Moon Bound (Glorious Darkness Book 1) (6 page)

(9) Thunders and Storms

|Scarlet's POV|

Several hours later, with the house clean and my other chores done, I find myself anxious to return the nightgown I've borrowed from him. I sigh as I fold the now clean and dry cloth, then drag myself to the second floor and stop in front of his door.

I never saw him back from his run so I can only presume he's still out there, working off his anger, though I've been busy with my work. I can't delude myself he hasn't somehow slipped past me on his way inside.

He's done that a lot in the past and just because we share a mate bond now doesn't mean I'd suddenly be able to sense his every move. It doesn't work this way. It is a connection between two souls, not a sudden psychic ability you are getting out of the bargain and that connection could be blocked still.

It's different for the mated pairs. Once mated the bond is nearly unbreakable. The feelings are stronger, the pull - undeniable. But in my case, it's just a minor irritation. An itch I want to scratch but, instead, choose to ignore.

I bring my hand up, rapping my knuckles on the thick wood, and wait for permission to come inside. For a few minutes, I just stand there, listening to the silence, then, with a relieved sigh, turn the handle and sneak my way in.

Not even halfway in, my breath hitches at the back of my throat when I notice the sitting next to the bed form, head hunched over his knees.

"I'm sorry to interrupt," I whisper, taking a step back, intent to flee on the spot, but not before he snaps his head in my direction.

"Scarlet?" he whimpers, peering up at me from beneath his thick, dark eyelashes, his green orbs rimmed with red as if he's been crying.

I snort. I won't believe it even if I see it and that's really saying something about my opinion of him. However, I decide not to dwell and just get the hell out as quick as possible.

"I just needed to return this," I explain, holding up the cloth in my hands and walking to his bed to place it there.

He propels up from his seat on the rug and glares at me. "You didn't need to do that," he says angrily, his mood fired up by my small act of consideration toward his bed partners. Of course, he is being his usual.

"You don't need to act offended, Alpha," I point out causing him to purse his lips in a displeased grimace.

"Scarlet," he grits out in warning, palms forming fists on his sides. Staying still.

I know this man like the back of my hand - every crease and wrinkle in his protruding character, what drives him, or at least, what does, where I am concerned, but since the discovery I've been swimming in unfamiliar waters.

This, the fact that he's withholding the urge to hurl those hurtful words at me is something new. Unexpected.

Chuckling, amused by his behavior, "And that's my cue to leave, I guess," I brush it off and scurry for the door.

"Why are you doing this?" he stops me, the barely audible tilt in his voice making his words sound clipped to my ears.

The bond is tightly wrapping around me, choking me with the need to console, to remove the lines off of his face.

Glancing over my shoulder, I discover my assumption to be true. His face is contorted in rage boiling just under the surface. That rage I've seen so many times I've perfected myself in recognizing the signs. 

A slight, grim line is stretching his lips, his fists now hidden in his jeans pockets, a dangerous gleam in his eyes with his posture rigid and body tense.

"Doing what?" I question, gripping the door handle for sheer life as familiar fear penetrates through my pores. 

I may be his mate but I don't consider it beneath him to hurt me. He's an alpha and alphas do not allow anyone's defiance, not even their mates'.

"Why are you fighting the bond?" he blurts out, shaking to keep control over his beast, over all these primal instincts that alphas struggle with.

I know I should stop here and get a better grip on myself.

I can't.

"The bond?" Erupting into hysterics despite everything inside me screaming to act reasonable, to be cautious with this male, I'm powerless to prevent the words from coming. It's like I've been suddenly freed and it's now pouring out of me. "You mean that measly, pathetic pull?" Hurling them out, every instinct for self-preservation is forgotten.

"It's not pathetic, Scarlet. It's like nothing I've felt before. I can feel it in my bones, in my head, in my heart." - He places a hand on his chest, grimacing as if it hurts there. - "Everywhere," he finishes, gaze traveling lower.

Heat crawling up my face in embarrassment by his implication, I can feel myself flushing bright red before the absurdity of his statement dawns on me. Delusional, that's what he is.

"Did you just call me delusional?" he growls.

"Didn't mean to say it aloud," I mumble, raising my eyes to his. If anything, he's even angrier now, the tension humming off of him.

Crossing the distance between us in a few strides, his hands clasping my shoulders, shaking me as he shouts in my face, "Don't you feel it? Don't you?" His fingers are digging into my flesh, certain to leave marks as a remembrance of him. They burn on my skin, the sensation not entirely unpleasant yet nothing one should expect from a mate.

"You're hurting me." It's like I can hear that terror inside me. He's never touched me in that way before. He hasn't allowed any of his pack to do that to me. It has always been simple. Clipped orders and harsh words of promises to b fulfilled, collars used to hold me still outside in the cold as I'm being punished for disobeying. 

Hands retracting as if he can read my thoughts, "I'm sorry... I didn't mean to-"

"It's fine." A lie I need to believe in as much as I need to convince him. "It's not like I didn't expect it," I add, wary of his movements. 

Slowly inhaling, his face is ghostly white. Concerned. Scared for me. An open book.

"Ah, I see it finally dawned on you," I point out. It's true what people say. Eventually, the victim will start taking pleasure in that pain too.

With a heart that's breaking by the perversity of my contempt to see him grasping how hurt I am, I'm whispering, "You won. You broke me beyond repair, Alpha. I feel nothing at all. Not the bond, not the mating pull, 
nothing.
" 

Words ending in a quiet laughter, I watch what blood has been left draining from his face and leaving a living, breathing shell of my tormentor behind. 

His hands fall to his sides. My skin is turning frosty from having been barred from his touch after taking his warmth. He steps away, turning from me. Light shivers are raking over his back, head falling into his hands, he's crying or just pretending to be.

"And you know what? I'm glad." The taste of his misery feels sweet on my tongue yet I can't watch his tears.

I turn back and slip out just before the first sob erupts from inside the quiet room. The door clicks shut behind me.

Descending down the stairs, my steps are followed by a loud crash. I hurt the man but I left the beast in that room.

Reluctant to linger so close to him when he's lost in his mindless violence, I pick up my speed when a body is hurled at me, cutting my haste escape short. I plop down on the step, peering up at the familiar face of the blonde.

"What did you do to him?" Sasha is snarling at me after intercepting me on her way up to comfort her alpha lover.

Alex. Alexandra. And now Sasha. Once a friend and now his whore. So much has changed since he came that I no longer can recognize my pack and my friends.

"Aren't you supposed to be asking what he did to me, Alex? But, oh, silly me. I forgot you don't ask that now."

"Whatever he does to you it's your own fault, Scarlet. You know you could have just accepted him so don't pretend to be the victim in front of me now. And I'm asking again. What did you do to him this time?"

Picking myself up, I dust my clothes off, giving her the smug look I know will piss her off.

"Always the caregiver, aren't you, Alex? But why you always seem to be doing that for the ones who can help you up the ladder? Anyway, since you want to know..." Trailing off, her eyes are heavy on me. Judging as if she's never been there or seen it all. 

She changed after they took her that day. She changed so much. What did they do to her to turn her into this person? What did I do?

"I told him the truth," I say to her - a girl who was once a friend and is now a stranger. Forsaken me for his strength, hoping perhaps he would share it with her or that it would rub off on her.

"What?"

"The truth," I repeat.

Face blank, confused. "Whatever. I'll deal with you later. Bitch!" she huffs out.

"Don't bet on it." Just a whisper.

Her eyes meet mine just then, with a sparkle of something I don't understand but something that is strangely reminding me of the old Alexandra. Is it tears I can see forming in those eyes? Is it hope that's regarding me back as I stare at her? 

"You should keep those eyes low when your superior is talking to you, Scarlet." And just like that, the moment is gone. 

She swirls back and, climbing up the stairs, disappears from sight.

Stumbling on unsteady feet, I run to my room to get my bag, then storm out from the home turned to ruins. As I flee further and further away from that place it feels like my imagination is running with me, wild along with the girl who can see the storm weaving its way into the house, the one that's just beginning, the one that's nothing like what they've ever known.

He will wither. He will die with half of himself missing.

Breathing through the pang of regret, I know that I won't be present long enough to see the hopeless fall of Alpha unravel.

(10) Crossing... Over

|Scarlet's POV|

I sit on the shore clutching the letter to my chest, the duffel bag next to me. I keep staring into the whispering water that's beckoning me into its dangerous depths... resisting.

The Moon has yet to set free, the first rays of reflection still hours shy of their appearance in the darkening skies as I hold that precious parchment-like sheet of paper where it belongs.

Close to my heart.

Fear and darkness are gnawing at me, making my heart's palpitations loud in my ears as sweat trickles down my back. The minutes tick past painfully slowly while I stay here, struggling to portray calm on my face and not knowing how long I have to wait until someone comes but hoping it would be soon.

For two years I've been sitting on that shore, waiting for them to take me away. Will it happen tonight? Or will I have to go back like so many times before?

Alpha's anger has probably wilted at some point, leaving him to seethe with much-deserved turmoil in the confines of his chamber... hopefully. I imagine he is now asleep, or better yet - drowning in his hard-earned misery, but most likely he is beating his brains out trying to figure new ways to deprive me into submission. Or he's just fucking Sasha's brains out. No surprise there.

As far as his present occupation is granting me a reprieve from his caustic demeanor, it doesn't matter what he is doing. Yet, I know it won't be too long until the bond gets the better of him. 

He may think I'm sulking somewhere or he may be just giving me space yet he's prone to seek my company sooner or later.

A slight, barely audible rustle calls my attention to the tall outline of the forest behind me. I don't call the place my home. It hasn't been my home for a long time. Too long.

My first instinct is to lay low on the ground, hoping to stay unnoticed if it's one of the patrols but, the moment I catch sight of the human form, I know it's not a pack member.

Is it really happening or is it just a dream?

A slim, petite woman emerges from behind the tree cover, her steps as soft and silent as the whisper of feathers dancing in the wind. Her dark, dirty blonde hair falls over the bigger part of her face, adding another visual barrier to the shadow of her hoodie.

She is a woman, of that I am certain. Her small, graceful figure is too feminine to be mistaken for a male's. Stopping a few steps into the clearing, the treeline looming threateningly behind her, she makes a small, barely there hand gesture in invitation. She probably regards me as warily as I regard her, but I can't really tell behind the curls curtaining her eyes from view.

However, the tension in her body is indication enough.

I sniff the air, trying to discern her scent in the mix of forest's aromas, but there's nothing. She's either hiding it somehow or has found a way to mask it.

I've only heard stories about it but never actually seen it, or rather scented it out.

She raises her hand again, beckoning me with an urgency I find odd at first, but then, remembering that I have been actually waiting for one of them to show up, brush off.

Is she one of them? Is this a trick?

Rising from my spot, I strap the duffel bag over my shoulder and tuck the letter back into my pocket. Slowly, I make my way over, taking her offer of a hand. She squeezes gently, letting me know she's my hope, then nods towards the woods, a miniature of a smile tugging at the corners of her uncovered lips. She swings back, pulling me behind into a jog before I can decide if I'm actually going to do this.

"Where are we going?" Whispering, the doubt is nipping at the corners of my mind and lacing through my words as I start second-guessing the situation. "Did you come to take me away? Was it you who sent the letter?"

"Be quiet. No need to alarm the patrols of our presence."

"Please, just tell me. Are you one of them? Are you a vampire?"

"Yes and only a half. Now, move."  Hushing me quickly, she doesn't leave space for argument.

"Took you long enough to come to my aid," I mumble. 

"I know and I'm sorry. We couldn't get you out before you have shifted."

Giving out a mental eye roll at the excuse, I keep trekking behind her. Do I believe her? Do I have any other choice but to follow her? That will be a 'hell to the no'.

Suddenly, the woman stops, causing me to nearly crash into her back.

"Too slow," hissing at me, her posture turns rigid as she stares at the darkness, listening intently.

"Get on," she says, tapping a gloved hand on her shoulder without sparing me a backward glance.

"What?" Whispering back in confusion I try to pinpoint the reason for her sudden wariness.

"Get on my back." With another hiss showing her razor-sharp set of fangs, she urges me into action, this time, brushing her bangs off of her face to add a death glare before that same hand gives another tap on her shoulder.

I arch a brow in disbelief. "Going to give me a piggy back ride?"

"No shit, Sherlock. Get on. Now!" Snapping back, she's bending her back low for me to climb on.

Without further argument, I hop on her back, silently snaking my arms around her neck before the patrol detects us as I suspect she's afraid will happen.

"Hold on. Maybe close your eyes." She advises and the next second we are flying through the woods.

Faster than I could have ever imagined.

Vampires are notorious for their greater speed and faster reflexes. They could pull off lightning fast attacks and nearly impossible escapes.

Weres are stronger, greater in numbers, however, nothing to vampires' speed.

Wolves are better hunters with their more enhanced sense of smell. They are natural predators or, at least, as natural as a shape-shifting human could be. They consider themselves as the final evolution nature allowed; whereas vampires are the ultimate monsters, feeding off human blood. killing because of a need as natural as the change is for a wolf but they are something else too.

Yet, vampires have been the only ones who answered my shout for help two years ago.

The border looms ahead of us, the new path signaling its existence only for me to see. 

The Moon is kissing the earth plane, winking at me her intent to reveal my absence from the house, and I have no idea when it will or if anyone would even care. Will it be now before I've found my freedom, will it be when it's over?

The moment we actually cross, I can almost hear her. She's cursing me again. She's condemning me for leaving the mate she has given me. All I can do is silence her away and release the breath I've been holding. 

Over. It's finally over.

My very lungs are erupting as the air fights its way in. Chilly and fresh like the freedom I taste on my tongue and feel coursing through my veins. 

SCARLET
, a sudden rush of sound is echoing in my head. A ringing roar. All animal and no man. Wounded. Betrayed. Alone.

Why did she do this? Why did she save me now when she could have done it two years ago? Why did she give me a mate like him? Why did she allow me to flee?  

The Moon never punished him because she always intended for me to do that.

Free. I am free. 
Sending back, I cry out my victory. Prevailing over him. Bittersweet, it's the only pleasure he'll ever give me. 

Soon, the woman slows down. The world turns on its axis and, as the first rays of sunshine glimpse through, I am dropped down to my feet in front of an old truck.

The vampire chic fishes the keys out of her jeans' front pocket, throws them at me, requesting, "Could you drive, please? I'll give you directions."

I nod, slinging the duffel bag off my shoulder and throwing it into the back, then slide into the drivers' seat.

The engine revs up on the first try.