11. ~Skylar~

"You're safe now. You're safe, I promise," I spoke to Bastian's sleeping form, as I sat on his bed stroking his hair. "I love you. I love you so much."

God, that didn't even cover it.

Emotion welled in my eyes as I took him in.

He'd been unconscious when he'd arrived back here and he'd had to be carried in by Caspian's people. The on-call doctor had been brought in and her, along with Caspian's staff had cleaned Bastian up after he'd been caked in dirt, sweat, and blood from dozens of cuts it looked like he'd sustained from snagging himself on tree branches and hell knew what else during his escape. He was now clean and clad in a pair of boxers, and hooked up to an IV. He was severely dehydrated and he was so pale and gaunt from being denied both water and food as the doctor had determined.

"Anything yet?"

I looked up from gazing at Bastian to see Caspian now standing in the doorway, arms folded across his chest.

And he was dressed in full tactical gear.

Shit.

Asher had fired up my intel and we'd been able to determine two stops that the transport trucks had made after Elijah's people had switched from the vans to them that night.

The first had seen the trucks idle in the middle of nowhere for a couple of hours, before then traveling two hundred miles away to another location. Asher had pulled up surveillance footage from a diner at a truck stop and confirmed the trucks had been left there. As for the location that they'd lingered at before, there was nothing in that area to pull up. It had literally been in the middle of nowhere. But it had been close to where Bastian's pendant signal had started emitting from, so Caspian wanted to head down there to search for Caleb. He was really anxious that Bastian had managed to escape, yet Caleb hadn't. So was I. It didn't make sense, so something awful had obviously happened. We wouldn't know what until Bastian woke up.

"Just give him a little more time," I urged Caspian.

"Ten minutes and then I'm heading out, love. I can't wait any longer. Caleb can't."

"I know," I admitted. "Just… going there without knowing what happened, how Bastian got out but Caleb didn't come with him, where exactly they were and the intel surrounding that… it's a risk."

"An acceptable one in order to bring Caleb back to us."

I pushed off the bed and rounded it to him. "You could end up in the same situation, Caspian. You could be taken as well. Especially when you've refused to take Luke, Dante, or any of your teams with you."

"They violated my command by circumventing me. They put you in danger by sending you out there beyond my protection."

"If I hadn't done that, we wouldn't have this lead."

He shook his head. "It could have been accomplished another way, a safer way that didn't endanger you."

"They were worried about your state of mind. I saw, Caspian, I saw what you did to that lieutenant of Elijah's."

He didn't so much as flinch at me bringing up his horrific torture session, his brutal murder.

"I did what was necessary. And in order to bring Caleb back to us, I need to continue in that vein. Nothing can be off the table."

"And that's another reason why you're insisting on doing this alone, isn't it? So there won't be anyone there to reel you in? So you can be as merciless and as sadistic as you like?"

"I'm not doing it alone. But those assisting me don't have any qualms about crossing certain lines. They see things the same way as I do."

Before I could continue to try to get through to him—as futile as that was proving to be—a hand landed on his shoulder a moment before Asher came into view. He was decked out just like Caspian. Oh God. Both Dante and Luke had warned me about Asher Monroe's reputation earlier right after our gathering in The Jackals Lair. Him going along was absolutely going to feed the darkness and depravity that Caspian was currently embracing to its fullest.

Asher gave me a chin lift, then asked Caspian, "Ready to head out?"

Caspian held my gaze for a moment and there was a brief spark of hope there that he might actually listen to reason when he hesitated as he looked between me and Bastian.

But then he blinked and told Asher over his shoulder, "Ready."

Rushed footsteps sounded a moment before Damien appeared, then brushed past Asher and Caspian, coming into the room for Bastian.

He walked to his sleeping form and stroked his arm. "It's all gonna be fine, little bro." He looked at me. "I talked to the doctor again and she said he's gonna make a full recovery."

"I know. She said any longer before he'd gotten treatment and it could've been a different story."

"But it wasn't. It's all good, Bluebell." He reached out and cupped my cheek in a comforting gesture that I really needed. Not long ago I never would have imagined accepting that from him, but things had shifted now. "And it will be a whole lot better once we bring Cal back." He released me, then grinned at Asher and Caspian. "With me and these two badass motherfuckers on the case, you've got nothing to worry about."

Caspian gave him a withering look, while Asher wasn't appearing to pay attention at all, focusing on his phone, typing away.

"Just be careful, all right?" I urged him.

He pulled me into a hug and discreetly whispered in my ear, "I'll take care of it like you asked. You've got my word."

He was referring to a backup I'd put in place if Caspian didn't heed my warnings and concerns about the dark path he was headed down. After my own struggle with it, I could see the signs all too well. I hadn't needed those photos that Dante had taken to tell me. I'd already seen it all over him.

As we pulled apart, Damien told me, "Just take care of Seb, yeah? He's gonna need you here when he wakes up."

"I will."

With that, he headed out of the room. Asher followed. Caspian hesitated for a brief moment, but then he took off with them, not even saying goodbye, not connecting with me at all.

He was standing at more of a distance as time went on by.

The man who always expressed his love and care for us was now just a shadow of that former self of his. He was basically locked down.

And I hated it.

I hated that it had come to any of this.

I pulled up the chair from Bastian's desk and settled beside the bed, my mind swirling with so much worry and anxiety.

The urge to go with them had been hard to swallow down, but I just hadn't been able to bring myself to leave Bastian's side now that he was finally back here with us. It would have been a massive fight with Caspian and in all likelihood a futile uphill battle to convince him to allow me to be present after he'd found out about my other off-the-books mission also.

As much as it was hard for me to simply stand down and sit on the sidelines of anything, especially when I most definitely had the skills to see to it, sometimes you just had to pick your battles.

"Sky?"

I jolted, pulled from my burdensome thoughts, where I'd been stroking Bastian's hair and staring off into space.

I looked to see that his eyes were opening and he was squinting to take me in.

I grasped his hand and gave it a soft squeeze. "Yeah, sweets, it's me. I'm here. I'm here with you."

A weak smile graced his lips and he croaked, "Best sight to wake up to." His lip curled. "You being naked would've been the cherry on top." He shifted his weight slightly and winced. "Although, there's not much I could do about that right now, huh?"

I chuckled. It was a good sign that he was going there. "Not really, no." I stroked my thumb over the back of his hand and shuffled right to the edge of the chair to be closer to him. "Anticipation makes it all the sweeter, though, right?"

He laughed, and the sound warmed me, especially after not hearing it for so long.

Unfortunately, it quickly turned into a coughing fit for him, his throat clearly too dry to take the strain of it at the moment.

I let go of him, then snatched up the glass of water I'd brought in for him a little while ago.

He shifted in the bed before I could stop him, pushing into a sitting position. "Careful," I warned. "You're still weak and you need a lot of rest and basically no exertion whatsoever. And there's also the IV hooked up to you."

"I'll be careful, baby," he said, managing it slowly, then leaning his head back exhaustedly against the headboard.

I handed him the glass and his fingers shook around it, his arm too, as he only just managed to bring it to his lips.

"Just sips, okay?"

He followed my instructions—unlike a certain somebody else—and took a few sips, then licked his dry lips. I helped him ease the glass down and he breathed a heavy sigh. "Much better."

I picked up the container of Jello beside it on the table and held it out to him. "You must be hungry. The doctor said you need to ease into eating solid foods again, but this will be okay. Green Jello—lime flavor. Damien told me it's your favorite flavor. But if you don't feel like this, I also had some soup made. I mean, we could also do a little bit of mashed potatoes if you want and—"

He grasped my hand, jarring me from my rambling. "Sky, I'm okay. I'm back with you. And I'll be fine."

"I… yeah, of course. I know and—"

He squeezed my fingers gently. "I promise. I'm all good."

I eased my hand away and then I was scrambling onto the bed right beside him. All the worry and grief of the last few days that I'd been holding back finally took me over and I sank against him, holding him tightly to me with trembling hands as I breathed him in. "I missed you. I missed you so much. I was so worried that—"

"Shh," he said, wrapping his free arm that wasn't attached to the IV around me and stroking my back. "I'm here now. I'm here, beautiful."

It took me several moments to get myself together and when I finally did, I eased back a little so I wasn't actually squeezing the life out of him.

"I love you," he said, reaching out and wiping my tears away.

"I love you."

He smiled and sank back against the headboard, taking my hand and holding it on his thigh over the covers. "Is Cas with Caleb? There's something I need to tell him about what Cal went through. He was steeped in major denial, so I'm worried he might not reveal what really happened to him in that room."

Oh God. "He's… he's not here, Bastian."

He jolted. "What? No, he has to be. You guys picked up me… I got clear of the signal jammer and my pendant started transmitting again… and that's how you found me, right? Cal said it was just a two-mile distance I needed to get for that to happen. That would've been close enough for you guys to find the mansion too, to raid the place and pull Caleb out." His hand left me and he shoved it through his hair. "I mean, I did pass out in a bank on the roadside. I couldn't… I just couldn't keep going. Then I woke up briefly when a construction worker pulled over to help me. He was lost because that area is like a maze." His eyes flashed. "A maze… is that why you couldn't find Cal right away?" Urgency took him over as he told me, "I know the way, I can guide you guys to that hellhole. I can—"

"Caspian is headed down to the area."

"Without my information?"

"He didn't want to wait for you to wake up."

"How long have I been out?"

"A few hours."

"Hours? You guys should've just forced me awake."

"The doctor advised against that."

"Fuck."

"It's all right. Just tell me everything you know and I'll relay it to Caspian while they're still on their way down there."

"Yeah," he said, calming a little at that. "Yeah, okay." He grimaced and warned, "It's a lot, Sky. You're gonna need to brace yourself."

"It's okay, go ahead."

And then he did.

He told me everything, every little detail he could remember.

The further along he went, the worse it got, especially the details about what had befallen Caleb.

I felt sick to my stomach when he got to that part, but I forced myself to swallow it down, and listen to every word so I didn't miss anything to pass onto Caspian.

My God.

It was brutal.

All so horrifically brutal.