Chapter 73: Colton: Part 3

My initial response is to tear up. My throat closes tightly as if it’s going to choke me, and butterflies escape within my stomach and bash around my insides, hitting every orifice and organ they can fly at.

I’m feeling the same as him, aching with the sudden waterfall of feelings I’ve been trying to fight for weeks.

~“Colton, listen. I don’t want to do this over the link, but there’s a lot, and, for right now, we need somewhere to go, and you need to be there.”~

~“Somewhere safe because we’re going to have a pack on our ass soon, and I can’t fight them alone. There are too many.”~

~“For now, I need you to tell me where to go so we can meet and for you to show up with enough of you to hold off some crazy, mad wolves.”~

My hands shake with the ferocity of overwhelming pain I’m experiencing at being in his head and having him in mine.

It’s like the weeks apart drop away instantly, and it reminds me of everything I miss the most about him—the intimacy of it.

His voice, his overprotective need to take care of me, and his presence, even in my head alone, make me feel suddenly safer, cherished—and he’s only making it worse by saying everything I’ve wanted to hear.

Why did he have to be stupid and mark that bitch?

~“We? As in… you’re with someone else?”~

The crumbling of his tone and the hint of hurt that seeps through shakes me out of my rose-tinted stupor, and I realize he thinks I might have found someone, as in a mate.

I don’t get why he would jump to ~that~ conclusion unless it’s guilt because he knows what he’s done to us, and I’m well within my rights to find a mate and say screw him.

It’s unimportant, and it irks me slightly that he would home in on that little word as though more important than the rest.

~“Yes, WE. Look, he’s helping me. He’s a friend, and we need to go somewhere safe.”~

It seems to completely sober Colton up, and I almost feel him draw back a little, the link falling silent for a moment as he seems to disconnect and then comes back an agonizing long-ass minute later.

I guess it’s a moment to pull his head together as jealousy eats him, but good, maybe it’s karma, and he can feel an ounce of what I’ve been going through all this time.

Let him hurt and think there’s someone else. He deserves some pain. If he jumps to stupid conclusions on limited information, then he can suffer.

~“Right. Where are you? I need to know so I can find you or guide you.”~

It’s that business tone of an alpha moving in as logic prevails, and he sobers up with that whip in the face.

It’s the babbling, happy to hear from me, dropping off to wounded male who’s trying not to sulk.

I know it hurt him. I can feel it radiating through, and as much as it pains me, I’m not going to correct him and tell him the “~we~” is a human in his sixties and his mom.

I turn to Doc with a severe expression, my head getting back to business and ignoring that my legs have turned to Jell-O.

“I need a location so Colton can help us.” I sound odd, strained, and my voice is husky and hoarse, hinting at the tears I’m refusing to shed. I can’t deny this is awful, but we need his help.

“Oh, goodness, that was quick, and it worked. Clever girl. Yes, location, of course. We’re fifteen miles or so from the Hackuuh mountain base, north of Rennington.

“We head south for a good forty miles from here, and we meet Route 10 to Normansville. Is that accurate enough?”

He scratches his head and returns to grabbing the steering wheel with both hands before peering back into the darkness, illuminated only by our headlights.

I shrug at him and turn away to focus on the link.

~“Colton, we’re fifteen miles or so from the Hackuuh mountain base, north of Rennington. He has us heading south. He says we’re forty miles from getting to Route 10 to Normansville. Does that help?”~

The directions mean nothing to me as someone who never ventured out of the valley until recently.

I try to focus on details and not the overwhelming emotions he’s passing this way or the way my heart rate is pounding sky high, and my legs are trembling at being connected to him.

It’s a bittersweet agony, and I’m totally helpless to defend myself from it.

~“The Hackuuh? You’re not that far, goddamn it, Lorey. You’re the feeling that I should go southeast? And yet, I still didn’t find you! ~

~“Tell him to stick to that route. We can meet you as soon as you hit Route 10 and escort you to where we’ve been staying. It’s not very far. ~

~“If we get there first, we’ll head toward you and, hopefully, meet sooner.”~

I knew Colton would push everything he was feeling aside and pull through. It’s what he does and why he’ll make a formidable leader one day.

His heart was always secondary to what he feels is his responsibility and what he must do. The curse that made him choose her over me.

Despite everything, even thinking I’ve someone to replace him, he’s still helping—no hint of malice or telling me to go away.

I feel guilty about letting that deception stay between us, but I can’t quite bring myself to put him right, and I sure as hell can’t tell him over a link that his mother is with us.

I don’t have the words. He’s going to find out soon enough as it is.

“Stay on track to Route 10, and they’ll meet us, and show us where to go. We’re going to be okay.”

I pat his arm, seeing the sag of relief as my words filter in, and he nods, exhaling the breath he’s probably been holding all this time.

I guess I do, too, because we can’t outrun the facility pack, but they won’t have a chance of getting at Sierra with Colton and the subs.

It is safety and success with minimal effort. We need to get to them and let Colton take over.

It feels weird to know he kept looking, though, and admitting something was pulling him to where I was. That’s odd.

Maybe it was his mother finally calling to him too, and nothing to do with me, and I find it strange he said they were staying somewhere else and not on the mountain.

I guess Juan has them scouring farther afield for vampires, and Colton has been using it to look out for me in case we crossed paths.

~“Please tell me you have the sub-pack with you. I have at least a pack of nineteen coming. This might be a fight.”~

I add in an afterthought, a sudden fear he might come alone eating at me.

~“What the hell did you do? Who are they? Not that it matters right now because I’ll rip them a new one and, yes, the sub-pack and then some. ~

~“You’ve missed so much, Lorey. I have so much to fill you in on.”~

Likewise.

I sigh internally and mouth it to myself. I dread it even more, knowing that I also have to add my lineage to the list of things Colton should know about.

That nausea chokes me again, and I try to push it down and concentrate on the act of breathing in and out.

~“I can’t get into it right now. Honestly, it’s better I show you when we meet to see for yourself, and you can tell me then. For now, I need to unlink. ~

~“This is hard, Colton, and we have a tough road to navigate out of this damn forest. I’ll link you when we hit Route 10. Please, understand. It’s just easier to explain everything when I see you. ~

~“You’ll understand why.”~

I’m being a coward. I know if we stay linked while passing the miles to meet, I might tell him stupid things and work myself into a mess of tears and love confessions.

I’ll tell the idiot how much I miss and love him still, despite what he’s done and the fact it can never go anywhere.

Or I might tell him about his mother and have to deal with the fallout of Colton’s self-imploding, and I am not strong enough for that or for keeping linked to him when I want to curl up and cry.

It’s too raw having him back in my head like we’ve never been apart, and I’m so not equipped to deal with my feelings on top of his shining through.

It’s a see-saw ride, and I have a lot to process.

~“Promise me you’ll re-link the second you hit the route. I hate this not-being-able-to-reach-you bullshit. It shouldn’t be this way. I don’t care what or who he is. I fucking love you, and nothing changes that.”~

That part shocks me, especially the hostile way he rasps it at me like it’s a threat, not a love declaration.

Jealousy is well and truly piquing in a way he can’t control, and it ignites mine, along with the urge to snap, “So much so that you marked Carmen, huh?” back at him.

It chokes me up, and I unlink him without responding, cutting him off before I lose my shit at him and compromise our run to safety.

That inner rage ignites every time I think of the four days after leaving and that undeniable sign that he betrayed me. He betrayed us. It’s not something I can forget or ever forgive.

It has the desired effect of pulling my head out of my wallowing, lovesick ass.

Instead of sentimental, weak longings, I now want to rip his head off for being a possessive shithead who thinks he still has a right to me—for swearing at me about this when he should be groveling.

“Ugh. He has a goddamn cheek, telling me HE is not mad at ME!” I let rip, startling the poor doctor, and the fright almost makes him swerve us into a bush.

“You know what? He should be more concerned with how mad I am at ~him~ and afraid because I’m the one who will rip him a new something when I see him!

“He should be the one getting sworn at and shielding off hostility, not me!”

Doc flattens a palm to his chest as though trying to calm the heart failure I inflicted, and he casts me a concerned smile. A flicker of confusion crosses his features.

“Good conversation, I take it?”

He gets a thunderous darkening scowl aimed his way. I look unimpressed and breathe in quick, raspy breaths as my temper rages a little higher.

I think it’s an aftereffect of holding my anxiety in while linking, and now the dam breaks.

“He loves me, PAH! And he doesn’t care who I’m with.

“As if he has any say in that respect when he pushed me out and made me leave, and then before even a week had passed, he had some skanky puta in his bed and completed the marking that should have been with me!

“Ugh! Is he conveniently forgetting all of that? Is he that dense and that much of a condescending hypocrite?”

I’m venting, so wound up with our interaction and triggered over the stupidest part of it.

Hating on him as an emotional response and oozing fury, I wriggle about in my seat manically, waving my hands around and kicking the dash.

“Skanky what, now?” He rubs his head, eyes darting between me and the road and tries hard to make sense of my ranting.

“You know what? If I didn’t need that jerk, for Sierra’s sake, he could kiss my ass and get used to the fact that I’m dust in his future.

“Not a chance of ever making me come back, and you know what he had the nerve to say? Do you?” I shout at him, getting a wide-eyed shake of the head and a half-shrug response.

“I wouldn’t like to hazard a guess, but I’m presuming something that hit a nerve or ten.” It’s a sarcastic yet wary reply with a feeble smile.

“He said, ‘I hate this not-being-able-to-reach-you bullshit, and it shouldn’t be this way.’”

I mimic Cole’s slightly accented dialect in a mocking male tone, bouncing my shoulders as I say it in a macho way, and kick the dash in fury when I let it out, hurting my toes inside my boot.

This only makes me madder.

“He is the goddamn reason I left! Oh, my god. Why the hell did I think that running straight back to that complete dumbass was the best plan? I should have known he would only piss me off completely.”

“Don’t kill me for the suggestion, but it may be because he is the best option, and you two clearly have a few issues that need to be resolved.

“He may be marked elsewhere, but it sounds like his heart is still fully invested here, and your overdramatic response screams you love him still.”

Doc points at my chest, meaning my heart, and I shake my hands out in frustration.

I want to show him what overdramatic looks like as the urge to air-punch him out of the truck hits me for that less-than-helpful observation.

“Colton’s heart has never been the problem.

“It’s his big, stupid, inflated head, that big dumb brain that sits in there, taking up space and telling him to do the right thing for everyone else in the pack except him—and me.

“That’s the only issue we have, and it’s an unresolvable one,” I say, reverting to juvenile insults because Colton makes me feel wacko sometimes.

Like back after the imprinting when he left me alone for two weeks and then just showed up in my head like some swooning Romeo and screwed me all up. Why didn’t he let me die that night?

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but surely marking another would completely dissipate your link and his feelings for you?”

He’s trying to tug me back to a sense of calm with a bit of question time, but I’m not biting. I’m too self-absorbed in my rampage of hating on Colton because I have needed to do this for weeks.

“We imprinted. No one knows. And in the entire history of fated mates, no one has ever rejected the bond and not marked—just that dipshit, Colton.

“So I don’t know if it’s meant to dissolve the link or whatever, but it didn’t. Clearly!” I spit out, turning away and banging my forehead off the side window to calm down.

“Then maybe…”

“Don’t, okay. I know what I felt, and I don’t want to talk about him anymore until I have to see his stupid face. Can we just drive and not talk? Please.”

I bite my tongue, so many more words poised and ready to spew out, but this is getting me nowhere fast.

“That’s fine by me, my dear. This is a difficult path to navigate, and I should probably concentrate on that,” Doc replies.

He’s probably relieved to have an excuse not to engage with the hormonal psycho making this time worse than it needs to be. I suddenly get hit with a wave of remorse at taking it out on him.

“Fine. Suits me fine.” I lower my tone and try for softer, but I sound like a sulking child and shut myself up.

I slump back against my headrest, exhaling heavily and staring out the window, pulling my legs up to curl under me on the oversized seat.

I’m bubbling and boiling up inside and counting down the minutes to see that asshat, listing all the things in my head that I deserve to punch him in the groin for.

It’s the only way to pass the time, as I’m not ready to simmer and douse these flames I have burning for that jerk. I compile a list with all the bones I have to pick. I am starting with a major one!

Betraying me with that skanky puta while claiming he loves me.