Chapter 95
1534words
"There was a time when you couldn't keep your hands off me. A time when you would call me with desperation when we were apart, and hold me when we were together, as though you were holding on for dear life. How can you tell me not to come to you expecting to find love? How can you actually say such a thing?"
She looked at me with tears in her eyes and my heart was torn in two. It was never my intention to hurt her this way. I had made a complete mess of everything. How had I let things get so bad?
"you're making it harder than it has to be." I said, "And my head feels like it's about to explode."
"make love to me," she said, coming close to me, and placing an arm around me. But I shrugged her off and moved away even before my wolf could react. She had refused to reject me or accept my rejection, so she was still my mate, which meant I was susceptible to her charms. But it was how I lost Ember in the first place.
The thought of that was enough to have me thinking straight again.
"No, Kate. There will be no lovemaking between you and I., not tonight. Not at all. I may be filled with whiskey. But I've got my head straight. I mean what I say about wanting to end this bond. Please don't expect me to suddenly want to make love. And it wouldn't be lovemaking if I touched you. You of all people should know this."
Unable to be close to her anymore, so as to avoid doing or saying something wrong, I got up and left her to herself.
~~~
I woke up the next morning with the feel of a wet cloth being slowly rubbed across my face, my neck, and my bare chest. It was soothing, but it did nothing to take away the banging pain I felt in my head.
I must have still been half asleep because for a moment though, I had managed to delude myself that it was Ember who ran that cloth over my skin,
"I have the mother of all headaches, though." I heard myself say and tried to lean into her touch,
"Would you like me to get you some painkillers?" and whatever amount of sleep I had left in me, immediately fled. I opened my eyes to confirm my suspicion. For indeed, it wasn't Ember who ran that cloth over me, it wasn't ember who stood over me, trying to give me comfort, but a maid with wide watchful blue eyes, and I sat up quickly so that her hand fell away from me,
"What are you doing here? Who told you could come in here?" I asked sharply, and I watched fear come into her eyes,
"I- Madame Kate asked me to come. She said you might have slept feeling unwell and this would help to soothe you. She was worried about you."
"worried about me. Worried about me!" I barked, and whatever pain I felt had reduced, somewhat increased, but I could not control my sudden anger, "Well, you can take your flannels and your buckets, and get out of my chambers right now!" I barked and the girl took a step back, as though my raised voice had caused her to move backwards.
"I'm sorry, sire," she said and started to pack up her things as ordered, fidgeting as she did.
I groaned when she left my room, because all that shouting I had just done had only served to make my headache worse, and I pressed my hand to my temple in agony.
Perhaps I should have asked the maid to leave her flannels and water, at the very least.
I reached for the glass of water at the side of my table and reached into my top drawer for some painkillers.
"Note to self." I said when I'd managed to down the painkillers, "No more whiskey decompression session." I said remembering how I had emptied that bottle of whiskey in one night, hoping it would ease the pain.
Well, it had not eased my pain in any way. On the contrary, everything pointed to a heightened pain. This headache was the height of all headaches known to man. Call me dramatic, but I felt what I felt
I laid my head against the pillow, waiting for the painkiller to take effect, and the wait felt like forever, because right at that moment, I really did feel like that headache was going to take me out.
While I waited for the headache to subside, I found myself wondering about Ember.
Was she okay? Did Jean get her home safely? All of these were questions I just did not have the answer to and it irked me to no end
My phone soon began to ring, and I considered just letting it go to voicemail, however, when it rang for the second time, I had no choice but to take a look and see what it was about. Anyone who called me a second time usually did so out of urgency.
"Jackson, this better be important enough," I prayed. Jackson was the kind of beta who could double-call because he was overwhelmed with paperwork and needed me to help him. If that was the case today, then he was just going to have to do his paperwork without me.
"sire?"
"Jackson," I said and noted the tone of urgency with which he began.
"Sire, it's the prisoner. I don’t know how he got away." Jackson said, and I sat there in utter confusion looking through the window. In all my years as an alpha regent, and then Alpha, I had never heard of a prisoner, especially one as injured as the one I took in yesterday, being able to get away. Which left me with only one conclusion. I had a mole.
"Jackson, we need to find that son of a gun. As soon as possible."
"I'm on it, sire. I just thought to keep you informed."
"but that's not all of it. That man, he didn't get away by himself. Especially not in the condition that we brought him in. Somebody helped him get away. We need to find that person." I said coldly. Jackson was silent for a moment, making me wonder if perhaps the line had been broken, but then he responded,
"I won't stop until I do, sire." he too sounded just as cold as I did.
When the call ended, I tossed my phone to the side and wrestled with my headache as I tried to sit up. Now wasn't the time for hangovers. After this, I really hoped I was going to be more considerate with my alcohol intake in the future.
Because I needed the fulness of my mentation if I was going to find that man that got away. But it wasn't just him getting away that alarmed me, it was knowing that someone from within had helped him. Someone who knew he was here- and only a few people knew he was here- also, someone who knew how things worked. That list was very narrow.
And then I remembered, that this was actually not the first time a prisoner had escaped since the beginning of my rain, quite on the contrary. The first escape of a prisoner since the beginning of my rain occurred a few weeks ago. And it had been no other person, than my own sister.
AXEL'S POV
At first, I thought it was the most adorable sight, to see Jean carrying my sister in his arms all the way to the house until he got to the porch, and I realized that it wasn't romance that had them that way.
I rose when he stopped in front of me, and the look on his face told me that Ember had not merely slept off either,
"What has happened to my sister?" I asked, not wanting to believe the worst, but mentally preparing myself to hear it anyway,
"Let's go inside, first, Axel."
I wanted to yell and demand an answer, but not with Ember between us, I nodded opened the door, and chose to lead the way to Ember's room, hoping that she would be more comfortable there.
I watched as he gently laid her unconscious body in the bed and then he turned to look at me in confusion,
"Well?" I asked in a low tone, and he pointed outside. I turned to look at my sister and had a hard time wanting to leave, but I had heard of unconscious patients still hearing the things that were said around them, so I nodded before following him out of Ember's room and quietly closed the door.
"Well?" I asked again when were down the hallway and Jean heaved out a sigh,
"Ember was attacked, Axel. A group of big men tried to hurt her.
I heard his words, but I suddenly had a hard time conceiving them,
"Are you telling me a bunch of bastards tried to lay their hands on my sister?!"
