Page 46 of Out of the Darkness

“What’s that? Did you find something?”

He shook his head. “No, it’s an encrypted video call.”

“Colby?” she asked, her voice hitching.

“Most likely.”

“Well, why aren’t you answering it?” she screeched, jumping up and reaching for the keyboard.

Xavier shoved her hands away instantly, and she was lucky that was all he did. He had already been barely holding it together, and with that new tidbit of information, his restraint was barely there.

“Damn it, Melanie. I have to set up a trace first. Unless you’d rather we not find Madelyn.”

The detective huffed but kept her hands to herself, which was a good thing. He wasn’t going to let anything cause him to miss this chance.

His fingers flew across the keyboard as he set up the trace. It only took him a few seconds, but it felt like a few seconds too many. When it came to finding his mate, every second counted.

Once everything was ready, he took a breath and answered the call.

Colby’s irritating face appeared on the screen in front of him, and an involuntary growl escaped from deep within his chest. It was a cell phone camera, so it wasn’t the best picture, but the guy was smirking as if he didn’t have a care in the world and hadn’t signed his own death warrant by taking Madelyn. At least, the scars on his face seemed to be causing him some pain.

“Where is she, Colby?” he ground out through clenched teeth.

“Well, hello to you too, Xavier,” Colby replied, feigning offense. “Is that how your kind greets an old friend?”

Xavier shot to his feet so quickly that the chair clattered to the ground behind him as he slammed his hands on either side of his keyboard. “Goddamn it, Colby. Don’t fuck with me right now. Where is she?”

Colby rolled his eyes and sighed in exasperation. “You are no fun. You’ve always been that way too, always wanting to get right down to business.”

The muscles in Xavier’s jaw ticked as his eyes flashed and his claws began to extend. He wasn’t going to be able to contain himself much longer.

“Oh, relax, would you? I got what you want right here.”

He watched as Colby’s arm disappeared off-screen before he pulled a bound and gaged Madelyn into view. Her cheeks were streaked with tears, and she was a little dirty, but she seemed to be otherwise unharmed. She was wearing a pair of sweats and the sweatshirt he had given to her the night she was attacked in the parking structure. Her eyes were puffy from crying, though she also seemed reluctant to look at him.

“Why don’t you say hello, Madelyn?” Colby laughed, draping his arm around her shoulders. “He is, after all, why you are here and in this situation.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

Madelyn

“Madelyn,” she heard Xavier call to her through the video.

She closed her eyes at the sound of his voice so full of concern. A few stray tears rolled down her cheeks, soaking into the cloth wrapped around her head that was being used as a gag. She had cried so much since she had been taken that she was surprised her eyes hadn’t dried out completely.

“Little dove, look at me.”

Even though it pained her to do so, she hesitantly lifted her head to the camera and opened her eyes. She couldn’t say no to him, and if this was the last time she was going to get the chance to see him, she was going to take it. Even if it was selfish of her. However, the sight of Xavier, the father of her unborn child, in his current state, nearly made her legs give out on her.

His face was covered in cuts and bruises, all in various states of healing. His chest was the same, and she could only see that much because he was wearing a zip-up hoodie with no shirt underneath. Unfortunately, she couldn’t see how bad the head wounds were due to the beanie he was wearing, and she could also tell that he was in a lot of pain even if he was trying to play it off that he wasn’t, for her sake.

It also took her another moment to realize that he wasn’t alone in, what seemed to be, a home office of some kind. However, it wasn’t Isabelle who was with him, as she had expected. It was Melanie, which was an odd thing to see.

Instinctively, she wiggled her wrists, once again testing the zip ties that bound them together. Her hands were cold and a bit numb from them being on so tight. It wasn’t enough to cut off her circulation completely, but it was enough to cause massive amounts of discomfort. Her lips and the inside of her mouth were dry as a bone from not being able to close her mouth, and she was filthy from all the times she had fallen on the hike up there from the service road. Colby and his guys had gotten a good laugh out of that too. Thankfully though, they hadn’t touched her. At least, not yet. Somehow though, she knew that was about to change.

Madelyn had no idea what Colby had planned for her, but she knew that this video call to Xavier was a part of it. It had to be. And there was nothing she could do to stop it.

It had been a long time since she had felt this helpless. She had spent most of her life working her ass off to make it so that she never had to feel this way again too; hours of therapy, dozens of self-defense classes, and gun training. But it had all been for nothing. She didn’t want anyone to see her like this, least of all Xavier, whom, she discovered, she had severely misjudged. Unfortunately, she didn’t seem to have a choice.

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