Olivia Blake
The two bags I'd packed with Caleb were swung into the back of the black SUV and I watched, processing the plan over and over in my head. They'd take us to a remote cabin, but the vehicle could only get so far, and then we would walk through the forest until we got there. It felt like I was escaping a war, but I guessed we were.
Lara walked around me with Krissy in her arms and gave me a glance. She seemed unconcerned about the situation but she always did when Caleb told her to do something. It made me want to roll my eyes but the emotion passed as soon as it came on. Something about listening to Caleb this time made sense to me.
John turned toward me as he shut the tailgate. “Ready to go?”
I hadn't seen Caleb in an hour – I wasn't sure if that had been our goodbye. “I guess...”
He nodded toward the truck and I followed him over. He helped me in the back behind the passenger and I slid into the leather heated seating. For a brief moment, I relaxed in the silence, pretending it was just a ride into town. I'd never been in that pack vehicle, I knew it was armoured though and had emergency lights on the roof.
Lara looked over to me as the door was shut. “I've got a plan,” she whispered, “just follow my lead...”
“I thought this was the plan--” My door opened again and I turned to face Caleb.
His brow in the last hour had adopted a crease of worry. “Johnathan and Tyler will look after you.” I noticed his fingers turned white where he gripped the vehicle and it made my heart pound from fear.He let out a tight breath that had been caught in his chest. “I'll see you.”
“When?” I asked, my fingers went to touch his chest as my heart beat from the new anxiety I'd adopted.
“Soon.” He stepped away from the door and went to close it with an obvious hesitation. Our eyes lingered and then he broke to the pressure. “Bye, my Luna.” And the door met the frame.
Leaving me to shut my eyes and hold back the tears. I had lost my composure hours before but now, it had happened full force. The tears streamed my cheeks and as the vehicle was started, Johnathan clicked on the pack radio system, “This is Beta Johnathan, we are leaving Alpha house for the north exit.”
I opened my eyes to look back at Caleb standing in the driveway as John turned the car around the corner. He left my view, even as I twisted in my seat to look back.
“Where are we going?” Krissy asked.
I came back around in my seat with a sigh and looked to the little girl next to me. “Somewhere safer than here.”
“But we left Uncle Caleb!” Krissy exclaimed.
Lara hushed her. “It will be fine...”
The further I got from my mate, the more it hurt. I fought back my tears again. for someone who made me so upset and annoyed half the time, my heart beat out of sync without him near.
The vehicle stopped at the north exit and the patrol guards greeted Johnathan with a smile and a joke. Though their smiles faded when they looked past him to me in the backseat, clutching my pregnant stomach.
“Travel safe, Luna.”
I nodded my head at the patrol member and his attention went back to the Beta.
“See you later, John.” They opened the rolling, ten foot high chain link gate, complete with barbed wire at the top and an aggressive high voltage wire. The more I thought about it, the less I could see how Silvermoon would be attacked. We had an intense security system and a twenty-four seven patrol, plus Caleb as Alpha. As much I wanted to hate him at times, I just couldn't – cause leaving him behind had me more upset then Krissy was. The twenty minute drive didn't end either, tree after shrub after gravel road, it wasn't coming to an end and then...
I looked to Lara as she hugged her daughter near, whispering something to Krissy. The little girl covered her eyes and as the truck bounced down the road, I wondered why.
Lara looked to me and mouthed 'get ready'.
“For what?” I whispered back.
In what seemed like a blink of an eye, Lara pulled a blade from her pocket and lurched forward on to the driver's seat. The truck veered off the road as she slid the blade across Johnathan's throat.
“Grab her!” John wrapped his hands around his bloody throat as Tyler fought against the grip of the seat belt toward Lara.
I screamed as the vehicle went airborne and straight into a large fir tree. My seat belt locked up across my lap and tummy, throwing me forward.
Tyler grabbed Lara's wrist as the she-wolf slashed the blade along his bicep- making him wreath, yet the well-trained male kept reaching for her and then his door opened and his throat was promptly swiped by a new blade.
“No!” I tried in vain to undo my seatbelt that had become jammed in the impact.
“It's okay, Krissy....” Lara's calm words made me look over as the she-wolf used her sweater to wipe off the blood of my friend .
“What are you doing!” I shrieked at her. “This wasn't the plan ever!”
“It was the plan. Just not the one I told you.”
“Liv....” John croaked.
Glancing up, I watched my friend who was bleeding out. “John!” The tears in my eyes welled from the pain in my heart, but it was nothing compared to the cramp coming across my lower back and belly.
I watched in horror as his cheek turned toward me, his dying eyes staring dead into my soul. “Run...” He whispered.
I grabbed the door to do just that but it was ripped open, right out of my grasp. I stared at the man looming over me with a crooked smile.
“Good job, Lara.” His dark eyes glinted to the she-wolf next to me.
I sucked in a terrified breath that didn't come close to filling my lungs. I knew who stood in front of me, even if I'd never met him before. The same jaw line of my mate accompanied his likewise expression of accomplishment.
“I tried my best for you, Alpha.” She purred next to me and opened her door to get out.
I turned to her in that moment. “You traitor!”
She stared blankly into my soul as she removed Krissy from the truck and into her arms. There was no emotion from the female Caleb had trusted, as she handed me over to the wolves.
“She's no traitor.” He barked at me while withdrawing a knife from his back pocket. He flicked the blade toward me and I curled over my belly to protect the baby. A drop of Tyler's blood dripped from the tip and soaked into my leggings. “She's my mate and mates do as they’re told. You know all about that, look at you here.”
“Please, don't hurt me....”
He cut the seat belt across my lap and took my arm in the same instant, hauling me away from the vehicle and into the snow and ice. I collapsed to my knees but he yanked me back up. “By the way, I know we haven't been formally introduced but I'm Jackson.” He yelled and males appeared from the shadows around us, taking each of my arms and leading me to the roadway where a van skidded to a stop. “Take her back to the hideout! Now!”
Lara stepped up to Jackson with their daughter on her hip and he kissed her, cupping her cheek like he cared about the she-wolf. It made me sick to watch.
The doors on the back of the white van opened and I tried to run, anything to flee the current situation was my main priority. I almost rather had died. They grabbed me and shoved me inside, binding my ankles and wrists into uncomfortable positions with duct tape as the pain in my back continued and caused me to scream aloud. “You pieces of shit!”
“Shut up!” A couple men climbed in the back to watch me and I narrowed my eyes at them.
“If you think Caleb won't find me, you're dead wrong.”
“I wouldn't worry about that,” they laughed at me. Across from me, the scar faced male's messed up smile sent shivers down my spine. “You'll be dead before he finds you anyway, little Luna.”
The back doors were slammed shut and I watched the pack vehicle disappear into the night, where John and the patrol member- Tyler, had died in vain. There wasn't a way to bring them back and I hadn't done anything to stop it, all that hit me like a ton of bricks and I began to sob.
“What's wrong with her?”
“Dumb thing is scared like she should be. Ignore her.”
I cried like a wound had been cut into my heart. The pup inside me twisting and moving against the ups and downs of the vehicle hopping over potholes and washboarding from the logging trucks. How would we survive this when Caleb had no idea I'd even been taken... and it pained me to even think about him finding his Beta, dead on the side of the road.
My eyes couldn't handle the tears. The end of the line seemed near. Jackson had done a lot to capture me to hurt Caleb- including convincing his mate to go along with a plan so twisted and gross, even I wasn't sure it had happened like it had.
With my draining hope, I realized I was in the middle of a war and I had no idea how to fight in it. I just prayed our pup would see the end without suffering.