CHAPTER 24

CHAPTER 24

Cynthia

Adam drives me home.

He called someone to pick up Kofo’s body. I watched some men arrive in a white van and take him away. Two of the men stayed and cleaned up the blood before applying some spray to the ground, giving it another scrub. I want to ask what will happen with the body, but it’s like the words are stuck in my throat.

I keep hearing Kofo’s scream as he rushed toward me, and then the way he threw himself in front of me. The sound of his flesh tearing is echoing in my ears, and I can’t turn it off.

"His family will be notified that it was a heart attack," Adam says quietly. "We have procedures in place for events like this. He will be buried with dignity, and his family will be compensated. His siblings, if he has any, will have their educational expenses covered, and his parents will be looked after financially by the pack."

"None of it will replace their son," I whisper, my voice thick with tears.

"No, it won’t," Adam agrees, his voice tense. "But we have to do what we can."

I want to scream about the unfairness of this all, but what will that change? Kofo is gone.

"That shifter," Adam asks suddenly, "did you know him?"

I shake my head.

"He was targeting you, Cynthia," Adam is looking straight ahead. "I want to know why."

My body tenses as I recall the night I felt somebody watching me in the park across my building.

"I’ve not interacted with any of the shifter community in Detroit since I came here. Nobody’s got any reason to want me dead."

Adam pulls up in front of my building. I had no choice but to give him my address since my car was in bad shape. When he gets out of the car, I go still. "What’re you doing?"

"I want to make sure that shifter hasn’t been sniffing around your home," he growls, slamming his door shut.

My eyes widen in alarm. Riya isn’t here, but if he enters my apartment, there are signs of her everywhere. I can’t let him do this.

"I’ll check for his scent myself!" I try to stop him.

"My sense of smell is sharper than yours," Adam snaps. "If you had been able to sense him, you would have noticed his scent the moment you walked out of the lobby."

He’s walking across the road, toward the park.

"What’re you doing?" I trail after him.

"The park is on the edge of the woods," Adam responds. "He would be watching you from there."

I pause, that ominous feeling now settling in my gut.

I bring Riya here every weekend.

The parking lot for my building is across the road from the park.

That night when I came here and felt I was being watched… It wasn’t my imagination.

"He was here," Adam says, a dangerous edge to his voice. "His scent is overlapping here."

I look over to see him standing by the tree line.

"What does that mean?"

"It means," Adam looks at me, his eyes hard, "that you have been stalked for months probably and you didn’t realize."

My ears are ringing.

Riya.

My baby.

All I can think of is my daughter.

That thing knows about her. Why is he stalking me? Or is he stalking her?

"Get in the car," I say suddenly.

"Wh––"

"Get in the damn car, Adam!" I raise my voice, panicking.

He gives me a confused look and I hold out my hand. "I need your keys."

He doesn’t question me, and even if he did, I probably would not be in a state to answer. My heart is pounding, and I think I’m going to be sick. I pull up in front of Riya’s preschool.

"Can you check if he was here?"

Adam studies me for a long moment, and then he asks, his voice careful, "Are you sure about this?"

I stare at him, his question not making any sense to me, but in my head, I’m asking the same question. I’m laying out the clues to his own child. But when it comes to Riya’s safety, I’ll sacrifice everything."

"This place," I press. "Has he been here?"

Adam gets out of the car, and I don’t have the strength to follow him. He looks up at the board of the small building which says ’Sunny’s Preschool’ and I push down the fear and nausea. He’ll know now. He’ll know about Riya. He’ll take her away from me, and I won’t be able to do anything about it. My eyes are wet as I watch him circle the building.

She still sleeps with her baby blanket. When she’s upset, she likes to wrap it around her shoulders. Will he let her keep it?

Will he let her keep photos of me?

My mind is a scrambled mess.

I’m losing my child.

But I have to protect my child.

And if that means letting Adam take her, I’ll carve out my own heart and hand it to him.

How will I sleep without her scent in my apartment?

Adam returns to the car, and his voice is cold. "A lot of overlaps here as well."

I don’t trust myself to speak, simply starting the car again.

I drive him to a few other places including the local healer of the pack in this area, the grocery store nearby. The shifter has been stalking us. But the scent is strongest at the preschool and our building.

Tony’s apartment building is the last stop. I sit in the driver’s seat, staring out the window.

"Why is he stalking me?"

"Could be a number of reasons," Adam murmurs. "You’re a single female, not affiliated with any pack in the area. Or there’s someone with a grudge."

"I only know of three people who would want me dead," I say tightly. "Norman, Jonathon, and perhaps you. Although, dead is probably an exaggeration when it comes to you."

"I’m not your enemy," Adam says. He takes my hands, forcing me to look at him. "I can protect you."

I look at him for a long moment and then smile sadly. "I don’t want the strings that will come with the protection you offer. If someone wants to kill me, I want to die a free woman."

His eyes tighten around the corners. "You won’t even listen to me."

"Now is not the time for this, Adam." I pull my hands away from his. "I’ll be taking the rest of the week off. I need to do some things. I’ll message you in a few days. Let’s meet up."

I open the car door, and he tries to stop me. "Where are you going?"

"I’ll be fine," I tell him. "I have friends here."

"Cynthia––"

"I need to go." I can’t look at him. I feel like a fool. My whole life is unraveling before me, and I can’t run around fast enough to gather the threads.

"I’ll be fine."

I don’t know how I get one foot in front of the other. All the confidence I had, the pride in my life, it’s all drained away in a heartbeat. Weeks, probably months, this shifter has been stalking us, watching my baby in her preschool, knowing where she is at all times, and I had no clue. My daughter was in danger all this time, and I had no idea about it.

What kind of mother does that make me?

I wipe my eyes as I cross the road, feeling useless.

I made a mistake. I should have told Adam about our child. He could have protected her. He wouldn’t have let things get this far.

A hand grabs me by the elbow, and it’s Adam who turns me around to face him. "This is not your fault, Cynthia. Nobody could have foreseen this."

"Let go of me." I try to pull away from him as the skies rip apart and weep.

"You’re not going to blame this on yourself!" Adam gives me a shake. "Whoever that shifter was, he was skilled. He knew how to conceal his scent. Only an alpha or a trained tracker would have been able to figure it out."

"Go away, Adam!"

"Get in the car." He drags me over to his car. "I’m done with this."

What?

He tosses me inside and then heads into the building. Where is he going?

Is he going to look inside the building and check for the shifter’s scent?

I bury my head in my hands. "What do I do now?"

If the shifter was just interested in me, it would have been an easy decision. I send Riya away with Tony and Maya. But he’s also interested in her. How do I protect Riya when I don’t know who the enemy is? I could barely take him on in a one-on-one fight. How am I supposed to protect her if he comes after her?

I don’t want to take any risks when it comes to Riya. Her safety takes priority over everything, including my personal feelings.

The best course of action would be to tell Adam the truth, to let him take Riya. He can keep her safe. He’s the alpha now. He can protect her from his own family as well. And this is his daughter. He won’t harm her. I was a different story. Riya is his flesh and blood. He’ll protect her with everything he has.

My next actions are becoming increasingly clear to me, but the idea of what I now have to do doesn’t hurt any less.

I look out the window and freeze.

Adam is walking toward me, and in his arms is a sleeping Riya!

I throw the car door open and leap out. "What’re you doing? How do you––"

When I make to grab her, he shakes his head. "She’s sleeping. You don’t have to wake her up."

I watch him numbly as he places her in the backseat of his car, and then my eyes lift to see Tony standing by the entrance of the building.

"Don’t blame him," Adam says. "He did what I told him to do four years ago. To keep you and our child safe and comfortable."

My eyes swivel towards him. "You… All this time…"

Adam takes a step toward me, and I step back, trying to process all this new information. My back presses against the car door and his hand reaches out, sliding around my nape, a smile on his lips. "Did you think I wouldn’t know that my mate was pregnant, Cynthia?"

I stare at him, unable to speak.

Tony. Tony knew all this time, and he helped Adam.

Once again, I was betrayed.

This feeling is painful. I trusted Tony. I made a mistake. I shouldn’t have trusted anyone. Not him, not Maya.

Adam’s fingers press against the edge of the back of my neck, right where my shoulder begins, and I feel a wave of euphoria. Horrified, I immediately shove him back. "What the hell are you––"

"You could never escape me, Cynthia," Adam says softly. "Not when you wear my mark. Now get in the car."

I can still feel that spot he touched on my neck tingling.

It’s always been sensitive, but my hair has always covered it and I never saw anything aside from a redness there to worry about too much.

I’m wearing his mating mark. So, Riya wasn’t a fluke but a result of us being mated.

A dull part of me wonders what other secrets he has that affect me.

I want to rip his eyes out. I want to claw his face.

Fury is building inside me, but my child is in the car.

I harden the burning anger and let it turn into ice. Opening the car door, I get inside.

Adam gets into the driver’s seat and as he begins driving, he says, "I know you have questions, and I’ll answer them all––"

"You can keep Riya," I say, my voice cold. "It’s obvious you can take better care of her."

I feel him glance at me. "She’s our daughter so we both––"

"I hate you," I state. "I despise your existence, Adam Moore. I’ll give you your daughter, but I won’t stay with you."

"You are my mate," Adam says tightly. "Do you understand what that means? You belong by my side. You can hate me all you want, but your position is next to me."

Angry, bitter laughter spills from my mouth. "And how will you tie me to you? Are you going to pull a page out of your father’s book and tie me to you with a blood debt? Or are you going to begin torturing me like your father until I bow before you? Tell me, Adam, what do you have planned? How are you going to break me this time?"

He’s silent and it grates at me.

"You’re all monsters in my eyes." There is so much pain inside my heart, so much agony that I want to rip out my heart and throw it away. Suddenly, every memory with Tony and Maya is tainted. Were they laughing at my stupidity this whole time? Did Adam pay them to manipulate me? Why did I trust them?

Did he know when I broke the blood debt? Did he know when I moved here, when I gave birth, and when I joined this office? Was Tony giving him daily updates? Did he enjoy my growing complacency, knowing he could destroy it all in a heartbeat and remind me of my place?

For the first time, my wolf is also not happy.

Deceit.

It senses deceit, and it’s hurt.

He must have been planning to take Riya away, or was he going to use my daughter as a hostage to get me to stay with him, to see him flaunt Tina in front of me while I was the bedwarmer?

He pulls up in front of my apartment building. I don’t question why he’s brought us back here. I get out first and pick up a sleeping Riya in my arms. I want my baby’s scent to be ingrained in my every cell so that once I part from her, I will never forget it.

I hold her close to me, the anger fading from my heart and replaced by a deep, gut-wrenching misery. She was supposed to be mine. I was supposed to raise her in love and affection and see her grow up to be a wonderful woman. And now I’m going to lose her.

I hesitate at the entrance, my heart screaming at me to take her and just run. I want to keep running until we are away from all these people who have hurt and manipulated me.

"Come on," Adam says. He’s wise enough not to touch me.

I unlock the apartment door and take Riya to her room. She doesn’t stir. I take off her shoes and pull the blanket over her little body. For a moment, I linger by her bedside, soaking in the sight of her.

"My precious baby," I whisper, my heart cracking. "You will always be loved wherever you go. Even if I leave, I’ll always love you."

I press my lips against her forehead, stroking back her hair.

I stay like that for a long time, my fingers combing through her hair, my eyes on her face, her little hands.

It takes every ounce of willpower to get to my feet and head to the living room where Adam is waiting. He’s looking at the pictures of me and Riya on the bookcase when I walk in. I don’t say anything.

He must have sensed my presence because he quietly says, "Tony only sent me one picture of Riya from when she was born, and you were holding her in your arms. I never dared to keep another picture around. I was always afraid someone would find it."

"Didn’t want your dirty little secret revealed to the pack?" I say coldly, walking over to the kitchen to make myself a coffee. My insides are jittery, and I need to do something with my hands.

"It must be easy to villainize me," Adam says, and this time I hear a trace of hurt in his voice.

"You make it quite easy, yes," I agree.

He’s quiet for a moment, and I put the kettle on the stove, keeping my back to him. I don’t want to see him.

"I don’t plan to separate you and Riya," Adam says suddenly. "You’re her mother."

"Then leave us alone."

"She’s my daughter, Cynthia!" Adam raises his voice, frustrated. "You can’t keep me away from her. Both of you belong next to me, by my side."

My hand tightens on the spoon I’ve just picked up. "Are you sure there is room for me and Riya there, what with your fiancée still standing by your side? Or is Tina your wife now?"

Adam’s silence speaks volumes.

I close my eyes briefly, struggling to get my wayward emotions under control. "When I found out about your engagement to Tina, I was still foolish. I was foolish enough to think that you would be able to explain the truth to me. I didn’t realize that you intended to chain me to your side."

"That is not what I intended to do," Adam says furiously. "If you’d just listen."

I whirl around, glaring at him. "Listen to what, Adam? How you isolated me under the pretense of giving two shits about me and then you went and got engaged to Tina? When were you going to tell me about you and her? After the marriage? After you made sure the control of the blood debt fell into your hands so that even if I protested, your fucking slave couldn’t leave your side?"

"You’re going too far," Adam snarls.

"Oh," I cover my mouth, "I’m going too far? I’m not the one who just torpedoed my entire fucking life in one week! Did you and Tony have fun laughing behind my back while you manipulated me? Or was this some sort of sick attempt at trying to tell me how stupid I am?"

"I was trying to protect you," Adam roars. "You’re my mate! I––"

"I don’t want to be your mate," I shout back, tears in my eyes. "I don’t want to have anything to do with you! I want to be left alone, with my daughter."

Adam opens his mouth, and then I hear a voice from behind him.

"Mommy, what’s going on?"