With a location in mind, and a route established for how to get there, we devised a plan. Unfortunately, we were still in the dark about a lot of the details. We didn’t know how many people to expect, but Betina guessed that it wouldn’t be many because Solarin was very particular about the people welcome in her lair with ‘the fewer better’ as her prime rule. Betina did her best to draw us a map of the premises, including the most direct path to the room where the witch performed most of her magic. In exchange, we promised not to kill the witch for her part in it, because she was still the one protecting Betina from her shit show of a mate. What I didn’t say, but that I’m sure my brothers understood regardless, was that if it came down to it, I would rip her head straight off her shoulders to get to Chantal, any deal I made be damned. We could deal with the fallout, and maybe even take out the claw that Betina’s mate resided in, along with the child predator alpha they allowed to rule over them.
We rode out in our usual formation, Knox in the front leading us to our destination, the rest of us following behind, and a few prospects bringing up the rear in cages so that we could bring the girls home, in case they were unable to ride. Our plan upon arrival was simple enough. Each of us was assigned an entry point, and we planned to infiltrate at the same time, taking out everyone we saw as quietly as possible on our way to the witch’s room of magical bullshit. The only person that was on a strict no kill list was Raven. That motherfucker was coming back to the clubhouse for a little one-on-one time with me, and then we’d be calling for a full reform of the council for allowing a shitwad like Raven to get away with this crap, especially when he wasn’t fit to lead even the weakest of our alphas.
I just hoped we weren’t too late. If anything happened to Chantal, I would make it my personal mission in life to destroy every member of the council one by one. Just then, I felt it for the first time since she disappeared. Her call for help hit me like a kick from Knox to the solar plexus. The connection was gone almost as quickly as it came, but it was unmistakable. My sweet, beautiful woman was calling out to me, even with a witch working her magic to try and stop her.
“I’m coming, Moonbeam. I love you.” I directed my thoughts as best I could and put as much oomph behind them as possible. I needed her to hear me too, and to know that we were coming. I was coming for her!
27
I had been relaxing my body and focusing all of my spiritual energy on reaching out to Gray for what felt like hours without so much as an inclination that he could feel me. My first distraction came when I heard my sister Charlotte stirring across the room, followed by a loud gasp, and the sounds of her writhing in her bed in an attempt to free herself from her restraints.
“Ah, there she is. I’ll go get the other one. I suppose it’s time.” Solarin piped up cheerfully, clapping her hands together and skipping out of the room.
“Charlotte, are you okay?” I called out to my sister. The good one, apparently.
“Physically, I think so. Where are we right now? Where’s Charisma?”
“I have no idea where we are. As for Charisma, sh-” I started, only to be cut off by the queen bitch herself.
“Charisma is here, and she’s fine, no thanks to her so-called family.”
“What are you talking about? Let us out of here, we’re your sisters! What the hell is happening?” Charlotte screamed. I could hear the panic in her voice, and my heart ached for her. She’d been around Charisma longer, and this betrayal was going to hurt like hell for her.
“Oh shut up. I’m happy to explain in just a moment. Solarin? Are we ready to start the bond reversal process? Raven is getting a bit antsy.” Bond reversal process? She couldn’t seriously be advocating for my bond with Gray to be broken by some witch.
“Almost. You should have just enough time to bore them to tears with whatever speech you prepared. This has to simmer a bit longer.” she stated, indicating the steaming pot in front of her filled with a mysterious, opaque liquid.
Charisma rolled her eyes as she pulled a chair out from the table that Solarin was sitting at and turned it around so that she could still see both Charlotte and I.
“While we wait, I’m going to tell you a little story, and you’re both going to listen without interruptions.” She paused for a moment to see if either of us were planning to object, but I was still in a state of stunned speechlessness. “Good, well I’m sure you both remember that fateful day that we were separated. Charlotte going with both Mom and Dad, because she was the favorite, and Chantal going with our grandmother, because they’d always had a special bond. I was shipped off with our uncle, who I’m sure no one knew had a huge gambling problem, right?
“No one knew that he owed a huge debt to the Devil’s Core Motorcycle Club, and no one really cared what happened to Charisma, the forgotten triplet. When the MC came to collect and our uncle couldn’t pay, they beat him senseless and took me to settle the debt, thinking I was his daughter.
“I hoped the MC would take me in and protect me, but that was the innocent mind of a child talking. I wasn’t there for protection, hell, they didn’t even know what I was. They had no clue how valuable my life was. I was there to make them money, and I no longer had the chance to be a kid. Instead, I was trafficked. I was brought to parties and used up by grown ass men while the two of you got to travel the world with our family. No one ever checked up on me.
“Our uncle never came looking. I gave up on the idea of ever being rescued, and after a while, I stopped missing my so-called family.” I could feel tears threatening to spill out of my eyes. I was in a shitty situation, but I had no idea what my own sister had been put through as a teenager. I wanted to fix everything, I wanted to fix her, but she wasn’t done talking and I owed her nothing if not hearing the rest of her story.
“Then, one day I was taken to a party that my dearest Raven also happened to be attending. He was the one who freed me from my prison when I had nothing left to live for and no one left to fight for me. He recognized me for what I was, for the potential power I held. He even paid a hefty amount to take me off of their hands, and he offered me the protection that I so desperately wanted my own family to provide. All he wanted in return was help finding the two of you, and I got to live with the council. And when all of this is over, I’ve been promised a seat at their table myself. I’ll be the first female on the feline shifter council.”
“So you sold us out for a position of power? What’s supposed to happen to us?” Charlotte spat out at her.
In the blink of an eye, Charisma flew out of her chair and over to where Charlotte was laying. She placed both hands around her neck and squeezed. “I said not to interrupt me, you insolent bitch. I wasn’t done talking.” She pulled her hands back and returned to her seat, leaving Charlotte to cough and sputter alone in her restraints. The tears that I previously held back were flowing freely down my cheeks, but I said nothing. There was nothing to say. I was stuck there watching one of my sisters hurt the other, and I couldn’t move to do a thing about it. I was beginning to wonder if Gray would be able to find us in time to save our bond.
“Now, where were we?” Charisma asked rhetorically, tapping her chin with her finger. “Oh right, the reason you’re both here. You see, the council has lost some of its power, and currently isn’t in a position to withstand any well thought out attacks with some of the larger, organized groups out there who may not agree with the council members and their decisions. Generations of royals that were forced to mate with lessers caused the shift in power to occur, and they need it back. That’s where you two come in. You’re both going to be mated off to members of the council, thus making them more powerful, and creating more powerful offspring. No one will be able to challenge us, and we will be able to infiltrate lesser leaps, claws, and prides.” She paused for a moment, a proud smile pasted on her face.
“So why didn’t Raven just mate with you? You’re clearly obsessed, and I’m already mated.” If looks could kill, I would’ve been long gone from t
his Earth. Instead of the voice I was expecting to hear, Solarin spoke up.
“Oh, that part is my favorite! Would you like to tell it, or should I?” Solarin taunted, eliciting a low growl from Charisma. “I guess I’ll tell it then, and you’ll do your best to remember my very essential role in your plan. You can’t rid yourself of me,” the witch winked at her, and then redirected her attention back to me and Charlotte. “Your sister is tainted. She’s been used up by countless men, human men. Raven might love her, but he won’t take her as a mate. She’ll be mated off to one of the lesser men on the council instead.”
“I’m tainted too, aren’t I? I’ve already mated with Gray. Plus no mated pair is as powerful if it’s forced.”
“Well, yes, you are tainted, but you were ruined by a supernatural leopard, meaning that my magic can reverse it. I can reverse your mating, as if it never happened, and with a very particular brew I’ve just finished, I can actually bend your will in a way so that your new bond with my brother feels as genuine to you as it will to him.” I shuddered involuntarily at the thought of being forced to mate with anyone but Gray. I still couldn’t quite wrap my mind around everything I’d just heard, especially the role that Charisma was playing in everything.
“It’s done? Your little concoction is finally ready?” Charisma shouted, rushing over to the table Solarin was sitting at, stirring the pot in front of her and scooping a bit into a nearby vial.
“It is done. Go get my brother. We’ll take care of breaking her bond before we do anything else.” Charisma did as she was told, and the witch went back to ignoring us entirely, as she prepped several more vials of her suspicious brew. I was running out of time, and was still no closer to escaping than I had been two hours prior. I closed my eyes again and did my level best to tune out the sounds of the potion sloshing around, and of my sister sobbing across the room. I focused all of my energy once more on the love of my life. He had saved me once before, and he was my only hope for getting out of there alive. I just hoped that he could get to me before something was done to break our bond, a pain that just might kill us both.
When Charisma and Raven walked back into the room, they both headed straight for me, Solarin not far behind them with a tray of vials in her hands. Raven reached out and traced a finger across my cheek. I tried pulling away, but my efforts were fruitless, and my detest for him only seemed to provoke the bastard more.
“I can’t wait for you to be mine, Chantal. I’ve been waiting for this day for a long, long time.” I reacted by doing the only thing I could to show him how much I hated him. I spit on the fucker, right in his left eye, causing him to let go of me so that he could wipe away the remnants of the only attack I was capable of. Charisma took a step forward and slapped me across my cheek, the same place where only moments before, Raven had been stroking.
“You will not disrespect him like that! EVER!” Charisma shrieked in my face.
“Calm down, Charisma,” Raven chuckled. “We were just having a bit of fun. In just a short while, she will belong to me regardless.” He turned a cruel glare to me then. “I can’t wait to show you what I’ll do to tame that fiery spirit of yours,” he promised before turning back to his sister. “Are we ready?”
“Yes, let’s get started. I need a bit of space.” Solarin stated, ushering the two of them back a few steps so that she had room to work. The witch started by cutting through my shirt a bit at the top to expose my mating scar. I tried to shrivel away from her, and continued pulling at my restraints, but to no avail. A sense of hopelessness rolled through my being when I wasn’t able to pull away far enough to cover the mark, and keep it safe.
“Now, this bit is going to hurt no matter what, but it will be far worse if you attempt to fight it. What’s happening here is inevitable, so if you’d like to make it easier, let my brew do its job because there’s no one here to save you.” She reached a dropper into the first vial and then carefully released three drops of the iridescent liquid onto my scar, eliciting a scream from the deepest depths of my soul. The pain I felt shook me to my core, and I immediately started convulsing, my brain transporting me to a different place.
Suddenly, I was no longer in some creepy ass witch’s room. No, I was back in the alley, the stench of vulture surrounding me and I could feel my pelt being peeled off again. I called out to Gray, but this time, no one came to my rescue. I kept screaming out for him with every fibre of my being, begging him to come to my side, but when he finally came into view, he wasn’t there to stop them. He was there to help them hurt me. I felt three more drops of that hellish liquid fall on my scar, and I could faintly hear Solarin chanting some sort of incantation in an unfamiliar language.
“Gray, please! Make it stop, it hurts! Please, I love you so much!” The Gray looking back at me wasn’t the man I had fallen in love with though, and so I closed my eyes, swallowed the fear that threatened to overtake me, and focused on a moment between the two of us that was pure bliss. I thought about being on the back of his motorcycle, my arms wrapped tightly around his waist and the wind wreaking havoc on the bottom of my hair that didn’t fit neatly into my helmet. I grit my teeth together and ignored the excruciating pain radiating from my scar and held on to my thoughts of Gray as hard as I could and refused to let go.
Right as I was about to lose my fight against the searing pain, and fall back into a reality where I was no longer one with the love of my life, I felt his returning call. I had no idea if I was hallucinating, but I heard his voice distinctly.
“Hold on just a moment longer, Moonbeam, I’m coming for you.” I didn’t know if that was just wishful thinking on my part because after that, the world just faded away from me, the pain too much for me to take as my conscious mind shut down.
28
When we arrived at the witch’s estate and cut our engines, Chantal’s presence was notable, but only just. We were able to take out the two men standing guard outside with ease, while not raising any suspicions from those inside. We split up and took our places at each of the three entrances, just as we’d planned. I took one last moment to collect all of my spiritual energy in an attempt to send a message to Chantal. We were coming, and she needed to hold on. I could feel my scar burning, and I knew what that meant. They were trying to sever our bond. Judging from the intensity of the pain I felt in my own mark, it was working.
At Knox’s signal, we stormed the building, Bomber and I heading in through the side door. We moved swiftly down the hall, clearing each space as we went. The room we were all looking for was in the basement, because what creepy ass magical witch’s lairs aren’t underground? We were met with no resistance on the first floor, and we reconnoitered in the middle of the house at the top of the stairs with ease.
As we attempted to descend the stairs, we were met with gunshots, which had most certainly alerted everyone in the house to our presence, if they weren’t aware already. Thian was the first to round the corner, where he was able to execute two of the men shooting at us before the third shot him in the shoulder.
“Go! It’s just my shoulder, keep moving!” He shouted from the ground, brokering no arguments from the rest of us. We pushed forward, taking out the third man before reaching the door that would lead us to the witch’s spell room.
Brace kicked down the door, clearing the way for the rest of us to storm in. The basement was huge, appearing to run the length of the entire house. There was an earthy smell to the place, but I could also smell something rancid bubbling from on the table in the middle of the room.
The witch held up one hand in our direction, a small, protective shield emanating from her body, while never taking her eyes off of Chantal in the process. Knox and Bomber fired at the forcefield, attempting to break the witch’s focus, while Brace untied Charlotte.
“Chantal!” I screamed, putting all of my power behind my words. The love of my life stirred, then slowly opened her eyes, tilting her head so that she could see me. The panic in the witch’s eyes was evident as she
yelled “Get them!” Solarin let go of her forcefield and focused completely on the ritual she was performing. Her moment of weakness became Chantal’s advantage. The witch was no longer focused, and the spells she was attempting to maintain with her magic were weakening. I could hear my Moonbeam in my head again, “Take care of them, I’ve got her.” Without hesitation, I trusted in my woman, and I focused on Raven and Charisma. The mission wasn’t to kill them. Hell, I didn’t even know what Charisma’s role was in all of this yet, though I could probably guess since she was the one sister not bound to a table.
Knox and I ran toward them, Bomber behind us with a gun, loaded down with silver bullets, trained in their direction. Raven aimed his weapon at my head and fired, missing entirely, and hit the wall behind us instead. Pussy. I got to him first, knocking the gun out of his hand, and taking my fist to his face. He fell over, and I went with him, landing blow after blow to his head.
“Stop!” Charisma screamed, but Knox already had her hands pulled taut behind her back and was forcing her to the ground. When I finally stopped hitting the poor excuse for a shifter lying beneath me, it was because I heard it, the voice of an angel. My angel.
“Gray?” She called, blood staining her face and body, as she held the head of the witch in her hand, Solarin’s body collapsed on the floor beside her. I directed Bomber to take my place restraining Raven and I ran to Chantal. “I was able to shift just part of my body when she broke her focus, and I swiped at her head. I didn’t mean to do this,” she stated, indicating the head she still held in her hand.
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