Chapter 25

Asher’s POV  

I couldn’t take it anymore, it had been a week. A week had passed since Arielle vanished, and no one had bothered to look for her instead they had chosen to believe the mindless and almost relentless rumors going around. I had gotten sick of hearing them myself.

“She ran off with some man.”  

“She didn’t even say goodbye." 

They were all lies.  I knew Arielle and I know that she wouldn’t have just up and left without a word. She wasn’t selfish like that.  

What I couldn't seem to believe was the way everyone else was so quick to turn on her, to accept this twisted story as fact.  

Everyone except me.  

For a week, I had been searching, questioning, and following any lead I could find, but I kept hitting dead ends because everyone had taken the rumours as gospel. The only person who seemed to know more than she was letting on was Vanessa and considering that the rumors all led back to her I was fairly certain she knew more than she was letting on. 

And I was done playing nice, which is why I was here, waiting outside Vanessa’s favorite little boutique in town, knowing she wouldn’t be able to resist an afternoon of mindless gossip with her equally senseless friends. And sure enough, she came strutting out, a satisfied smirk on her lips as she whispered to the girls beside her, she had the same self-satisfied look in her eyes that I had seen too many times to mistake it for something else. 

“Where is she?” I growled my voice was low and she scoffed.

“I thought you already heard —”  

“Don’t lie to me.” I hissed, my fingers tightening  just enough to make her wince. “You’ve been running your mouth all over town, spreading bullshit. But I don’t buy it, Vanessa. I know you, and I know Arielle.” I hissed my jaw clenching.

“She wouldn’t just leave.” She lifted her chin defiantly. 

“Believe what you want. The truth doesn’t change just because you don’t like it.” I didn’t even think. I grabbed her wrist and yanked her away from the crowd, ignoring her startled gasp and shooting a warning glare to the girls who moved towards us as I dragged her into a nearby alley, pressing her against the rough brick wall. Her blue eyes widened, but she quickly schooled her features into one of feigned indifference. 

“You think I don’t know you? That I don’t know how much you hate her?”  

“I don’t hate her.”  she hissed back.

“You do. And you’ll do anything to get her out of the way.”  

“Believe what you want, Asher. But she left you. She left all of us.”  

"It would do you good to forget her " she hissed and my nostrils flared, my gut filling with all the rage I couldn't express in that moment I clenched my fists, my wolf snarling beneath the surface. 

"I'll ask this one last time, Vanessa and if you don't want me to get very violent you'll use it.” 

If she didn’t tell me the truth, I’d—  I didn't get to finish that thought, something—someone—shoved me hard from the side, knocking me off balance. I stumbled back, eyes flashing as I turned to find my attacker.  

Rowan, Vanessa’s idiot of a brother. He looked like his sister but a male version of course, his blond hair was disheveled, falling into his face and his green eyes were narrowed with anger as he stepped between us, his chest heaving. 

“Back off,” I growled. 

“What the hell, Asher?” he snapped. 

"You don’t put your hands on my sister.”  I scoffed at him.

“You don’t even like your sister.” His jaw clenched as he glared up at me.

"That doesn’t mean I’ll let you shake her down like a damn criminal.”  I took a step forward, barely restraining my anger. 

“Then tell her to stop lying. Tell her to tell me the truth.”  

Rowan’s expression flickered over to Vanessa for just for a second—before he glanced back at me. He laughed.  

"Is that what this is about, that reject" he muttered and I growled under my breath, he huffed.

"That's not as scary as you think it is.” he mumbled and I looked him dead in the eye.

"You had better star talking."

“You really don’t know, do you?” he muttered, my heart slammed against my ribs.  

“Know what?” I demanded. Vanessa was glaring at him, shaking her head slightly, as if daring him to say something but whatever silent warning she was trying to send him, he ignored it totally in favour of pissing his sister off. He turned back to me and sighed. 

"She didn’t run off, Asher.” My heart nearly stopped.  Rowan ran his hands through his hair and the back of his neck. 

"She was taken.”  

The world tilted slightly around me confusion filling my gut.

"What?”  I hissed and he shrugged. Vanessa let out a furious hiss. 

“Rowan, shut up.” But he ignored her, his gaze locked on mine. 

"Arielle didn’t leave. Alpha Damian took her.”  

“Liar,” Vanessa hissed at Rowan, her face red with fury.  

"He's lying Asher" she called out. The breath in my lungs froze.  

"You can't be serious " I muttered and he shrugged.

"You asked." 

My mind struggled to catch up to the words and make sense of them.  

Damian.  

My brother.  

The same brother who had rejected Arielle without hesitation even after marking her, who had made it clear she meant nothing to him my hands formed a fist by my side as I tried not to let my  emotion have control. It didn’t make sense.  

“Why?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.  

Rowan shook his head. 

“I don’t know. All I know is that he took her, and she’s with him now.”  I staggered back, my thoughts racing, this changed everything.  I had spent the last week searching for Arielle, chasing dead ends, battling the frustration and helplessness that clawed at my chest when she had been right under my nose for likely all that time. 

Vanessa was practically shaking with rage. 

“You idiot,” she seethed, shoving Rowan. “Why would you tell him that? He’s going to—”  

I didn’t hear the rest of whatever argument I had likely just started I was already moving, already turning on my heel and walking away, my heart pounding.  

I needed to find Arielle.  

And I needed to know why my brother had taken her.