Page 25 of Knot What She Seems
Huh?
I think I may have said that out loud. Or maybe I just think it. Confusion weighs down on me like a coat woven out of lead strips.
I hear the squealing of tires, and then a rusty black van pulls into the parking lot. The side door opens, and an unfamiliar man peers out at us. I don’t remember a lot of details about him except for his eyes. They’re such a shade of light blue, they could be white in some settings.
“You boys did good.” A grin tugs up his lips.
My two lovers release my arms simultaneously, and I stagger forward, feeling unsteady and confused. Rough hands grab at me and then haul me into the vehicle. I land on my palms and knees with a choked sob, but the physical pain is nothing compared to the terror rushing through me.
What the hell?
No. No. No. No.
Just before the door to the van slides shut, I lift my head and turn so I can see my alphas one last time. They’re not my scent match mates by any means, but I chose them as my own. Thought I loved them. Thought they loved me.
They stand shoulder to shoulder now, their expression impassive, the only tell of their tension the way their knuckles whiten. The triplets maintain eye contact with me until the door slides shut, obscuring them from view.
And then the van is weaving away with me inside of it.
My feelings of confusion and fear alchemize into something new, something I can barely articulate.
My alphas…
My pack…
They betrayed me.
I don’t know to who, and I have no idea why, but they discarded me as if the last year and a half meant nothing to them.
Tears burn where they land on my cheeks, and I twist my head to smother my sob. But it still comes out anyway, ripping through the silence like the crack of a whip.
One of the guys in the van—and I think there are at least six, though I could be seeing double—begins to chuckle. Blue Eyes twists where he sits in the passenger seat and offers me a malicious smile that has fear percolating low in my gut.
“Welcome to hell, little princess. Let’s see just how much your mommy and daddy love you.”
* * *
I wake with a gasp,heart pounding, throat clogged, and terror sweeping through my tired body in a raging inferno. I suddenly feel too hot, too constricted, and kick off the blankets.
At first, I don’t know where I am. I half expect to be in that tiny, abnormally bright room my captors brought me to. But then my heart rate begins to calm as I take stock of the familiar surroundings. The framed picture of me, Caran, and Teddie. The unicorn stuffed animal I won at a fair when I was a little girl. The green backpack I stole from my brother. My Darling uniform, immaculately ironed and hanging off the back of the desk chair.
Darling Academy.
Safe.
I’m safe.
I repeat that mantra in my head as I reach for my phone on the bedside table. It’s a little after five, which means breakfast should start soon. Since it’s a Tuesday, I have to hightail it over to Eros Academy before eight for my first class of the day. At least it’s a lecture. I don’t think I can handle starting the day with brutal hand-to-hand combat, especially after the night I had.
A tremor works its way down my spine as I force myself out of bed, force myself to get ready for the day.
I haven’t had a nightmare about my exes in…fuck, I don’t even know how long. They aren’t usually the stars of my bad dreams. That position is reserved for the men my alphas handed me off too.
I know innately what’s the cause of this particular nightmare.
The masked alpha.
My…scent match.
