Chapter 89 by Cara Anderson

Ch. 89 Bloodbath

Trigger Warning: This chapter contains descriptions of physical and sexual abuse that may be difficult for some readers.

Darcy’s POV

I hated being here in Hazelwood territory. I hated being any place where Quade’s presence lingered. I could feel him everywhere I went, like a waking nightmare I couldn’t escape. But I had nowhere else to go.

He may be locked in a cell, but the memory of his tyranny still roamed free, haunting these people who suffered under him for so many years. It was in the drab walls of this ramshackle packhouse while he used their wealth for his own gain. It was in the hopeless and defeated expressions of the people who lived here.

Not that I saw much of the Hazelwood people. The crippling anxiety that plagued me prevented me from leaving my room most days. Besides, Alpha Nathan Richardson had taken charge of the pack, and while he never treated me unkindly and seemed to tolerate my presence, I knew he blamed me for what happened to Mallory.

“Let’s go outside. I need to run.” My wolf, Duchess, pleaded.

“I-, I can’t g-go out.” I loathed the way my voice shook but the thought of being out in the open terrified me.

“Why not? Wolves need to run.” She pushed.

After the first time Quade hurt me, I locked her away any time he was nearby. I couldn’t let her feel the pain of her mate betraying her that way. But now, she didn’t understand my fear.

“Not safe.” It was all I could say. I couldn’t speak about what happened to me.

I huddled under my blankets, pulling them over my head to shut out the world. I squeezed my eyes tight against the images that assaulted me, the memories that refused to be locked away. I started humming to myself, a tune my mother used to sing to me as a child, one that reminded me of happier times.

My wolf was restless. I could feel her pacing anxiously in my head. She needed an outlet for the nervous energy I was forcing on her. It hurt to know I couldn’t spare her from experiencing the aftermath of my trauma, but I couldn’t bring myself to block her out anymore. It was too quiet without her in my head. And I was too weak to be alone with my torturous thoughts.

A knock on my door had me burrowing deeper into my mattress. I considered crawling under my bed to hide, but I tried to tell myself I was safe here. Quade was in a prison cell and couldn’t hurt me anymore. Still, my body trembled in fear that he had somehow come for me.

“Darcy?” Nathan called to me from the hall. “Darcy, I’m coming in. We need to talk.”

It was no use hiding. Nathan knew I was in here, that I hadn’t left my room all day. I was fairly certain he had someone watching me. Mallory would have told him Quade was my mate. He probably didn’t trust me not to try to set him free, though that was the last thing I would do.

The door creaked open, followed by footsteps, then a shifting of the mattress where he’d sat on the bed. I flinched at his nearness but if he noticed, he didn’t comment.

“Darcy, can you please lower the covers and look at me?” His voice was gentle but firm. “I won’t hurt you. I just want to talk.”

“Talk about what?” My voice was muted, timid. I didn’t recognize it anymore.

“I have some news I’d like to share with you and I’d prefer it if you’d look at me when I tell you. I won’t force you, but I think it might help you not to be hiding in the dark when you hear it.”

He continued to talk softly, like coaxing a wounded animal.

I pushed the blankets back slowly, blinking against the already too bright light after the self-imposed darkness. Scooting back against the headboard, as far away from the Alpha as I could get, I pulled the covers up to my chin like a shield between us. Nathan waited patiently for me to get comfortable.

“I won’t pretend to know what you’re going through,” Nathan’s eyes held a gentleness I didn’t expect, nor deserve. “Mallory didn’t tell me what happened to you, just that it was bad. She insisted it was your story to tell when and if you wanted to.

“But I do know it has something to do with Alpha Quade’s treatment of you. So I thought it only fair you know what’s happening where he is concerned.”

“W-, what do you m-, mean?” The words came out as a high pitched squeak. “H-,he’s in j-, jail, right?”

“He is.” Nathan confirmed. “We have a guard on him twenty-four seven. But you should know his wounds are mostly healed. The council has set his trial for a week from now and it doesn’t look good.”

“But, but, but,” I stammered, my mind reeling with the news. “He, he…”

“Darcy,” Nathan reached a hand toward me but let it drop when I recoiled. “As far as the council is concerned, it doesn’t matter what really happened. It only matters what we can prove. Mallory’s word alone won’t be enough to convict him. I just thought you should know.”

He patted my leg beneath the blankets then rose from the bed. He made it to the door before he seemed to recall something he’d wanted to say and turned to face me again.

“Mallory and the Black Moon Alphas will be here tomorrow. I imagine they will want to speak to you.”

I nodded my head and thankfully, he left. I leapt from the bed and pulled the bedding with me, cocooning myself in the blankets while I paced frantically. This couldn’t be happening.

The council had to convict him, right? Someone so evil couldn’t be allowed to continue his reign of terror. They had to believe Mallory!

I knew what they would say to me when they arrived tomorrow. They would want me to testify. But I just couldn’t do that. I couldn’t face him again.

A jolt of fear so intense I felt it like a crushing blow hit me in the chest. I dropped to the floor, incoherent pleas spilling from my lips. Scrambling across the floor on my hands and knees, I wriggled underneath the bed and curled into a ball.

Nothing I could do could stop the memories from flooding my mind and nausea twisting in my stomach. Gooseflesh paraded up and down my body, every hair standing on end as the sound of Quade’s voice came rushing back to me.

** Flashback **

“If you can be a good girl, I’ll take you as my second Luna. Not to be seen in public of course, but my wolf will want to spend time with his mate. You can be useful to me by keeping him settled.” He said it like he was offering me the deal of the century.

“I’m your mate! Do you know the pain it will cause me and my wolf to share you? If you don’t want me, just reject me! Please!” I begged.

Crack! He backhanded me across the face. It felt like my eye would explode out of my head. I screamed in pain but that only made him angrier.

“Shut up and kneel!” He shouted, digging his fingers into my shoulder and shoving me to my knees. “You need to learn to listen when I speak! How dare you suggest I reject you! You’re mine and I’ll use you in any way I see fit!”

I sat on my knees before him, shaking and resisting the urge to touch my swollen cheek. I kept my eyes on the floor but I heard it when he unzipped his pants. Then he stepped up to me and lifted my chin, a cruel smirk on his face.

“Now you can show me how useful you can be.” He said, pulling out his cock and waving it in my face.

“No!” I gritted out through clenched teeth.

“Oh little mate, that’s not a word you ever get to say to me.” He gripped my cheeks and squeezed painfully until I opened my mouth then shoved his cock down my throat.

The memory faded only to be replaced by another.

“Regina told me you refused your bath today. What have I told you about that? I expect you to be naked and clean when I come to you at night!” He growled. “I don’t want to fuck some dirty whore!”

I didn’t bother to explain that I’d been in too much pain from his beating the night before to move, let alone bathe. He would just hit me again for talking back to him. Instead, I just lay there like a deaf mute.

By that point, I’d learned nothing I said or did would make a difference. None of it would save me from his wrath. But if I’d known how he would punish me that time, I might have made an effort.

“Nothing to say? Fine!” He snarled, grabbing me by the hair and hauling me off the bed. If you want to smell like a dirty whore, you might as well play the part. Guards!”

Two men entered the room when he called. He dragged me by my hair to meet them at the door.

“Take her. Share her. Pass her around to your friends. Don’t bring her back until she’s learned to be obedient. Just make sure she stays alive.” He tossed me at the men’s feet.

Filthy, calloused hands touching me. Rancid breath, slimy kisses, forced to take them one after the other, or sometimes more than one.

** End Flashback **

The memories were too real. I could feel them, smell them, hear them taunting me. The sound of screaming hurt my ears. I put my hands over my ears to block out the sound then realized it was coming from me.

“Why didn’t you let me protect you?” My wolf demanded.

“I couldn’t let him hurt you too, Duchess. It was my fault we even met him. I couldn’t let you pay for my stupidity.” I sobbed.

“Well you can let me protect you now!” She insisted.

“There is no way to protect me from him.” I argued. “If the council lets him go, he’ll come for me. I know he will. And he’ll punish me for leaving him. I can’t, Duchess. I can’t ever face him again!”

“I promise you won’t have to.” She sneered.

The next morning I woke up to the sound of footsteps and keys jangling on their ring. My neck and back were killing me, like I’d slept on them wrong all night. And I was freezing.

My eyelids fluttered open, momentarily blinded by the sunlight streaming in from a high window. I shifted only to feel cold concrete scraping my back. What? Where was I?

I jumped up and looked around wildly, ignoring the clank of metal hitting the ground. The surface below my feet was wet and sticky. I looked down to find myself standing in a pool of blood.

Slowly, my surroundings came into focus. A bloody knife lay on the ground at my feet. There was blood everywhere. I was covered in it. The walls were covered in it. The concrete walls of a cell, not my bedroom.

In a panic, I scanned the room until my eyes landed on the source of the bloodbath, Alpha Quade laid on the ground on the other side of the cell, multiple stab wounds slashed across his body like a macabre work of abstract art.

“No, no, no, no. no! How did this happen?” I muttered to myself, though I refused to regret his death.

A pained groan echoed from across the hall. I turned to see a prison guard propped against the wall, a gaping wound pouring blood from his side. The footsteps and keys were getting louder, their owner getting closer.

Then a new scent rose above the coppery, iron smell of blood surrounding me. It smelled like rich coffee and something delicious, chocolate croissants maybe. It made my mouth water even as my stomach roiled at the violent scene around me.

The owner of the scrumptious scent came into view, one of the Hazelwood warriors, probably come to relieve the guard who sat injured across the hall.

He was the most gorgeous man I’d ever seen and the words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.

“Mate! Mine!”

But instead of claiming me in return, his face twisted into molten rage.

“What the fuck happened here?!”