Mates: Revenge

Chapter 32

~Jayden~

So close! So close to finding out what’s really going on with Kehlani. I watch Kehlani walkout of our room and decide to go after her. They may have only alerted her, but I will play my Alpha card and join. I’m curious to see what the issue is.

I follow Kehlani out the backdoor and into the woods. We head towards the south border and I can see a crowd of warriors. We make it to a large tree where I see a note nailed to a tree. At the base of the tree is a warrior with a knife sticking out of his shoulder. The warrior is in agony which must mean that the knife is silver. The medical team is working diligently on the warrior to ensure that he survives. I move closer to read the note while Kehlani speaks to the warriors gathered around. The note says: I’m coming for Jayden.

I stop in my tracks once I read the note. Someone is looking for me? Who could be looking for me? I don’t have any enemies that I’m aware of and Malachi is dead. I turn to look at Kehlani and she doesn’t seem as shocked as I feel. Kehlani turns and catches my eye. She slowly walks over to me until she is standing in front of me. “You don’t see that surprised by this, whereas I’m shocked.” Kehlani looks everywhere but at me. “I think it’s time to tell me exactly what’s going on.” Kehlani sighs and launches into everything that has been going on from the phone calls at the office to the man in the parking garage. I can’t believe all of this has been going on and I’ve been in the dark about it. I don’t understand why Kehlani would feel the need to keep this from me. She has been in danger and I have been unaware. What if something happened to her underneath my nose? How could I ever come back from my love being seriously hurt or worse and I could have saved her?

~Kehlani~

The look on Jayden’s face is heartbreaking to say the least. He looks so distraught that I kept the truth from him. I considered this reaction, but what else was I supposed to do? I almost lost Jayden when Brooklyn was kidnapped. He barely survived and I’m not sure that if it took longer for us to find Brooklyn, if Jayden could have made it. Every time I think back to that time, I start to hyperventilate. I can’t imagine my life without Jayden in it and I don’t want to see what that would look like.

One top of that, Brooklyn is still struggling and I know that takes most of Jayden’s time. We both want to help Brooklyn, but so far that seems to be a tough thing to accomplish. She has been seeing the therapist, but doesn't seem to be making any progress. The therapist feels that the trauma was so severe, that she is literally stuck at the moment. We are all trying to come up with a way to break Brooklyn free. It doesn’t help that Melanie has left. I understand her reasoning, but it seems that Brooklyn is even more withdrawn than she was before. It’s hard for me to see her this way so I know it’s even more difficult for Jayden.

Jayden continues to look at me and the look has turned to one of betrayal. He is looking at me like I’m the biggest enemy he has. “I need some air.” Jayden turns around and starts to walk.

“Jayden, please let’s just talk.” He turns back, quickly, to face me.

“Talk?! Now you want to talk?! You have had weeks to talk to me about what’s going on. You didn’t want to talk to me then so why would you want to talk to me now?” My heart starts to beat faster and my mouth goes dry. He is hurt and upset. This is my fault, but I was only trying to protect him.

“Jayden, I was just trying to protect you-”

“Protect me? Protect me from what?” Is he serious right now?

“Jayden, with everything that has been going on, of course I was trying to protect you. Brooklyn was taken and you were devastated. Brooklyn is still having trouble adjusting to being back and now Melanie has gone. You have so much going on and I didn’t want you burdened with this too.” Jayden steps towards me.

“You don’t get to make that choice for me. We are supposed to be partners; deal with everything together. You don’t get to decide to handle things on your own, especially when they concern me. How is this something that I have to explain?” I reach out to touch Jayden’s face, but he quickly grabs my hand to stop me. “I…..I need space right now.” Jayden drops my hand and walks away.

I can feel the tears fall from my face as I head towards the packhouse. The tears in my eyes blur my vision and I try to blink them away. I walk to the packhouse slowly, trying to think about what I’m going to do next. As much as I’m blinking, my vision doesn’t clear up. I continue to walk to the packhouse, but my steps are becoming shaky. I don’t know what’s going on, but I stop to take a breath. I decide to detour from the packhouse to the clinic. Whatever is going on, I need a doctor to check me out. I’m sure it’s just stress and exhaustion, but I want to be sure. The last thing I need is to pass out or worse and have Jayden worrying about me on top of worrying about Brooklyn.