Page 37 of Oracle
However, the fuzzy memory of walking with Reagen to meet his parents before Caleb could join us slammed back into me. The tent had been empty, no parents in sight and just as I had spun to question where his parents were, I had been punched in the temple.
That motherfucker. He’ll pay for this.
Why the hell had Reagen punched me and where was he holding me?
Wiggling around, I felt that I was slumped against the wall, my wrists and ankles bound by rope, I believe. There was nothing covering my mouth, though, so I took a chance to call for help, hoping someone in our camp would hear me. “Help! Someone, help me! I’m trapped in here!”
A dark chuckle from close by was the only response I got, causing me to inhale sharply at the thought of someone being in here and not knowing who.
The bag was ripped off of my head, my hair a fucking bird’s nest, obscuring parts of my vision, but I could tell that I was in a circular stone cell with no windows. The only light reflecting through the small room was coming from the candles burning on the walls.
There, standing like a gloating fucking bastard was Reagan at the doorway to my cell, eyes shining with unfiltered glee at this situation. It was like he had transformed into a completely different person than he’d portrayed. His shining personality had morphed into a bloodthirsty and cruel one. The only thing golden about him being his similar physical features to Caleb.
I’ll fucking rip his balls off and shove them so far down his intestines that he shits them out.
I didn’t share the same animosity as Lux. Call me naïve or weak, but all I felt was the sting of betrayal. How deep did Satan’s influence run into our ranks? How many of those we cared about would smile to our face and then the next second feed us to the enemy like meaningless fodder?
“Why?” I asked him, my voice soft. I needed to know why he had defected and turned against us all. “Are you already infected with his blood? Are you a demon now?”
That would explain why he had done this, being under Satan’s influence as Jace and Maya had been. Disguised as a shell of the person they were pretending to be, when deep down the person they were was dead.
The two guards who worked on removing the rope restraints I had on quickly replaced them with metal shackles and clipped them to the wall. As soon as their task was done, they backed off, silently leaving Reagan and I to our chat.
Leaning against the edge of the wall, he tilted his head and smirked. “No, I’m not. I haven’t had a single drop of his blood.”
No.
I winced at his admission. That hurt a whole lot fucking more, knowing he did this with a clear head and of his own free will. No one was to blame besides him.
What was he offered to do this? I thought of Christofer and how he had been promised that his dad would come back to life if he stabbed me. It had to be something of importance, right?
After he shits his balls out, I’ll feed them to him again, but cut off his airway before he can swallow, choking and suffocating on them.
“Did Satan offer you something of importance to take me?”
I wanted so desperately for his answer to be yes and to explain it to me. I wanted to understand why he would do this of his own free will.
The shit-eating grin on Reagen’s face proved that his intentions were malicious before he even opened his mouth to respond. “Yes. He offered to kill you. That’s of great importance to me.”
How could he be so callous and cruel to the mate of his brother? What had I ever done to him to deserve this?
You did nothing, Kira. He’s a piece of shit.
A gut-wrenching question came to mind, and I almost buried it back down immediately. But I had to know the truth. I asked, my voice trembling slightly, afraid of his answer, “Did Caleb know? Was he in on this?”
I hated how weak and broken I sounded as I asked, but I had to know if it was their entire family that was infected. If Caleb had fucking played me—no, played all of us. He held a piece of all of our hearts, and I couldn’t bear to hear that he had abused that, taking advantage and allowing his brother to deliver me to Hell.
If it were true, this would be a blight on my soul for the rest of my existence at Selene’s side. It would haunt my dreams during the night and my thoughts during the day.
A scoff came from him, “As if that spineless twit could ever pull this off. He’s like a fucking cub again with you, doing everything you say without question, just for the hopes of a measly scrap of your whorish attention.”
Wow, tell me how you really feel.
It didn’t matter what he said to me, though. I held on to the peace that Caleb hadn’t betrayed us. He was still the mate I knew and loved.
“He has no thought for his family he left behind. Did you know he told us the first night we arrived that after this war is over, he planned to follow you wherever you wanted to go?” Reagen asked, disgust dripping from his words. “We made a pact when we were young to never chase pussy that led us away from our family and yet, he has spent no time with us since we arrived besides that brief conversation. I guess yours must be pretty fucking spectacular to break a promise between brothers.”
He was goading me and trying to hurt me, but I let his words roll off. They were meaningless until I gave them power over me, and I would not give him that satisfaction.
