Page 11 of Scorned

Peach called Vivi, informing us of Venom members needing a place to hide, and asked what we should do with them. Of course, Vivi said we should kill them, per the norm. As Vivi stood there waiting for an answer from me, I shrugged and walked away. It may be cruel, but in my current state, I didn’t give a fuck.

Marcus, Peach, Ravage, and Drag took it upon themselves to decide for the good of everyone. Now we have three former Venom members staying with us, not counting me and my friends. Initially, they mostly stayed in their cabins at night. After a while, they began socializing, gradually forming friendships with the supernaturals.

My friend Jimmy had been one of the former Venom members, and even if he was a little weird to converse with, he was a good guy. And since he was a computer nerd like Winnie, they seemed to become friends pretty quickly. He would wave anytime he saw me, but let me be, unlike some others around here.

The other two were women, each with different personalities.

Nellie was usually blunt with her words, not caring who they affected. She got on my nerves.

Randi was a sweet girl, but extremely shy and quiet.

Both of them avoided me like the plague, not even making eye contact when they saw me. And I was perfectly okay with it. I had no desire to talk to my friends, let alone them.

Even though I hadn’t participated in conversations, especially the ones about what happened the night of the war, I regularly listened. More than once I heard the ex-Venom members say their objective had been to capture as many vampires as they could to break up Save, which is a group of vampires and wolven sworn to protect their species from hunters like me. Or, like I used to be before I knew what we were doing was immoral.

After my father realized I was a traitor, his goals changed. The mission shifted from capturing us to killing anyone they could, except for Luka. He was to be unharmed. When someone figured out Marcus and his brother Zeke helped Erik, Lyric, and myself escape, my father added us to the list. The field crew were told we were all traitors and needed to be brought in for interrogation.

My dad even went above and beyond, sending them pictures of us—including one of Luka, which I’m assuming he stole from my phone.

One might think my father’s sins were what brought me here, but honestly, my sins did. I knowingly betrayed him just like he did me.

I played the game as best as I could, I just didn’t win.

“Can we even trust this woman?” Lynx asked, bringing my attention away from the pine trees.

What woman?

My painful thoughts had kept me from hearing the beginning of the conversation.

Everyone living here usually gathered around the fire every night to talk about random things. But at least once a night, someone would bring up the rescue mission to save Luka and Strike. A mission which I’d eventually given up on. This didn’t sound like that.

Maybe I didn’t hear everything.

“I don’t know,” Ravage responded. “What do you think, Drag?”

The fire crackled, the sound of a log being dropped into it ringing through the night.

“She may have valuable information, and we don’t have any other leads. You know her, Marcus. What’s your opinion?”

“I think it’s worth a shot. Sage may not come out of the state she’s in if we don’t.”

I whipped toward the crowd of people. “I can hear you, you know?”

“We don’t care if you hear us,” Winnie spat, hopping up from his seat and pointing at me. “We know you miss Luka, most of us do too, but you need to get your shit together so we can get him the fuck back.”

The expression he wore told me he was still angry about his bike, and I needed to tread lightly.

I averted my gaze and glanced around the campfire. Most of the people looked at me with sympathy, like April and Peach, and others blatantly avoided my eyes, like most of the ex-Venom members. But not Winnie and Marcus. They stared me down, ready for the battle.

They had both been on my ass the past few days, and after what I did tonight, it was probably going to get worse. One way or another, they were going to make sure I didn’t shut down any more than I already had.

Not wanting to fight or converse anymore, I just shook my head. “Shut up, Winston.”

He snickered. “Winston? Still hate me, I see, and even after I healed you.” An arrogant grin spread across his face, and it made me miss Luka.

I fought back tears, determined not to let them fall in front of people. I’d been getting good at that. “Whatever,” I mumbled, before turning back around.

Every night, something inside of me pulled me toward the forest. I stared into the darkness, hoping Luka would magically walk out of it because he somehow managed to escape and make his way back to me.

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