years they’d realize that I am just as capable, maybe even more so than them at doing this job, but nope… I’m constantly getting sexual innuendos thrown at me and god, when they tell me I am too pretty for this job… well my anger spikes and I want to punch them straight in their ugly mugs, but I don’t.
I love this job. It’s given me a purpose, it’s given me hope when I was at my lowest point in life. I’m just saying… all this bullshit would take a toll on any female, not just me.
I initially decided to become a cop after a brutal beating given to me by my father.
I remember the incident like it was yesterday.
Instead of stopping the memories, I let them wash over me. I plop a seat on my couch and lay my head back closing my eyes.
* * *
Many years ago…
Since Oksana disappeared the night of prom, nowhere to be found… I was the one who called and informed her parents of the terrible reality. I couldn’t find their daughter. She was missing.
I was in hysterics as I filled them in on what I knew. I told them what happened with Charles and how I took care of him, but I was in a panic because my best friend had seemed to disappear off the planet of the earth.
Avel and I searched and searched… looked around the whole vicinity of the hotel all night until the early hours of the morning, when the sun started to rise.
This is the morning of the inevitable. We showed up to Oksana’s parents home just a few minutes ago, and the second I see Jade I lose it. Tears flow out and I run up to her, throwing my arms around her, giving her the embrace I believe we both need.
“Where could she have gone?” I blubber out.
Jade rubs her hand up and down my back soothingly. “I don’t know. We will find her. We have to.”
We contacted the police already, but they told us it’s not a missing person’s case until that said person is missing for more than 48 hours. It was a waiting game at this point.
I stay the night at their place, sleeping in Oksana’s bed.
Her room smells just like her. The natural scent of Oksana floods my nose and fills my head with memories of everything we’ve done together. Everything we’ve been through.
Try as I might, I can’t fight away the horror of what might have happened to her.
What could be happening to her right now.
I don’t think I’ve ever cried so much in my life. Oksana is my person, I love her like the sister I never had. She accepts me, cares for me when I had no one, tolerates me and doesn’t judge me even knowing I’m all sorts of fucked up. I stayed up all night, wondering what the fuck has happened to her.
It couldn’t have been Charles, I fucked him up pretty bad… even made him cry like the little bitch he is.
Oksana didn’t have any enemies. That is me - not her. This is something that I can’t wrap my head around and it’s driving me insane. It’s all I can think about as I let sleep finally claim my exhausted body.
The next morning, I tip-toe down the stairs fairly early needing a hefty cup of coffee. I try my hardest to be quiet in order to not wake up the house. But just as I hit the bottom of the steps, I overhear crying coming from the family room.
Tobias is trying to console Jade, trying to make her feel better over the situation. I plop down on the last step and once again proceed to cry. I cry with Jade because I feel like it is my fault. I should have stayed with her. I should have protected her. I should have done so many things.
I race back up the stairs, grab some clothes and a pair of sneakers from Oksana’s closet. I throw them on and rush back down stairs, flinging open the front door and I ran. I need to feel something besides guilt. I need to clear my head and for once in my life, I do the one thing I never did when Oksana would ask… run.
It’s like the world hates me because as soon as I walk in the door, I see my father sitting in the old, beat-up, torn recliner. He has a metal baseball bat in one hand and a gun in the other. I pause all movement, frozen in terror.
What in the fuck?
“Where have you been, Hadley?” he growls at me and then I take notice that someone had gotten to him. His face is beaten pretty badly, one eye closed shut. Bruises covered him. His arms, neck and face… I would have love to see where else he is injured.
Karma sure is a bitch.
“I needed you here two nights ago, girl.” He screams at me. I don’t answer. I just stand here and smirk at him.
“You think this is funny?” He states venomously.
“Actually, I find it hilarious. Now you know exactly what it’s like to be me. Does it hurt, daddy? You in pain.” I chide, saddening my voice a bit to sound sarcastic.
Instead of replying back to me he stands and rushes at me, swinging the baseball bat. I move my body, attempting to protect myself somewhat but the bat hit me right in the shoulder part of my back. It hurts, hurts so fucking bad but I ignore the pain. I turn my head and look at him. His fist makes contact so hard with my face that my vision starts to blur, little dots appearing out of nowhere.
His fist makes contact with my jaw yet again, and then straight in my stomach.
I start to feel sick. My vision isn’t holding up and I keep thinking that this is the end.
No.
I need to live.
I need to find my best friend.
The one person who is more of a family to me than this sadistic son of a bitch.
I shove him with as much force as I have inside me and run to the door, but not before he grabs a handful of my hair, forcing my body into his. I bring my fist up and throw my elbow back into his stomach. He leans over holding his hand over the spot I just elbowed, so I grab him by the back of his head, pulling his hair like he did to me and I raise my knee up, hitting him hard in the face. I hear a crack, but it doesn’t matter to me… I am out of here – finally free!
I’m barely out the door when my body starts to sway. I reach into my back pocket and grab my phone. I dial a number I swore I’d never call.
911.
I need help and calling Oksana’s parents is selfish, especially with everything they were going through right now.
“911. What’s your emergency?”
“I need help. Please,” I rasp out, finding it even harder to breathe. The only way I’m keeping myself upright is because I’m holding on the railing of the stairs leading up to the door.
“Okay, ma’am. We will send help to you as soon as possible. I need you to answer a few questions for me, can you do that?”
“Ye… Yes.”
“Where are you currently and are you injured?”
“Yes.”
I can’t help but think why there’s the need for all these fucking questions. I need fucking help and I need it now.
“My father… He just beat me. I can’t breathe… I’m… I’m not going to make it.” I get out before I slump over, and my body continues down the stairs… I know he will come after me, it’s only a matter of time. I move my feet as fast as possible making my way into the dense tree line.
“Ma’am! Ma’am!” I hear the operator say, I completely forget about her as I’m more worried about my life.
“229 Crystal Park Lane… Hiding in bush… come soon!” At this very moment my body decides it wants a nap because I don’t remember anything after that.
I wake to the sound of beeping and white sterile walls surrounding me. A female police officer sits in a chair right next to my bed.