Page 103 of His Curse

“Exactly. You saved the entire clan compound by leaving that hell hole the first opportunity you got, and while it didn’t make it any easier for the ones you left behind, we will get those who remain out as soon as we can.”

I roll my eyes again with a huff, annoyed with my mate even though I know he’s right.

Deep down I knew Kentworth would react like this, knew he’d wipe out another group of people as some sort of twisted punishment for my escape. I just wanted to believe he wouldn’t and I’d be able to go back to that godforsaken place and free everyone before he had the chance.

And I’m going to have to live with the guilt that comes with knowing any life lost from the moment I left is my fault. “He’s going to kill them all.”

“Oh, sweetheart,” Frankie says as she reaches out and places a hand on my knee. “Lark, you can’t blame yourself for any of this.”

“No?” I glance at her with narrowed eyes. “I can’t blame myself for causing enough chaos on my way out that Kentworth would want to punish as many people as he could? Can’t blame myself for being the reason so many suffered at his hand?” With a frustrated growl, I go back to the pictures in front of me and hone in on South Hall. “And I definitely shouldn’t blame myself for waiting so long to go back, for waiting weeks to give you enough information to use in order to devise a plan to get us in? For all the innocent people meticulously and painfully killed every day that’s passed between when I left and right now?”

“Luna,” Ronny says softly as he clears his throat. “If you hadn’t gotten out then our entire clan would be under attack. A surprise attack that none of us could have planned for, and there’s no telling what would have happened to you if you stayed.”

“I know exactly what would have happened,” I snap. My anger is warranted but it isn’t fair to take it out on my nephew. It isn’t fair to take it out on any of them but the harsh reality is, this is a battle we’re going to lose one way or another and no matter how good my intentions are, there’s no way of changing that. “I would have been forced into the breeding program, would have been forced to watch that crazy son of a bitch kill more of my people. Then I would have had to sit by and watch him go after all of you, all while hoping Kentworth didn’t tire of me so I could stay alive long enough to keep fighting.”

“Lark,” Colton grunts, another firm warning in his tone. “Everything happens for a reason, you know this, and regardless of what wewantto happen, things are going according to The Maker’s plan and no one else’s.”

“Stop,” I whisper through clenched teeth.

“I won’t. None of us will, not until you see that nothing is your fault, and you have no control over the things that have or will happen. Every damn bit of this entire fucked up scenario can be blamed on one person and one person alone, and that isnot you.”

With a growl, I clench my fists and refrain from losing my shit on my mate. “Stop, Colton. Right or not, now isn’t the time to try to make me feel better about any of this. It isn’t happening until we free those who remain, and burn that facility to the ground.”

“We will,” he sighs. “We will do all of that and more, but if you go in with guilt on top of the anger you already harbor then—”

“Stop!” I snap as I throw my hands up in frustration, my right one coming into contact with something as Colton grunts, “Fuck!”

I turn my head just in time to see my mate grab his crotch and double over before toppling onto the bed with a dry heave. He curls into a ball almost immediately, hands covering his junk as he groans in pain, and when I hear Ronny and Zan start to chuckle behind me, that’s when I realize what just happened.

Colton managed to come up beside me without me noticing, and I punched him right in the dick because of it.

With a sigh, I get to my feet and climb onto the bed next to him as my alpha starts into a coughing fit. “Mahasani…”Lifting my hand, I carefully push the long strands of hair from his eyes, my mate gagging and pushing his face into the mattress. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do but you know better than most how hard it is to carry around a burden you have no control over, then just wish the guilt away because it’s unwarranted.”

“You didn’t”—cough, gag—“have to punch me in the junk for it.”

I roll my eyes as Colt scoots close enough to bury his face in my thigh. “I didn’t mean to.”

“But that was one hell of a shot,” Ronny says on a laugh. “Intentional or not, that was a well-deserved nut punch.”

“Along time coming, as they say, yes?” Zan chimes in, the two males earning a playful scowl from me.

He’s not wrong.“My point is, I will always feel like any loss after my escape is my fault because I didn’t get out soon enough.” I look down at my alpha, Colton loosening up a bit as I run my fingers through his hair. “I had so little to lose before, and I needed to try but knowing so many lives will still be ruined because I couldn’t act fast enough is just something I’m going to have to deal with.”

One of Colt’s hands leaves his crotch long enough to come up to my leg and give it a squeeze. “Give yourself a little grace, Birdie. You are doing everything within your power to save everyone you can, and even if that’s only one person, we will stop Kentworth from taking anyone else. It might not be the original plan but it’s a good one.”

“I completely agree,” Frankie says while she comes to sit next to me, linking her arm through mine as she rests her chin on my shoulder. “You know that insane doctor won’t hesitate to do what he needs to if he feels hisresearchis jeopardized. It’s the sad truth of this entire thing, but getting out, making it to us,warningus then devising a plan to go back. All of that not only spares the clan, it could be saving countless others that Kentworth would have otherwise taken the same way he took you.”

I appreciate this, appreciate all of them, but I’m really starting to question my entire line of thinking.

The photos alone have my anxiety spiked and even though I know better than anyone how the doc operates, those cells weretooempty, too pristine for them to have simply moved the others in order to put in a front for Frankie. My gut is telling me he’s already started killing off those who remain in order to make a point and when we go storming the gates, that lunatic won’t hesitate to throw the killswitch.

“My dear Luna,” Zan sighs as he pushes his faded pink mohawk back through his magnificent and twisted horns. “Your inner turmoil over all of this is admirable but ridiculous, nonetheless. You are doing a good thing any way you cut it, and that’s what you should hold onto.”

I look at him for a few beats, regarding the demon with a curious combination of love and annoyance.

Again, my gratitude toward the four of them for trying to make me feel like I didn’t totally fuck everything up by escaping the way I did is unmatched, but it’s grinding on my nerves to a degree.

They don’t know those people, haven’t met them and learned about their lives. They’re just prisoners to Colton and our family. Prisoners who deserve to be set free and given a new lease on life, but still. They don’t know them the way I do, and the idea of losing anymore of them because of me—especially one of my friends—makes me sick to my stomach. The problem is, looking at this group of people who jumped in to help me without batting an eye, the ones who are physically here or helping remotely,theyhave me questioning if the risks of doing this are starting to outweigh the rewards.

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