Chapter 37 ULTIMATUM
Amelia gives me a little hope, but at the same time, gaining their trust sounds like so much work. How long will it take me to gain it? Days? Weeks? Months? What will I have to do to prove to them I that I am with them and not against them?
I don't like the thought of waiting so long and it makes my heart drop. How can I go for months without seeing Samuel? How can he go months without seeing me? Can I wait that long? No. But what other choice do I have?
If I don't behave, I'll never get out of here or see the light of day again. I'll have to play their little game carefully and make sure to only play my hand at the right time. I will find a way to leave here and get to Samuel, even if it kills me.
I am a fighter by nature and sure as hell won't give up without one good fight.
"Now that you've eaten and seem to be okay I have to send for Logan. He's been coming here checking in on you since you arrived. He'll be glad to know you're up."
I get chills again and force my back against the wall sitting on the far side of my bed. The distance still isn't enough. He'll soon be here. My arms wrap around my legs as I bring them to my chest. I don't want to see him. I don't want to be anywhere near him. I hate that I can't do anything to stop it. I am completely helpless here."I'm sorry," she says, noticing my actions. "I don't have a choice. Both he and Grog want to talk to you and they will do it one way or another. Best to get it over with quickly."
I want to beg her not to leave me as she turns to go. I know she has to though. She says something to the guard at the door and she's gone seconds later without another word to me. A few tears escape my eyes and I hate myself for it.
I angrily wipe them away with the back of my hand. I don't cry. I haven't cried since those dark days of my rejection and I swore that I'll never do it again. And yet here I am doing exactly that. I am not weak. I am strong. I am a Luna who can't be broken. I have survived a rejection that I thought would kill me. Surely I can survive this too.
Be strong, I remind myself. Don't let him see how broken you are. You can do this.
'Samuel?' I say, trying our link once again since the woods. ‘Samuel?' I repeat. 'Please answer me,' I beg him. 'I need you.'
I am greeted with silence just like before and my heart sinks further in my chest. I don't understand why he doesn't answer me. Is it that he can't hear me or possibly something more? What if he is hurt? What if he is.....
No. No. I won't finish that sentence. He is still alive. I know it. I can feel that in my veins. At least that hasn't disappeared yet.
The door to my room opens and I tense. I can feel the hairs on the back of neck stand up. I know he is here and I feel like an innocent victim in the grasp of a mad man.
Logan steps inside and his eyes rake over me. He doesn't speak, just stares. I clench my arms around my body tighter.
"You look better," he finally says.
I don't move until he starts slowly in my direction. My back presses against the wall even harder. I hope it gives way to the pressure and lets me fall into the next room to get away from him, but it doesn't. I am stuck here with him until when he will want to leave.
He stops at the side of my bed. "You ate," he says. "I'm glad. You were out for nearly twenty-four hours."
I watch him carefully. Why is he acting so concerned for my health? He doesn't care about me. If he cares he wouldn't have kidnapped me and dragged me here against my will.
He sighs impatiently. "Have you gone mute? You have a voice, Grace. Use it."
I scowl at him. Now he is bossing me around? I don't think so. This is exactly what it would have been like if I had stayed and became his mate.
I shudder. I hate that thought.
"Grace." He sits down on the bed next to me. We are only inches apart. He can easily reach out and touch me should he wish. Immediately I feel the need to jump off the bed and run into the opposite direction of him, but I can't do that. It will only take longer for him to trust me.
"You're still afraid of me, aren't you?" he asks. He knows the answer to that question already. "Well you can rest assured I won't ever harm you. You're safe here."
For the first time since waking up here I want to laugh. He can't be serious. Safe here with him? He really has lost it.
"You kidnapped me," I remind him. "And you have the to audacity to tell me I'm safe here? How dare you."
You aren't helping matters. You won't gain his trust this way, my subconscious tells me. I know it is right, but it is still hard to listen to it. I hate Logan now. I don't know how I will ever pull this plan off.
He slowly starts to reach for my hand and I know it is coming. I grow sick again. No. This is wrong. It's like I'm betraying Samuel to even allow Logan to touch me. I am about to jerk my hand back when loud screams erupt outside the door.
They ring through the halls and bounce off the concrete walls. I shiver and in an instant I jump to my feet and run to the door to see what is happening. The guard who looks about the age of my dad turns at me in surprise and alarm.
"Get back!" he orders.
I don't move. Instead I look out the small cell window built into my door. I want to know what is going on.
"I said get back!" he repeats. "I won't warn you again."
"It's alright," Logan tells him. "It would be good for Grace to see this. Open the door."
The guard nods and opens the door for us. He doesn't even argue with him. I frown. Is Logan giving the orders around here or Grog?
"Come with me," he says. "Let me show you what happens to those who refuse to trust us and fight back against what we've offered them."
I don't know what it could be, but it doesn't sound like something I want to endure. I walk side by side with him to a cell a few doors down from mine. I can smell the blood before even we get there. It is unsettling. Whatever is going on here, it can't be good.
When we stop and I peer in to open door I want to scream. The scene before me is horrific. It is pure torture.
A middle aged man with graying hair lays thrashing on the floor before me. His pained screams cause my breathing to become heavy and labored. My head spins. No. This isn't right. What are they doing to him?
"He's dying," I whisper. "He's dying, isn't he?"
"We gave him a choice. He made the wrong one. When that happens so does this." Logan doesn't even seem pained or remorseful as he speaks. "We might have kept him alive and kept pursuing him if he hadn't attempted to attack one of the guards and escape. What he didn't realize was that no one escapes here. It happened once, but it won't happen again. We've taken certain measures to ensure that."
The man screams again. A pained bloodcurdling scream. It just keeps getting louder and louder and I know I can't stand there watching the invisible torture going on inside this man's body. I need to leave, get away so I can't hear it anymore.
"Take me away from here," I tell him. "I can't stand it."
Thankfully he doesn't make me wait to see the man's death sentence carried out and he gently escorts me back to my cell. Surprisingly I don't hear the man's screams anymore once I return. Did they finally kill him? I wish so badly for peace to that man and hope he found it somehow. I can't believe what they are doing here. They are forcing loyalties.
When the cell door shuts behind us I remain standing and so did Logan. This time he doesn't come so close to me, keeping his distance.
My hands are still shaking from the scene I've just witnessed and I have to coax myself to calm down. I will never get that man's face out of my mind for as long as I live. And if I am not careful I'll end up just like him.
"I have some questions," I manage to say. "I want some answers."
He nods as he walks across the room and sits down at the empty table I had eaten at. Someone must have come in and taken my tray while we were gone.
"Ask your questions and I'll tell you anything you want to know."
I stand in front of him and cross my arms over my chest, slowly getting myself under control.
"What happened to that man back there? What caused his suffering?"
Logan's arms rest on the table in front of him and he stares across it and he answers. "I only know what Grog told me. It's something he's been working on for a while now. It's a serum that slowly kills you, from the inside out. It feels like every vein in your body is splitting itself open until the pain gets so bad there is nothing left of you anymore. Eventually you just give up and die. It's not my taste really, but he started it before I even joined him."
"But you still joined him, knowing fully well what he's capable of," I state. "How could you? Is there anything left of you in there at all?"
"This is me and the sooner you accept that the better."
I shake my head disbelieving. "No. I can't accept that. I get that you lost Josephine. She died and I'm sorry, but doing this...joining this pack, that's not going to change anything. You loved her Logan, and you should grieve. Just not this way."
"Loved," he says, letting his eyes drop down to the table. He studies it as if it holds all the answers to life's questions. "Everything changed when I realized you were the one that was meant for me. I fought it and I rejected you just like my father wanted and just like I thought I wanted. But I couldn't even do that right. I let go of you in my mind, but in my soul you were still there." His face is pained.
"I didn't know how to get rid of you and then I didn't want to. Day by day I slowly slipped away from her. I became distant and withdrawn. I realized my mistake with you but it was too late to fix it. You were already with him."
I swallow and wait for him to continue, not daring to interrupt. I want to hear more of this.
"You did something to my soul when you left. You took half of it with you when you left or something. I can't really explain it. All I know is that part of me was missing and I was never the same after that day. I felt it every time you kissed him. Every time you thought about him. And every time you were with him. What was left of me slowly died inside and now all that's left is an empty shell of a man that used to be. And you want to know what the worst part of it is?"
My throat feels dry and I don't know if I can speak, but I do. "What?"
"I couldn't even feel anything for Josephine or the baby when she died. That's how empty I am. It seems the only emotions I can feel are for you because you still have half of my soul. The part that was always yours to begin with. That why I could mate with her. You may have severed the bond between us, but for me it's still there. I can still feel you in my bones."
I gulp, trying to control myself from taking a step back in fear. I know I am never supposed to show it and I don't want. I just don't know any other way to react. And I certainly don't like where this is heading.
"I want that part of my missing soul back when I'm around you," he continues. "That day you showed up in the woods it felt like a part of me was returning that had been lost for such a long time. I knew it was you before I even saw your face."
I shake my head at him. "I don't understand. Why tell me this part when there is nothing that can be done to fix it?"
His face slightly cheers. "But that's just it. Something can be done. There are two ways I can get my soul back." He stands up from the table and as he speaks the words that scare me to my core he walks to me. "I can either kill you and it will return to me or I can mate you and we'll be as one."
Before I can even think, I am backing away from him. He is crazy. Absolutely insane. He can't be serious. I can feel the horror on my face matching how I feel on the inside. I don't stop moving until my back hits the wall. He doesn't follow me.
"It's too late for that," I tell him. "We can never be together. I'm with Samuel now and he's my mate. We've completed the process. And I..." I trail off, not knowing if I should dare continue. But I can't stop myself. I want to tell him and tell the world. I want everyone to know the next words that are about to slip from my mouth. So I let them. "I love him. I'll always love him."
Logan's face is pained again. "But that's because you're still tied to him. If you were to let go and stop fighting it, it would go away. You might not stop loving him, but you would have room to love someone else too."
Words come out of my mouth in a rush. "Do you hear yourself right now? You took Samuel's first mate away from him and now you want to take his second. That's just cruel. Only someone completely incapable of feeling could do something like that." Then I stop.Of course! He can't feel anything. That's why he's doing this.
"You can't talk to him anymore, can you? Your link to him is gone."
My eyes widen. "What? How do you know that?"
"It's my presence here. It's disrupting the signal. That part of me that is inside of you, it blocks out anything that's not me when we're close to each other. Your mate bond is numb. It can't react, it just lies dormant. It can't overpower my presence in you."
"So what you're saying is that as long as were together I can never talk to Samuel again?" My stomach drops because I already knew the answer to my question.
"Yes. The longer you're around me, the weaker your mate bond becomes. Every part of it. I control it all. Your wolf included. She'll be silent until I feel it's safe for you to tap into that part of yourself." Any hope that I have left is seeping out of my body like blood pouring from wounds. It is all slipping away from me and there is nothing I can do to stop it. It is hopeless. As long as Logan has me here, Samuel, my mate, will always be just out of reach and never within my grasp.
It feels like the floor has suddenly shifted under me and I am falling through the sky. I am going down and will hit the ground hard and no one can save me now. Not even Samuel.
But we can still win this, my mind screams. If we could just get away from him he can't control us and we can call for Samuel.
But how far away is enough to make a difference? Logan is not going to tell me that. He won't give me that kind of hope. He wants me to feel weak and defeated. I'm on my own in this.
I'm strong though. Surely he can't take all my hope. I'm a Luna after all. A fighter. I'll never stop trying to get to Samuel, my mate. And if it's the last thing I do, I'll fight him until I take my last dying breath.