Chapter 45: Mother knows best

Amina’s POV

“Get up!”

The tallest and bulkiest of the two guards had grabbed my arm and yanked me onto my feet before I could even comprehend what was happening. Until now, they had never looked at me or spoken to me, much less dared to cross the threshold of my prison for fear of Micheal’s reprisals. Yet, here they were, forcing me out of the only room that I had grown accustomed to. I kept yelling, demanding to know where they were taking me as they continued to drag me along through a series of dark and narrow hallways. The men remained tight-lipped and ignored my pleas with every step they took. A sense of panic was slowly befalling on me, but before it could take over, I used the surge of adrenaline to focus. Nestled deep into my mind were my plans to escape, and this was a good opportunity to look around.

The few fluorescent lights above us flickered with a steady rhythm giving me only seconds at a time to scrutinize my surroundings. The first two short corridors were completely empty, void of anything useful. The walls were dirty, cracked and the paint had peeled off long ago. The broken-down hardwood floors creaked heavily under our weight and there were rat droppings everywhere. The abysmal state of this place, while giving me the creeps, didn’t allow for much of an escape plan to form. I knew we had turned our last corner when the two guards slowed down their pace. The new hallway had a small amount of windows boarded up by thin degrading plywood panels threatening to fall off. The men opened the only door to the right and we entered an old-fashioned and run-down kitchen.

My gaze instantly shifted on Ophelia who stood in the middle of the room holding a tray of food. For a second, I wondered if our plans had been discovered and if they had brought me here to kill us both. Her body stiffened and her gaze flustered and it was enough to convince me that the young girl was just as surprised and confused by my presence here as I was.

“What’s going on?” She asked the guards in a low and shaky voice.

“Shut up, slave!” The shorter guard replied as he pushed his way past her.

They pulled me to a back door leading out of the kitchen and I couldn’t help but look over my shoulder and glance at Ophelia once more. I could see the terror and utter defeat that covered her small face as she watched us slowly disappear behind the door.

“What about her food?” I heard her little voice echo behind me.

“Bring it to her room. She’ll eat when Gisele’s done with her.” The guard shouted back as he shut the door behind us.

My blood curled up at the mention of her name and the panic that I had managed to control earlier, suddenly coursed through me like an untamed river. My heart rate picked up and I began to sweat profusely. *‘What could she possibly want with me, now?’* I asked myself as I recalled our first meeting. She had tried to kill me then and I feared that she would try again. Her hatred for me ran deep in her soul and I knew that my life itself posed a threat to her cause.

The guards threw me to the floor, forcing me to land roughly on my knees. A quick burst of pain shot up my entire body as I achieved to get back on my feet. When Gisele entered the room, the two men closed the door behind her and stood guard while she walked up towards me. She smiled unemotionally and invited me to sit down next to her. I was hesitant to accept her offer or do anything that she wanted, but every inch of my body was aching and I needed to rest.

“I feel like we have got off on the wrong foot, you and I…” She waited for me to sit before speaking. “You seem to be important to my son and he is very important to me. In my opinion, it is high time that we started appreciating each other, don’t you think?” She asked in a honeyed voice.

“You’ve officially gone crazy if you think that I would want anything to do with you.” I snickered back to her in complete disbelief.

Gisele raised her right hand in the air and brought it down to my face with a force so violent that my bottom lip instantly split open. Blood had quickly filled my mouth, spilled down my throat and sent me into a coughing fit.

“Oh, dear, I’m sorry!” She chuckled with absolutely no remorse for her backhanded strike. “Old habits die hard, you know?”

“What do you want, Gisele?” I asked spitting out the excess blood pooling in my mouth.

“I told you. I want us to be friends and for you to be with my son.” She replied gently stroking my hair.

“And I told you that I’m not interested.”

She held her breath at my response and I could tell that she didn’t expect me to stand up to her. She dropped her fake smile, her pupils widened and her face turned dark. She was having a tough time bottling her anger and as she stood up very suddenly, Gisele’s rage escaped her like a dangerous gas ready to blow everything in its path to smithereens.

“Why? Because of your precious Alpha? Your destined mate?” She yelled out keeping her glowering stare on me. “Look around you, Mina. You’re all alone. Where is your mate now? If he loved you so much, where is he?” She kept on badgering me as her shrill voice took up the entire room.

I looked towards the two guards who remained stoic and found some sort of strength in their indifference. Like them, I maintained my silence and I refused to give into her games which only infuriated her more.

“Answer me!” She shrieked in my ear before pushing me off the chair and onto the floor.

She crouched down next to me and took a fistful of my hair to jerk my head backwards. I held my tears back, fighting to not show her any distress as I knew Gisele would only enjoy my pain.

“He has abandoned you, dear.” She whispered in my ear with disdain. “He doesn’t love you. He never truly cared about you. I’m sure that by now, he’s already rejected you.”

Her bitter speech came to a startling halt when she noticed the changes on my face. As much as I tried to ignore it, her words were finally piercing through my shield. I remembered the hunting nightmare that I had tried to quell for a week and that left me heartbroken and hollow. Benjamin’s pull had seemingly waned since that day and all hopes of happinness began to dissipate with it. It took me a while to figure out that Benjamin had rejected me as his mate and that I no longer had a claim to his heart.

“Goddess, he really did reject you, didn’t he?” She asked me as she saw my eyes well up with tears.

For a brief moment, Gisele let her evil mask fall and I could see that she was feeling sorry for me. Her dark eyes reflected my own sadness and her grip on me loosened. She let go of me completely before sitting back down in her chair. She just sat there, completely mute while I struggled to pick myself up off the floor. Despite the fact that her eyes were still glued on mine, it seemed as though Gisele’s mind had strayed away, taking her back to a different time and place.

“Being mated to someone doesn’t mean a thing anymore… I should know.” She said with a trembling breath. “Mates are supposed to love each other and spend their life together. Oh, Mina, I loved him. I truly did, but Samuel was obsessed with that whore, Grace. I was his mate, but he loved her. Even after Micheal was born, he only had eyes for her. He spent his days circling his old pack, watching her kids grow up while he ignored his own.”

As the extent of her pain grew in full depth, tears streamed down her pale face unexpectedly. Gisele’s heart was as black as coal, but it had been poisoned by the one that was meant to protect it. While nothing could have excused her behaviour, Samuel’s willful and cruel callousness certainly managed to explain it.

“Why didn’t you reject your mate?” I asked under my breath, taking her out of her thoughts.

“Could you reject yours?” She asked me with a regretful half-smile.

Her eyes remained locked in on mine, looking for answers that I couldn’t give her. I had felt Benjamin’s rejection, but I couldn’t bring myself to reject him in turn. As painful as living without him would be, the connection that I shared with him had been the light I desperately needed to brighten my dim life. It had brought me joy and I wasn’t ready to let go of that.

“We’re going to take over Blackwoods Pack sooner or later and the Alpha is going to die. My son loves you and is offering you the chance to be his Luna, true mate or not. If I were you, I’d cross over to the winning side.”

“I’m not a traitor.” I answered in a decided way.

Gisele chuckled wickedly as she stood up and leaned over me.

“Actually, you’re nothing. You’re not a werewolf, you’re not a pack member and you’re not even a mate anymore.” She cupped my face with both hands. “You have two days to decide between us or them. After that, not even Micheal could stop me from killing you.” She finished off.

Gisele left the room as she ordered the two guards to bring me back to my room. It didn’t take them more than that to grab me by the arms and drag me all the way back to the cursed room that served as my cell. Once I was thrown inside, I waited to hear the sound of the door locking before collapsing onto the dirty mattress. I could feel my energy and my willpower diminishing with each passing minute in this hellhole. I was about to let myself fall asleep when I noticed the tray of food that Ophelia had prepared for me. I crawled to it, praying that she hadn’t let me down.

A huge sigh of relief escaped my lips as I dipped my fingers into the food and pulled out a short, but sharp knife.

“Alright, Mina. It’s time to get out of here.” I smiled holding my freedom between my fingertips.