Page 169 of Claimed

Gone.

A roar of rage flies from my mouth.

Hands are on me. Riley has my shoulders. He’s behind me.

Noise rushes into my head and new shapes are in the space. My father. Rye’s father. Mase’s dad. I hear Riley speaking but make out nothing over the adrenalin pounding through my veins.

Bailey holds that phone. Erica has my hands. They’re either circling me slowly or I’ve got vertigo. My mom. The woman who raised me in the hospital bed is hooked up to machines because someone fucking targeted her. And she needs to be better. She needs to wake up. Wake up and be okay so I can go find my fucking mate. Heat intensifies not only in my eyes, in my entire head.

Pull.

Pull.

Smoky shadows ooze from the walls and float directly over her. The shadows are still, but the room has begun turning slowly, around and around with everything turning except Erica who still has my hands. Red and blue sparks fly, hitting the shadows and sparking loudly, like crackling electricity.

“Pull,” Erica urges.

And now the sparks are purple. Mine and Erica’s magic working in tandem.

I pull in a deep breath and suck the shadows straight out of the air into my lungs.

Mom is suddenly sitting straight up, eyes open, gasping for air, and I’m immediately releasing my cousin’s hands, turning to the bathroom door in the corner of the room, rushing for the sink and vomiting whatever I’ve pulled from those shadows, straight into the drain.

My guts are convulsing painfully.

It's rancid. Rotting. It’s hatred. Pure, covetous hatred.

Covetous? Why do I know that?

I taste the meaning behind the poison. I know what spell was used. If I were more experienced, I’d know exactly how to cast it. Someone poisoned her, someone who wants what she has.

My ears are ringing. Erica’s hands are on my back as steam from the hot, running water rises. I spit into the sink and whatever it is bubbles back up in the drain like black sludge before a slurping noise pulls it back down.

“Grey,” Rye puts his hand on my shoulder. “We’ll help. We’ll help, brother.”

Erica mutters something, holding her hands over the sink, flexing her fingers.

Wind, seemingly from nowhere, blows her hair back.

And I hear my father loud, clear, but baffled. “Baby? Why the fuck do you smell like that?”

I stare at the drain another beat while the hot water continues to run before I reach for the tap and turn it off, then take in my distraught father.

He turns to me. “She smells like your mother.”

He’s not making sense. Or I can’t fathom anything because I’m reeling at the news that Stacy is gone.

“Carrie smells like Soleil,” my father clarifies, and he looks pale.

49

Stacy

I should’ve known this was how it would go. Of course Wyatt would make things hard, would make things ugly. Causing a sewage problem as part of his legacy is not a shock. But how will it end, though? Grey finding me and rescuing me, of course. And he’ll probably have to kill my brother to do so. It’s likely just a matter of what I’ll have to endure until then.

I can barely see from my left eye since it’s swollen nearly shut. I’m in the back seat of Boyd’s red pickup truck and my hands are bound. Beside me, Jase’s sister is bound, and also gagged. Her head is by my hip.

Wyatt referenced his mate being too spirited and too mouthy for his nerves, which must be why she’s tied up and gagged like this. She and I have exchanged glances, and I can tell by looking into her bloodshot eyes that she’s not feeling feisty or mouthy. She seems broken.

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