Page 40 of Chain Me Knot

We break the surface and I hear twin shouts of horror from the pool's edge. I cradle her head above water, her body limp against mine as I swim for the edge where my pack brothers wait with outstretched hands, their expressions stark.

“What the fuck?” Soren’s eyes gleam and lines bracket his mouth as he hauls her from the water and lays her on the tiles.

Water streams from her clothes, her hair, her too-pale skin. I haul myself out of the pool as Phoenix presses two fingers to her throat with more gentleness than I've ever seen from him.

“Come on, Tough Girl,” he mutters, before the rigid set of his shoulders slump a little. “She has a pulse.”

Soren turns her onto her side as Phoenix cushions her face. Emma convulses, water spewing from her mouth as she coughs. The sound is horrible. Wet,desperate, painful, but it's the most beautiful thing I've ever heard. Relief hits me so hard my knees buckle. I sink to the ground next to her.

“What the fuck happened, Asher?” Phoenix asks.

I shake my head. If I hadn’t chanced looking at the monitor in that split second, no one would have found her until it was too late. “I saw her come out of the door, walk straight to the pool and right into the water.”

I want to say more, but Emma’s shaking. Violently. Her skin has a blue tinge, lips nearly purple. Her teeth chatter so hard I can hear them clicking together, her whole body wracked with tremors that start in her very bones. Her clothes cling to her like a death shroud, highlighting how fragile she is.

I press my fingers to her cheek. “She’s freezing. We need to warm her up.”

I bundle her in my arms and gather her against my chest. Her skin is ice against mine. I glance at Phoenix “We have to get her into a warm shower. Now!”

Phoenix bolts ahead of us toward the house, taking the stairs two at a time to her room. Both Soren and I run after him. Phoenix disappears into her room because it’s the only bedroom with a pack shower. The bathroom door slams open and the shower splutters to life.

I waste no time and step into the shower fully clothed. Emma is a block of ice against my chest. The lukewarm water hits us like thousands of tiny needles, but I know from emergency training we can't shock her system with heat. We'll increase the temperature gradually as her body warms, letting her core temperature rise slowly. Emma moans and a small frown ripples her forehead as tremors wrack her frame.

Her clothes are frozen to her skin and will hinder getting her warm. “Help me get these off her.”

My stomach hollows out, rage and grief warring in my chest as we remove her clothing. Every rib is visible beneath sallow skin, casting shadows like prison bars across her torso. Hip bones jut sharp enough to cut and, oh gods, those round puckered scars scattered over her belly are cigarette burns. More scars in sharp lines curl around her waist and lead up to the mangled flesh at the base of her neck.

I’m going to be fucking sick.

Phoenix’s hands flutter over her body, as though he doesn’t know where to begin to touch her. He swallows hard before spearing me with a horrified look I feel all the way to my soul. “How…how the fuck can anyone do this to a person? How the fuck could they be so cruel? This is…fucking…perverted, Ash. They’rederanged.”

My pack brothers’ grief weaves with my own. I thought I’d known the full extent of Pack Carmichael’s cruelty through the state of the basement, but seeing it written on her skin is a new kind of horror. Dr. Chen told us what she’d suffered but seeing it like this…no amount of imagination could come up with this type of abuse.

“No wonder they want her back. No one can ignore this kind of evidence of abuse,” Soren whispers.

Yet still, would it even make a difference? Pack Carmichael are the type to say she begged for it in the depths of her heat. They only did what she asked. Omegas are unpredictable and will ask for anything in the haze of heat. They were only being caring alphas, giving her what she wanted.

Bile rises at her mangled ankle where the chain sat. Her flesh is a mass of scar tissue, purple, red, silver, all layered together like geologic strata of trauma. Layers of damage speaking of countless attempts to escape, of infection allowed to fester, of metal eating into skin until it became part of her.

Fuck this world to the ends of all the fucking hells. I’ll personally make sure Pack Carmichael rot in all versions of them.

I tighten my hold on Emma, careful of her injuries, as the water gradually warms her frozen skin. They weren't just killing her body. They were killing her spirit. Breaking her down piece by piece.

And they wouldn’t have stopped until she was dust.

Emma moans, the sound barely audible over the shower spray. Her eyes flutter open, unfocused and distant. Relief floods through me at seeing her conscious, but that relief curdles as I realize she's not really here with us.

“Beach,” she mumbles, trying weakly to push away from my chest with trembling hands. “Need... my beach. Please…take me back.”

Chapter Sixteen

Asher

“Do either of you know what she means?” I look between Soren and Phoenix, desperate for understanding. “Has she mentioned a beach to either of you?”

Soren's jaw tightens as he studies her and shakes his head. “She’s said nothing to me.”

Phoenix's brow wrinkles in a troubled frown. His blue eyes dart between Emma and me, searching for answers neither of us has. Water drips from his disheveled blond hair as he shakes his head slowly. He brushes wet hair from Emma's face with gentle fingers. “What beach, Tough Girl? What safe place are youtalking about?”

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