Chapter 42: Chapter Forty-Two

Morning the next day hit Saffron like a one-two punch to the face.

She was exhausted from the lack of sleep, stress, her ruminations, and a million other things that circulated through her mind.

That exhaustion, however, did not change the fact that she had to get up and go about her day. Slacking at her unpaid job was sadly not an option.

A cold shower and a cup of stale coffee later, Saffron was awake enough to get to her job at the bar, but it wasn’t enough to make her want to do it.

After the revelations from last night, it was hard to find the motivation to keep on living and working at a place that she wasn’t appreciated, a place where she was ostracized, bullied, and hurt at every point.

It didn’t make sense to her how the Alpha insisted on her stay on the island when he did everything in his power to make sure that she knew she was as unwelcome as the shit that stained the bottom of his boots.

It made no sense to her, that he expected her to go about slaving herself at his whim, when he had sicced his henchmen on her, leaving her at their mercy, to play with and torture.

The memories of her second captivity at his hands replayed in her mind like a highlight reel of a footballer’s career, making her question every single thing that had happened, analyze every single encounter, and dissect every word spoken ever since her arrival at the island.

She shouldn’t be alive.

That thought followed her like a bad omen, gnawing at her insides and making her feel disoriented as she made her way out of the slave quarters and made the long trek towards the bar.

The logistics about her survival made no sense to her. She remembered the fight with Alaric Vaughn, how he had crushed her neck under the palm of his hands, how she stabbed him, how she had… how she had killed him.

The thought sent her to her knees, her insides rioting, as the implication of what she had done hit her.

She had killed someone.

She had turned into a murderer.

SHE WAS A FUCKING MURDERER!

Saffron gulped against the onslaught of memories, using the sleeve of her dress to wipe her mouth after she was done retching the coffee she had earlier.

Perspiration dotted her temple as she straightened to her full height, swaying a bit as nausea assaulted her once again, making her double over.

It was all too much for her to her handle—the pain, the suffering, the betrayal, and the memories of what she had done, of the life she had taken, even if the world was a better place without a man like Alaric Vaughn.

She was just like the Alpha. She had taken a life without flinching. She had become what she had feared.

There was no coming back from that, even if she had done it to save her life.

She was a monster, just like the man who kept her captive.

She stared at the palms of her hands, imagining the blood of the man whose life she had taken, seeing his blood coating her palms, feeling the warmth of it as it dripped down onto her feet, staining the earth red.

She heaved a sigh, taking a greedy inhale of oxygen, replenishing her lungs before exhaling slowly, trying to calm her racing heart and get her thoughts in check.

It would be so easy for her to lose herself to the thoughts that threatened to pull her under, to the panic that had overtaken her senses, and to the dread that filled every orifice of hers.

But, she wouldn’t let them win.

At least, not today.

Taking a deep breath to center herself, Saffron rose to her full height once again, inhaling through her nose slowly and exhaling through her mouth.

It worked in calming her to a certain degree until she heard the scrunch of feet on dried leaves, which sent her careening back headfirst into the night she had been attacked again, by the trio from hell.

**

“You killed my father, and you think it is okay to parade around pack lands as if you are something special when you are nothing more than a lowly human being whose father sold her to clear away his gambling debt,” the red-head in the middle, Myra ranted, glaring at Saffron with venom in her eyes.

A sharp pain speared through Saffron’s heart at the mention of the circumstance that had led her to living on the island, even though she didn’t understand half of what Myra was saying.

Saffron killed her father?

When?

How?

Why?

Why would she do something as monstrous as that? Why would she take someone’s life and go on with her life as if nothing had happened? How was it possible for her to kill someone and not remember doing it?

It was a mistake. It had to be.

She wasn’t a murderer.

“I didn’t do anything,” Saffron denied, shaking her head to refute Myra’s claim. “It wasn’t me. You have to believe me.”

“Believe you?” Myra scoffed, advancing towards Saffron as she took several steps backwards, putting distance between them. “You want me to believe that you didn’t kill my father? When there was a witness who saw everything go down? You want me to believe you over my own brother?”

Brother?

What the hell was she going on about?

Had she somehow tangled herself with a family of psychos unknowingly?

“I have no idea what you are talking about.” Saffron shook her head again, fear eclipsing her doubts as her back hit the trunk of a tree.

Cornered, with no way to escape, Saffron tried to appeal to her would-be attackers, hoping there was a bit of empathy in them and that they would soon realize that they had gotten the wrong person.

“You have the wrong person! I didn’t do anything! I’m not a murderer!”

With a snarl, Myra’s elongated claws took a swipe at Saffron’s chest, ripping apart her dress and taking away a chunk of her body with them.

A loud scream bubbled up Saffron’s throat, as a burning unlike any she had ever experienced speared her and sent her to her knees, blood gushing out of her open wounds, her insides making her feel like she was being eaten alive.

“Myra! What the hell?” one of the other girls exclaimed, but her shouts fell on deaf ears, as Myra transformed into a giant wolf right before Saffron’s eyes.

Half delirious and disoriented from the pain, Saffron wasn’t sure what she was seeing, as the wolf launched itself against her, rolling them both down the forest floor.

Pain blossomed against her sides, as the wolf took a swipe at her again, the attacks raining down on her in tandem, while the other females tried to get the wolf to back down.

A scream tore at her lips, as blood gushed from her wounds, before the wolf was pulled off of her.

Lying in a pool of her blood, Saffron wondered if indeed what she had seen was true and not the machinations of her brain due to the pain she was feeling.

A sharp tug at her arms brought her back to the present, and she found herself staring into the concerned brown eyes of Ryder Oscura, the son of her enemy and the current object of her desire.