31. Sneak Peak at Bonded by Fate

BEXLEY

Say my name.

Oh little one, you have no idea what I’m capable of.

Mate.

“Bex, please just hang on. You can do this, okay?”

I’m trying to keep us primed and ready, just in case.

This is just a bath. Nothing else is happening right now.

My precious little bumblebee.

“Hah, hah, HAAAAH! I didn’t know a back could arch like that.”

“Shut up and do something, Delilah!”

“What did you just say to me, boy?”

And what, sweet girl?

People get desperate when they’re dying.

So, she’s… what? Giving dying people a choice? That doesn’t sound like her.

She’s got a point. Humans use the best of the military world to convince young ones to enlist, when the best of the military world is also the rarest.

Excruciating doesn’t even begin to cut it. The pain that wafted through my system marred my vision and filled me with a sense of dread. It was too much. Everything was too much. And if I had any shot at surviving whatever the fuck was happening to my body, I had to latch onto something.

I decided to latch onto my mates.

Who would hate me for what I was doing.

Bumblebee.

My sweet girl.

Darling.

I missed their voices. Their nicknames. I missed the way Ronyn glared at me every time I did something he didn’t like. I missed Dom’s cheeky smile whenever I did something he did like. I missed Voss’s commanding presence, like he’s the only one in the world that gets to protect me. I missed their smiles. Their smells. I missed Voss’s cooking and Ronyn’s awful coffee skills. I missed Dom’s little side glances from across the room and Voss’s bellowing voice over the compound.

I memorized every part of them in my memories as my body vibrated with pain.

My God, they’re going to hate me if I ever find my way back to them.

No. I have to find my way back. There’s no ‘if’ about it.

“What’s happening? What did you do?”

“Bex!”

“Hey! Bex! Look at me. Can you look at me?”

I heard Jacob’s voice, and it sounded panicked. It also sounded far away, though. I felt the world tilting around shifting around me, but I wasn’t sure if that was the world or my body. The pain pulled me under. A blinding flash filled my vision with a bright white light, and all of a sudden, the pain ceased to exist.

“Darling.”

I gasped and whipped around, looking up into the beautiful green eyes of my mate.

“Voss,” I said with a soft smile.

He chuckled as he reached out and gripped my chin. “There’s that darling smile I love so much.”

My cheeks flushed. “Love?”

His eyes burned with passion. “Ronyn?”

“Yep?” he asked as he appeared at my side.

I flinched softly before I looked up at him, gazing into his metallic eyes. “Hey there, handsome.”

He tossed me a wink from that scarred eye of his, and it made my knees melt. “Hey there, bumblebee.”

“Where’s my sweet girl?” Dom called out.

I squealed and turned around. “Dom!”

“Hah! Get over here!” he exclaimed as he held his arms out.

“Bexleeeeey!” Jacob roared.

I gasped for air as my eyes flew open. My back arched so deeply that I thought it might snap me in two. I wanted to go back. I wanted to dig back into my memories. Back to a time where I had all three of them at my side. I wanted to change things. I wanted to rewind time and tell all of them how I felt. I wanted to rewind time and tell them that it wasn’t them that was the issue, but me. I had a hard time coming to grips with things. I had a hard time piecing everything together. I had a hard time accepting my new life. It wasn’t them.

It was never them.

It was always me.

“I’m… sorry…” I choke out.

I didn’t have a choice, however. The second Delilah had me pinned and bitten, I was given a choice: die struggling, or rise back up and have a chance to become the victor. I did my best not to think about the disdain for vampires that my mates had. Flashes of that vampire in the cave ripped across the front of my mind. The way they had that damned thing chained up in there like an animal.

Is that what they’d do to me?

Had I just lost them while trying to save them?

“Bexley, no!” Jacob exclaimed.

“Get off her,” Delilah growled. “Give her some space.”

“Beeeeex!”

I wanted to open my eyes and see what the fuck was going on. Now that the pain was finally starting to wear off, I had to focus on the good. I had to make the best of the worst situation imaginable so that I could take Delilah down from the inside out. It was the only way to protect mine and Voss’s pack.

I’m so sorry, Voss…

If there was a way to preserve things and move forward, however, I needed to give it a shot. Maybe my mates could come around, in time, to the idea that I’m a vampire.

Or, maybe they’d string me up in a cage and beat me for information, too.

“Do you believe me now, Delilah!?” Jacob shrieked.

“Huh,” Delilah grunted in the distance.

Jesus, they sounded so far away…

“What’s happening to her? Tell me!”

Jacob sounded so panicked. Why in the fuck did he sound so panicked? The world slowly faded back into view. Not literally, but all around me. All of a sudden, I became increasingly aware of the fact that my clothes stuck to me like glue. Most likely because of sweat. Ick. I needed to get up, but it still felt as if I was harnessed by something.

“Bex, just open your eyes,” Jacob whispered against the side of my face, “please, just open your eyes.”

It felt like such a chore, though.

“I see them wiggling!” he exclaimed breathlessly. “Good, good. That’s it. Just take it slow.”

All I could get out was a grunt, however.

“Good! Yes!” Jacob said as he tapped my cheek. “Come on, we’re a step closer. Just open those eyes for me.”

“Geez, what a waste,” Delilah said breathlessly.

“Just give her a second!” Jacob bellowed.

It shocked me that the woman didn’t decapitate him right then and there. Even in my pain-induced stupor, I knew it was a ballsy move to bark at the woman like that. And yet, she didn’t move a muscle to help him.

It filled me with dread.

How close was Jacob to Delilah in the first place?

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait a second,” Jacob said.

I still couldn’t open my eyes, but I felt my body moving. Gone was the hard surface against my back. Gone was the sticky sensation of my clothes sticking to my skin. I felt something warm and pressing wrap itself around my wrist, and Delilah’s hissing voice came from…beneath me?

“Let her go and shut up,” she practically snarled at Jacob.

I wanted to claw her fucking eyes out for talking to my brother from another mother that way.

Then, as if I were on some hell-trafficked carnival ride, the world around me spun. Or, maybe I was spinning. Either way, something was spinning, and my hair flailed everywhere, and it felt like my body was about to be slingshotted into space.

“Bexleeeey!” Jacob exclaimed from beneath me.

And all Delilah did was cackle before her voice pierced the world around me.

“Well, well, well, this is certainly new!” she chirped while clapping her hands. “And I really do love something new.”