Hell tried to erase the thought of his Mate from his head as he got out of his home running towards the border—where his men were fighting the rogues—trespassers who never learnt to keep off his land.
His Mate was already distraction enough from the task at hand—which was killing every one of the intruders. If not for them, he would have been with his Mate. The little temptress. How had she even learn that? How to seduce? Because clearly that's what she had tried to do. Seduce him into staying.
Mid-run and thought, he shifted into his white wolf.
"Please come back safe to me."
That he definitely will. And then they would talk.
♡
To Rowan, the passage just kept on growing narrower. In truth, it was still pretty much the same width since she entered it. The darkness hid that to her. She felt literally blind. The pitch dark-ness kept swimming in her vision. It wasn't any different when she should close her eyes so she relied in feeling through the wall.
It wasn't easy. She was tired. Her injured leg and arm hurt and she just wanted to sleep.
She was starting to think she wasn't going to find the end until she reached a spot and she couldn't feel any wall again. She reached out to empty air. She tried again. This offset her stand and led her falling face flat to the ground.
It hurt like a bitch. She had used her forehead to hit some weird metal shape. She raised her hand in the darkness to rub the bump which was growing by the second.
Her hand found her forehead and felt the sweet. Swearing out loud, she angrily dropped her hand in the process, hitting the metal with her fingers.
"Damn it Hell! Is this some kind of sick punishment you came up with? Argh!" she yelled loudly. But stopped. She thought she heard something. She stilled looking around the darkness for what exactly she had heard. She heard again. It was from directly below her. A bang.
Hell had told her to stay down here no matter what. He had told her to stay quiet, well oops on that. She just screamed her lungs out and it was obvious someone heard her due to the thumping coming from below her. He also said Gemma will come find her.
Could that be Gemma then?
"Gemma," she asked knowing it wasn't a smart move. If it was a killer, that's how they would be able to get her. She wasn't even supposed to say anything.
"Rowan? Is that you." the loud voice of Gemma filtered through. She didn't properly here the words that followed after but she heard a 'I'll come get you.' 'Stay back.'
Stay back.
Acting in reflex, she moved backwards and heard a loud bang and dust read with a loud clang like a metal door being tossed aside. The dust had gotten into her eyes and caused her to cough and sneeze repeatedly.
As the dust settled, Rowan saw that it was an opening. The metal door she had hit her head on was somewhat a trap door leading down to what looked like an underground basement filled with—people. A lot of them. Most of them stood by the side watching her as she watched them, surprised.
What is this? What is happening? Who are they? Where did they all come from?
Was this some sort of trap she was falling into?
She began to shield herself from their searching gaze until she heard Gemma push through the crowd.
"Thank God you're alive. He'll would have killed me if not." she saw the pure relief on Gemma's face.
For someone with a lot of people, Gemma looked calm about it. There was a sense of familiarity with the way she went through the crowd to get directly under the opening, looking up at Rowan a kind smile on her face.
"Hi," was all Rowan could manage.
"Are you okay?" Gemma asked but didn't give her a chance to respond. "Why don't you come down. You must be tired. It's a far walk from the passage door here."
Rowan watched as some built men walked to Gemma carrying a ladder as they attached it to the opening of the trap door as they did, they bowed?—and went to stand beside Gemma.
"Come on now. I'll hold it steady as you come down." true to her words, Gemma walked to the ladder and supported it with her weight so there wouldn't be any accidents. No matter how she behaved, Gemma didn't like getting on the bad side of her brother. It was the worst ever.
Rowan hesitated looking at the steady ladder to her arm, her leg. She couldn't make it.
She sighed, "I'm sorry but I can't." she was still even lying on the floor, too weak to stand up.
Gemma was confused. Was she scared?
"Why?" Gemma asked her. "No one will harm you here, I promise." /they are too scared of your Mate to try anything.
"It's not that, I trust you." Rowan quickly dispelled that thought. "It's just that, I'm injured. I don't think you know. I was out in the woods earlier today and—" the incident with Hell had happened. When she saw him as a wolf, something she had never ever experienced in all of her life. Something she didn't think she could. "I had a bad fall. Which resulted in me having my right hand and login a cast. I've exhausted it today and now, it looks pretty hard to even get down."
"Oh," Gemma muttered nodding her head as realization dawned, "It's no problem then. Daniel here will just help you. He's strong. He'll climb up and carry you, right?" Gemma asked the taller of the two men who had carried over the ladder—who nodded in reply.
He was good looking and built which Rowan had started to discover was her type of man—like Hell. But Hell was a hundred time hotter than this Daniel and he had far more rippled muscles but not to the extent that it was too much. It was just perfect. And Hell was toned—Daniel here was pale. He'll she knew had gotten his olive skin from his Italian descent which she even forgets he comes from. He never acted like it. Spoke perfect English, no trace of the accent, or she didn't notice.
She paused. What was she doing? Lying here on the floor comparing a total stranger to Hell. What even brought that up? Daniel was just going to do her a favor bringing her down. That's all it is. Why was she now imagining Hell doing so instead? She really was fucked up.
She didn't miss the look of interest on Daniel's face as he approached the ladder and started to climb up. Now, she didn't want him to carry her down again. She just wanted Hell.
She even sounded needy to herself. Brushing off the thoughts. She readied herself to be carried as Daniel reached her.
"Hey there beautiful." she cringed, rolling her eyes at his blatant display of flirtation. She wasn't even interested. Was too interested why her head all of a sudden revolved around a certain person.
"Have you ever been told you have a beautiful set of eyes.
She rolled her eyes again skyward at it." It's just brown." really?! He could definitely do better at this. All looks and mush for brain.
"Exactly." was his pathetic reply flashing her a smile that could at a point in her life, weaken her but now, she was annoyed and wanted him to keep away from her.
"Can you just get me down now?"
"Feisty. I like it."
What!
Thankfully, he carried her down and she was at least glad he had the brain to do one thing right. That was hold her firmly and gently at the same time so he didn't press on her injured side. But she didn't miss how he pressed her so close to his bare, hairy chest! ew!
Who had lied to him and deceived him into thinking he was sexy? That trick wasn't working for her.
They finally got down but he wasn't dropping her and her patience was running thin.
"Drop me." she said as politely as she could manage. Which wasn't anywhere close to nice as her teeth was gritted as she uttered those words.
"Hey, why don't you enjoy this?" then he added in a conspiratorial wink. "There are a lot of girls dying in your stead to be held like this."
I'm not a lot of girls. She wanted to scream back but was cut off by a very angry voice.
"Get your hands off her!"
Author's Note:
Me and my cliff hangers._. Thank you for reading! Please vote and comment. I'll really like that♡ ♡ ♡
unedited