Page 67 of Ruined Wolfsbane

As I walk, four faces flash before me. Ava’s obviously. But Malachi’s, Xander’s, and Bastian’s do too. The useless organ in my chest cries out for the Wyldhart brothers, wanting the ending of our story to be different. Because I’m pretty sure that is what this is. The end of my story.

But their stories will continue. The Wyldharts will find beautiful girls to have beautiful babies with and live beautiful lives. Why does thinking about them with someone else make my heart feel like it’s going through a meat grinder?

Ah, hell.

Apparently, my heart doesn’t remember that I’m not supposed to be getting attached to them.

You had one job, and it wasn’t getting wrapped up in the Wyldharts like a lovesick fool!

Yeah, yeah, I know.

If my snarky inner voice is going to complain about something, it really should be angry over my current predicament and the clearly terrible life decisions I’ve made that landed me here.

I feel like I should be more scared while having a gun to my head. Yeah, I’m a little freaked out, but I’m nowhere near as frightened as I should be. Instead, I just feel numb. Maybe this is my mind’s way of protecting me.

When I reach the back of his SUV, I stop. Patrick opens the trunk and gestures for me to get in.

Really? The trunk?

Come on, dude. At least let me be comfortable while I’m getting kidnapped.

Without any other choice, I sigh and climb up. As soon as I’m in the trunk, I feel a hard blow to the back of my head, and everything goes black.

Blinking open my eyes, I struggle to lift my head from my chest. The throbbing pain in the back of my head feels like a line of enthusiastic kick dancers going to town. When I get my neck muscles to work, I see a dingy concrete floor, drab gray cinder block walls, and one tiny window to my left.

Where the actual fuck am I? And what happened?

“Oh good, you’re awake. Took you long enough.” Patrick’s smarmy voice behind me has everything rushing back.

Oh goodie, I’ve been kidnaped by Patrick—quite possibly my least favorite person in the world.

Just what I wanted.

“Drink up,” Patrick tells me as he walks to stand in front of me. He’s holding a wooden bowl with a glowing blue liquid in it. That totally looks safe to drink. Not.

Standing up, I hesitantly approach Patrick. “What’s in it?”

“Wolfsbane primarily. And other ingredients.”

Is he delusional?

Wolfsbane can kill you just from touching it. Drinking it will definitely kill you. Also, wolfsbane should create a murky brown liquid, not neon blue.

What the hell else did he add to it?

Not that it matters because there’s no way I’m drinking that. I’d prefer not to die today. “Um, I’m good. Thanks, though.”

Faster than I can react to, Patrick whips up the gun and fires at me. A searing pain rips through my left shoulder. I feel the muscles and tendons tear as the bullet forces its way through. There’s nothing I can do about the scream that works its way out of my throat—half from the feeling of getting stabbed by a shard of molten metal and half from the shock of it.

Patrick lets out an unhinged laugh at my scream.

I’m starting to think he might be insane.

I bite the inside of my cheek to prevent myself from making any other sound. I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of seeing my distress.

Looking down at the wound, I see dark red blood running out of it. I also feel a sticky liquid running down my back. Hopefully that’s the exit wound. Having a bullet in my shoulder probably isn’t a great idea.

Well, I’m not dead yet, don’t appear to be bleeding out, and can still breathe, so hopefully the bullet didn’t hit anything major. It hurt like a bitch, though.

---