Her Rejection's Revenge

CHAPTER TEN: UNLIKELY ALLIES

“Paid?!!” I echoed incredulously even after the shock had abated long enough for me to be able to utter a proper word. “By whom?”

Isaac looked at me with serious eyes, and I could discern his features better in the moonlit room. Full moon was gone but the new one was shining so bright that there was enough light for my werewolf eyes to make out his features. He had the kind of face, which was unpleasant and nasty at first sight, but once you get used to it, it became less intimidating. It wasn’t a friendly one though.

“I…I don’t understand,” I stammered incoherently as my heart jackhammered inside my chest. “Who would give you money to attack our Alpha?”

My mind raced with the potential criminals as this changed everything. If Isaac had been sent to attack Brax, then it was not premeditated as I had assumed. Maybe just maybe I had rushed to conclusions?

My heart wasn’t into the gullible thought anymore as I recalled how they’d treated me during the ceremony and my distress grew. I was only fooling myself with false illusions. But Brax wouldn’t pay someone to hurt him, would he?

“I don’t know. Whatever I said about my pack was true – I was a beta who was outcasted because I was unable to save my Alpha. After the rejection, I became a member of the Rogue club which is located in Brooklyn. The club picks up rogues like me, and it’s a metaphor for the likes of those who roam about in the urban city without the protection of a pack.”

I tried not to express my impatience as he insisted on telling his background story. It was not like me to be impolite, but I was not very interested in his sob story. “I’ve been living there for a few years now. I have a certain reputation,” he offered hesitantly.

“Reputation?” I queried, not wanting to be left guessing.

He sighed at my question. “I am a mercenary,” he admitted albeit reluctantly. “I undertake to do things willingly for the sake of money. One day, I received a package which issued that I was invited to the crowning ceremony of Alpha Braxton Cooper. And that I was supposed to create trouble. With twenty grands stashed.”

The air went out of my body in a rush of air. The only person I could see who had any motive to cause trouble during the ceremony was Beatrice. However, attacking the Alpha was not something she would have dared on her own. Without Brax’s involvement.

I sighed heavily. I longed to confront them. I had so many questions in my mind despite me trying not to care. But I would not rest until every of my doubts were cleared. If only I could recuperate as fast as the other wolves.

“What did the invitation say exactly? Do you have it with you?” I asked curiously.

He sighed. “Listen, this is all that I’m prepared to tell you. I don’t know much either anyway otherwise I would have been long dead. All I know is that we’re on the same page, me and you. We’re both liabilities in the whole story.”

I took umbrage at his comment. “I am nothing like you,” I spat somehow hostilely. “I have a family. They won’t let me stay in here forever,” I protested vehemently. “I understand that there’s been a certain kind of misunderstanding which will be cleared as soon as I get out of this shithole!”

I wiped away the tears impatiently – furious when a fresh pool spilled on my cheeks again. Although I wasn’t sure whether my parents would go against the Alpha for my sake, I was willing to beg them to take me back. With hindsight, I was not even angry with Braxton anymore. He could have Beatrice if he wanted.

All I wanted was to stay with the pack – a rogue’s life sounded even more miserable than staying under the protection of a pack. Miffed, I clenched my jaw and stared in the darkness with a grimness that wasn’t like me.

That man was a soulless mercenary who didn’t bother who he was hurting in the quest for money, while I had spent my entire life trying to do good upon others. How the hell were our fates intertwined? How did I find myself locked in the same room as him?

I must have dozed off with that thought in mind because the next time I opened my eyes, there was a beam of sunlight which seeped at the window at the top. I’ve already tried to plot my escape plan through it, but it was so high that I would never be able to reach out to it.

“It’s not that unreachable,” a voice stated, and I turned abruptly to stare in a pair of bottomless black eyes. Ones which had lost any semblance of hope.

I heaved a heavy sigh. “I am not that daring,” I confessed self-consciously. Isaac c****d his head again to look at me like I was some puzzle he was still trying to figure out. I didn’t know whether I liked his inspection or not.

“What are you so afraid of?” he asked instead, and I had the feeling he was mincing words around me. Probably thought I was not worthy enough to have a decent conversation with. Not that I cared. About his opinion.

Isaac was an okay guy, but I was sworn off men, especially werewolves for a long time. With belated realization, I noticed that the pain was not soul wrenching anymore – if I laid still, I could breathe properly now.

Itzel? I cried tentatively, my first instinct to make sure that my wolf was okay. No response. I sighed inwardly, worried that she might have been wounded beyond repair by the rejection.

Spurred with the fact that the pain had stopped, I tried to sit up but instantly howled with pain as the action brought me back to my initial position. I bit my lips to withstand the anguish raking through me as I struggled to keep still desperately waiting for the storm to pass.

“Aaarrrggggh!” I cried out in frustration as the familiar shame followed. Why was I so weak and pathetic?

“Cut yourself some slack!” Isaac gruntled making me jump as I realized that I had spoken aloud. “You’ve just gone through a rough rejection. It’s normal to feel so weak. Why are you so hard on yourself?”

My jaw slackened at the passionate explosion, but I didn’t respond. Nobody had stood up in my defense for a long time. Not even Beatrice. I bristled again the fresh bout of pain which grabbed my heart once again at the maudlin thought. For how long would I linger in those moments of pity? I had to be strong to combat that betrayal and move on. Both emotionally and physically.

Before giving myself to process my latest thought, I turned towards Isaac once again. “For how long we have been down here?”

He shrugged, his large shoulders flexing at his clavicle. “No idea. I guess weeks, or days at most. But it’s hard to keep track in here.”

I responded with a nod, my mind on the multiple options running through my mind. It was clear to me that I could not rely on my parents or anyone from the pack. There was only one person left who could rescue me from that shithole. Zendaya, my sister. If only I could find a way to reach out to her.

“Will there be anyone coming for you?” I asked Isaac with my lips pursed. “Is there someone who cares enough to come looking for you?”

“Nope,” he replied without hesitation. “I am a loner, with no family to miss me. What about you?”

It took me a minute longer to respond. I was not going to trust him, but it like we were allies in that moment, however unlikely. “I have a sister. But I don’t know what lies she will be fed by my parents,” I said lackadaisically.

“Hmmm,” he mused. “So, no hope for any rescue mission, right? We are doomed until your ex decides our fate.”

My ex. The way he referred to Braxton made me shiver convulsively. It was still hard for me to accept that we were over. I felt like I was still the same girl who’d been so excited only days ago to become his Luna while he’d transformed into someone else altogether.

What bothered me was for how long had he been planning all this behind my back?

How long had they been plotting such schemes behind my back? My boyfriend and my best friend? All those moments of self-doubts about myself had just been a way to destroy me little by little. They’d been feeding me poison all this time, and I’d been drinking their venom with a smiling face.

With hindsight, I realized that catching Braxton with Anna two days before the crowning ceremony had been a cleverly executed ploy. They’d wanted me to expose Braxton’s cheating episode just to make me sound like a crazy possessive girlfriend. That was why they chose a different girl than the actual girlfriend, so that on the crowning ceremony if I accused them of conspiring against me, they would have used my own words against me.

I heard a wounded whine and didn’t realize it came from me until too late. I swallowed the rest of the pain as I’d been doing for the past days.

“For the record, I am sorry for causing so may disruptions in your life. When I was given the mission, I had no idea what I was up against.”

I scoffed derisively. “Would you have backed down from the deal if you’d known about it?” I asked meeting his eyes heads on so that he wouldn’t even consider lying to me. He seemed caught off-guard by my question.

“I don’t think so, no,” he replied honestly.

I nodded expectantly but briskly. “No need to feel sorry for me then. You’re exactly where you should be,” I sent him the cryptic message, although my heart wasn’t into it. What did it matter whether he was repenting, or he would have chosen to betray me? He didn’t matter. Not when my own kin had left me to suffer in such an atrocious way.

We remained quiet for a long time after that comment, and he approached me only twice to feed me when the food was served from under a gap in the door. I resorted to my fate and ate only to keep my strengths. I knew that after a proper meal, I would sleep for days because I was recuperating little by little.

I had no idea how much time passed with me trying to appease the guilty mind of a mercenary while nursing my broken heart. My wolf was finally responding but with weak whines instead of a decent conversation. I was able to move to feed myself, but I was still too weak to ty to reach the window at the top.

A few more days, I promised myself resolutely. At least, I wasn’t tied down like the rogue was, and I refused to untie him no matter how much he pleaded me. I hadn’t forgiven him yet, and he would not give me more information about who’d hired him for the attack.

I tried to cut deals with him so that he would tell his truth to the pack, but even I wasn’t sure whether it was worth it anymore. The people believed what they were willing to believe.

Besides, I no longer feel like I owed them any explanation now. The more I thought about it, the more sense it made. I would move to Philly with my sister and pave a new life for myself there.

Then it happened.

It was one night like any others – nights in a basement were hardly discernible – and I was sitting in front of Isaac still debating whether I should release him from his misery. We weren’t friends yet, but I was more comfortable around him. He was the guy who’d helped me with my rudimentary needs during my captivity – held me when I vomited my lunch, took care of my basic toiletries, and kept me alive.

It was a moment of pure folly when I removed the knots from his hand and feet. Then, at that exact moment, I heard the voice in my head.

“I, Braxton Cooper, Alpha of the Ocean Howl Pack disown you Zelda Settlemire from the pack, you are now no longer under my protection. I am making Beatrice Larson of warrior descent my Luna and my wife.”