It was way past midnight.
But the party still hadn’t died.
Laughter. Music. Glasses clinking. Somewhere outside the door..the world was still spinning...everyone was still drunk on celebration.
But for Autumn...time had stopped.
But her chest was not.
It ached. Not with pain. Not even sorrow.
But with this brutal, hollow sort of absence.
A black hole of everything that was not and that should have been.
She had walked away from that room like a zombie. Nobody had tried to stop her when she almost stumbled out of the chamber where the ladies were having their private party... or may be they hadn’t noticed. Most of them were already too wasted and had probably passed out... or vomiting.
Autumn pushed the door open and stood in the center of the room Alpha Velor had assigned her...quite generously.
Her dress was still on her. Red...like how she was bleeeding.Crimson... like her shame.
She couldn’t breathe.
Her throat was closing. Her ribs hurt. Her lungs would not expand.
She just stood there...her fingers curled into the fabric of her dress. Then slowly a sound tore from her throat. Half sob, half snarl.
Her hands flew to the straps of her gown, clawing at them, yanking until the delicate fabric ripped. Silk slithered down her body, pooling at her feet like shed skin. She kicked it away, disgusted.
"Get off. Get off me."Autumn began to scrub. Arms. Neck. Chest.
It wasn’t the fabric that she was trying to get rid off, it was his scent. It still clung to her. Still lingered where he had touched.
Autumn didn’t realize when her hands began trembling. Or when her steps carried her blindly towards the bath.She didn’t bother with the lights.
She stumbled to the shower, wrenching the faucet with enough force to nearly snap it.
Water exploded from the showerhead..icy at first, then scalding. She did not flinch. Just stepped under the torrent, head bowed, letting it scald her skin red.
His hands on her waist.
His breath against her ear.
The way he had looked at her
She turned the water on full blast! Scorching.
Steam flooded the room instantly, coating the mirrors, making the air thicker and harder to swallow.
But she did not care.
She did not fight with it...
Her fist slammed into the tiled wall. Once. Twice.Thrice.Pain splintered up her arm, but she welcomed it. Better than the other pain.
"I am sorry," she gasped, sliding down the wall, her legs giving out. Water pounded her back,her hair plastered to her face like a shroud. "I am so sorry, my little ones. I did not mean to...I did not want..."
But the words dissolved into raw, heaving sobs.She pressed her forehead to her knees, arms wrapped around her stomach. "But he doesn’t get to touch me like that...I am sorry...but he does not just..."
She hurled a bottle of shampoo and it shattered against the opposite wall.
A soap dish followed next.
Then the mirror...her reflection exploding into jagged fragments as she hurled a perfume bottle at it.
"Why?! Why does it still hurt?!"
Her voice echoed off the tiles.
The water slowly ran cold. She did not move. Just sat there, trembling, her nails digging into her thighs hard enough to draw blood.
’He carried her. He carried Lyla like...’
A laugh bubbled up her throat...hysterical.
"Stupid. Stupid woman." She pressed her palms to her eyes then slapped herself hard."You knew...knew what he had chosen."
But her heart had not listened.
Hadn’t stopped wanting.
The babies kicked again...harder this time.
Autumn’s breath hitched. She looked down at her stomach...at the life growing there...his blood, his legacy.
And for one wild, vicious moment, she hated him intensely. Hated him for making her love something that was a part of him.
"I can’t do this," she whispered.
"I can’t carry this alone...How am I supposed to?! I hate you, Kieran! I hate you! Why did you look at me like that?! Why did you come near me?! Why didn’t you just...WHY COULDN’T YOU JUST STAY AWAY?!"
The pain. The loneliness. The fact was that no one...not a single soul...knew what she was carrying... what was happening within her.
She looked down at her belly again. At the tiny lives breathing inside her. The only thing still tethering her to normalcy.
"You are all I have," she whispered. "It’s just you and me now."
Her hands trembled as they curled protectively over the bump.
"And I swear...I will protect you. I swear I will love you enough for the both of us.I swear Mamma will be strong...I promise..."
Her fingers traced the skin beneath her navel. "I hate him...true," she whispered to them, voice raw, shaking . "But I could never hate you."
Another kick...softer.Autumn choked on a laugh and on a sob...at the same time.
"I know, my loves. I know."
She leaned her head back against the tile, eyes shut tight. "We don’t need him," she murmured. "We don’t."
But the moment the words left her mouth...her breath hitched.
Something shifted inside her.
Like the wind had changed directions!
At first, it was nothing more than a pressure...a vague tug low in her chest, like her soul had been yanked by an invisible thread. A vague but sudden jolt.
She blinked and sat up, slowly.She pressed a palm to her heart, trying to ignore it.
Probably just exhaustion.It had been a long day after all.
But then...It happened again.
A sudden clench inside her ribs.Her breath sputtered. Both hands flew to her chest.
Her heart had begun to beat too fast...Too wild.Too... out of rhythm.Inflating and deflating like it was no longer hers. Like it belonged to someone else now.Following somebody else’s instructions.
"No..." she gasped, clutching herself tighter.
But it would not stop.
The rhythm inside her felt off.
The kind of pulse that only came when someone was being hunted.
"Kieran..." she whispered before she could stop herself.