Page 58 of The Bookseller and the Alpha
I let the knowledge settle in my gut. “Fuck.” Spinning, I punched the wall. Plaster sprayed around me. I punched it again and again. I might be destroying evidence. Probably not, but even if I was, I didn’t give a fuck. The tide of rage was so close. I could let it pull me under entirely and slaughter everyone in sight. Someone betrayed me. And took my mate.
I forced myself to take a breath. Slaughter wouldn’t help. I flexed my damaged knuckles and the pain helped to ground me. To bring me back from the edge. I dropped my head against the ruined wall, panting. I had to control myself if I wanted to find my mate.
“Boss, look.”
I lifted my head, focusing on the small item Sam was holding up.
A hypodermic.She’s alive.Drugged but alive.My legs refused to hold me up and I slowly sagged down the wall until I was on the floor.Maybe she couldn’t hear me but I sent my message down the bond anyway.I’m coming for you mate. Hold on.
Chapter 67
Calypso
Gods. Why did I hurt so much? My head was pounding and everything ached. I was shivering. Did I drink too much? My mouth was dry, my tongue swollen in my mouth. I opened my eyes, but the space around me was dark. Completely dark. And I wasn’t in bed. That sliced through the fog of my headache. Something wasn’t right. Where was I? Where was Luc?
I reached for the mate bond. It felt thin, stretched.Luc?
CALY!Caly! Thank fuck. Finally.Where are you? Are you hurt?
For a moment his emotions overwhelmed me. His fear, his anger, boiled around me. My head pounded and I had to force back the bile rising in my throat. He sensed it (of course he sensed it) and then he pulled in the panic, getting himself under control. For me. And then he pushed love and reassurance down the bond. So much love. I let it warm me, surround me. Luc’s love gave me strength, washing away my headache, pushing back the aches and pains in my body.
I’m okay.I sent my own love back down the bond. But I was already cataloguing the other things that I could sense, to send them back to my mate. So he could find me. Because he would always find me.
Always.
What could I tell him? I could tell him that my hands were tied, but I could still feel my fingers. My legs were free and I wasn’t gagged. But that wouldn’t help. That would feed the anger. It was already a given that whoever had taken me wouldn’t survive if my mate reached them before the police did. And the police would hand them over to Shifter justice anyway. Which wouldn’t be kind.
Maybe it should have felt wrong that my mate was ready to kill whoever hurt me. But it didn’t. In fact, I felt an answering savage satisfaction in my own chest. This was a deliberate and planned kidnapping, probably by the same people who had already tried to kidnap me at least two other times. Whoever did it deserved whatever was coming to them.
It was a woman. Blonde. Young.
We found the security footage. Tell me more about your surroundings.
Right, of course. I kept going.It’s dark. I’m propped up against a wall, sitting on a cold floor.
It wasn’t just the floor that was cold. The air around me was cold. Now that I’d noticed, I realised it wasn’t just cold. It was frigid. Keeping my thoughts tightly to myself, I pushed my bound hands out behind me, reaching out. I touched the wall. Slick. Metallic and damp.
A fridge?The thought escaped down the bond before I could hold it in.
Fuck.
Was I in a fridge?
My heart rate spiked. Ohgodsohgodsohgods. Instinctively, I crouched into a ball.I wasn’t claustrophobic. But no-one wanted to be tied up and dumped inside a fridge.
Through my own panic I felt Luc going insane at the other end of the bond.Rage. Helplessness. Fear. More rage.
His emotions washed over me and somehow, it stopped my own panic. I had to be strong, or Luc wouldn't be able to function well enough to find me. He could go off on a murdering rampage, and his own people would need to restrain him.
I forced myself to sit up and take a few deep breaths. I could do this. I had to do this.
STOP.I sent the thought down the bond with all my strength. I’m all right. Let’s work on getting me out of here. You do what you gotta do, and I’ll see what I can do here.
Then I locked down the bond. Closing him out.
Chapter 68
Luc
