Page 21 of The Barren Luna

“Thank you for the broth, Jessie, it was delicious.”

“You should be thanking yourself, Luna,” she smiled. “I used the one I found in your freezer.”

I chuckled and was amazed at how I was still capable of the simple gesture. Somewhere in my freezer, there was a batch of broth that was made and frozen at a point in time when Dorothy was still alive. Would one be able to ingest a moment of that time while eating it or did it disappear in the process of thawing?

Lost in those thoughts, I didn’t even notice that Jessie had left. My body was weakened by the weeks (months?) of starvation and darkness. I made a mental note to ask Jessie what date it was. The door opened and I immediately wanted to know:

“Jessie -,” I looked up and saw the once-loved and familiar male standing in the door frame, his eyes trained on me. I whimpered as I frantically crawled backward on the bed until I reached the headboard, and then I started looking around the room for a weapon to defend myself.

“I’m not going to hurt you, Ginny,“ he said quietly and I almost believed him. The asshole had the audacity to look hurt at my reaction. I just shook my head.

“Don’t come closer.”

“I won’t,” he held his hands up in surrender. “I’ll stay right here. How are you feeling?”

“What am I doing here? Why did you bring me here?”

He seemed to consider his response carefully.

“This is your home, Ginny.”

My face must have clearly shown my confusion and disbelief because he added: “I know now that you were innocent, Ginny. I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you before. I deserve your reaction tome, what I did was unforgivable, but I am your mate and we will work on this, we will get through this.”

Some sixth sense in the back of my mind prickled, and I took a good look at Henry. His eyes seemed wild, and his hair and clothes were unkempt. There was just something off about him. Why did he believe in my innocence all of a sudden? Where was his whore and their pup? Many questions needed answering and I got the sense that I had to ask them elsewhere.

When I remained silent, he said, “We'll eat dinner together downstairs. Wear the green dress you wore when we went to your sister’s mating ceremony,” and he left.

Ignoring the clearly insane request, I decided to search the room to see if I could find anything that could be used as a weapon, either on me or on him, but there was nothing. In one of the bedside tables, I found a braid of hair. A braid that looked like it was made from my hair, to be exact. It was washed and combed and braided nicely, and thinking about how he got it and why he kept it next to his bed just made me sick.

Oh, God. Was he going to sleep in this bed with me? Panic flooded my body and my flight response kicked in. I looked at the window and decided – I would jump. It wasn’t high up enough to die on impact, but in my weakened state, it could still do significant damage. Besides, I assumed I was still his prisoner, so maybe the guards would kill me during my escape attempt. Anything was better than staying here and wondering whether Dotty's murderer would come join me at bedtime.

I felt my ribs crack as I hit the ground. I struggled to breathe as I tried to summon the strength to get up. A very blurry pair of black boots appeared in my line of sight, and then another. Soon, someone was carrying me back to the house. I tried protesting but my body wouldn’t cooperate, and darkness pulled me under.

Jessie was doing something to my ribs and the pain woke me up.

“What the hell was that, Ginny? Were you trying to kill yourself?” Henry seethed but upon seeing my expression, he stilled. “Oh my God, you were. Ginny, what the fuck?!”

He paced around the room before fixing me with his gaze.

“Don’t harm yourself,” he commanded, and I felt something wet on my upper lip. Jessie gasped and quickly excused herself. While she fumbled with packing up the first aid kit, Henry sat down next to my bed, pale and lost in thought.

“I just remembered my command to you,” he said as the door was closing. “I only wish I’d remembered it sooner.”

I furrowed my brows, thinking back on all of Henry’s commands to me, and it dawned on me.

“Fuck, I messed up, Ginny. I wish I’d remembered it earlier, fuck! Why didn’t you remind me?”

I considered for a moment whether to respond or not, but when I realized he was truly clueless, I decided to help him one last time.

“One moment, I was in pain because you were fucking someone else,” I said and he grimaced. Red-hot rage was bubbling up inside me.

“Then I injected myself with poppy seed and fell asleep. Then someone knocked on the door and told me you were expecting me. Then your pregnant whore threw herself down the stairs. Then I was in the dungeon. Then you killed my favorite person in the world and made me watch. When, in between all of these shocking events, was I supposed to have sat down and taken a moment to rationally dissect everything and maybe even remember your command to me? And why was it my responsibility to keep track of the Alpha commands you made?” He didn’t respond.

“And since you’ve never been commanded, let me enlighten you – it’s not like youthinkabout the command all the time, you may even forget it, but your body never does. So my body wouldn’t have let me harm her even if I had wanted to. That’s why I didn’t say anything, I had forgotten what you hissed at me the first time I sat next to her!”I could see spit flying from my mouth as I raged.

He just hung his head in shame, and I saw it as my opening. I couldn’t fully shift yet but I released my claws and swiped at his neck, hoping to nick his jugular. The movement jarred my broken ribs and hurt like hell. Hearing me move, he lifted his head and I only managed to slash his face before he caught my wrist and stared at me in shock.

“Guard!” he yelled, and a male I’d never seen before opened the door. “Tell Doctor Warren to send over some wolfsbane.”

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