Chapter 10: The Black-eyed Man
[ Haleigh's POV ]
The intimidating, bulky man that had been disguised as a police officer,led us down a long, beige hallway. It was very bland, and somewhat of a reminder that I might just not be able to escape this place.
I glanced at Nathan, who was walked stiffly beside me, glaring at the man’s buff back. He, too, seemed to hate the man. If only he had known that I had chucked a dart at the man’s arm…
We walked for a minute or so, until the man ordered us to a harsh stop. I dug the heels of my feet into the hallway’s wooden flooring to prevent myself from smashing straight into the man’s back.
We had stopped in front of a large, dining room. It wasn’t very clean or neat, but it wasn’t covered in mess. Just like the hallway’s walls, the crumbly dining room’s walls were a light, unattractive beige.
The hard, wooden floor had transferred to a velvety, smooth carpet that at least displayed some sort of fanciness in this overall house. There was a long, oak table in the split center of the room.
A clear, white tablecloth covered the farthest half of the table, where there was also gorgeous red cushioned sitting chairs. That half of the table pretty much screamed rich and fanciness, with a small vase of light purple flowers freshly blooming.
The other half of the table, though… Oh, boy.. There was many dents and scratches in the table’s wooden surface, ruining the image of a perfect table. The chairs looked hard and uncomfortable, with not one cushion. The back of the chair was small, and I just knew that if I was sitting in one of those chairs, it would certainly dig into my back painfully.
It was quite obvious that the uglier side of the table was meant for the prisoners, and the fancier side was meant for the capturers.
I knew that because three men were already seated in the chairs, all wearing full-on black suits and dress pants. Four of the fabulous chairs were left vacant.
The buff man’s body, who I had almost forgot was there, stood right in the way of the faces of two of the men.
I could see that one of them was the second disguised police officer, the one who had taken me out with a dart. He wasn’t as quite as buff as his partner, and he was wearing a black fedora, which almost made me laugh out loud.
Then, the buff man turned around towards Nathan and me. Now, I could clearly see the other two men, as well as Nathan.
The one sitting at the head of the table was looking directly at me, catching my eyesight almost immediately. His extremely dark, almost black, eyes watched me too carefully. I felt a shiver crawl up my spine.
Nathan, too, seemed to notice the glaring man. Suddenly, his already-rigid position froze, no longer carrying any more movements, including breathing.
He had just taken in the appearance of that man, and he was suddenly unfrozen. He took in deep breaths, and then, taking me by surprise, his strong, muscular arm snatched my waist, hooking me towards him.
He pressed my back into his chest tightly, as if I was his oxygen to breathe. I struggled away from him, glaring at him in mostly shock. But, as much as I chanted in my head, I didn’t want to struggle.
So I didn’t. I wasn’t getting anywhere anyways, so I simply sunk back into his arms, relaxing my body. His touch spread a soothing, warm feeling throughout my small body, sizzling across my humming nerves.
I found myself closing my eyes, and breathing in his attractive scent. It was still as woodsy as can be for a werewolf, and very intoxicating.
Then, it was all gone.
The buff man had ripped my body away from Nathan’s, sending me tumbling into the side of the wall. He glared at Nathan with a threatening warning look.
“We don’t allow PDA in prison,” he mumbled gruffly, his devilish eyes flickering back and forth from me to Nathan.
I opened my mouth to argue, but someone beat me to it. Surprisingly, it was the man with the coal-black eyes.
“Christopher, seat the prisoners. Now!” his incredibly deep, angering voice almost shouted at the buff man, whose name was Christopher.
Christopher gave the black-eyed man a slight nod and proceeded grabbing both of our upper arms. He led us towards the messy part of the table, shoving Nathan down into one of the uncomfortable seats.
There were already a few prisoners seated at the table, and I’m sure that wasn’t it. My eyes trailed sadly amongst the poor kidnapped, innocent people, wondering how long they had been here.
After forcing Nathan into a seat, I expected Christopher to allow me to sit next to him, but instead, he dragged me to the other half of the table.
What in the world?! Was this Christopher dude seriously taking me to the rich and fancy half of the table?!
Last time I checked, I’m still wearing my utterly disgusting and filfthy Army’s uniform. I was taken aback for a moment. I hadn’t realised how much stuff had happened since that dreadful day marching in the Army.
In my memory, I could still visualize the dead chocolate-colored wolf tearing off the first head of one of the many deaths.
Christopher was about to force me into a seat directly next to the black-eyed man, to my very horror, but the black-eyed man suddenly interrupted Christopher.
“Actually, I think I’m going to have a little talk with this newbie, first,” he spoke sneakily, eyeing my direction.
I immediately stiffened, almost choking on my own saliva. My eyes suddenly found a pair of dark brown eyes.
The black-eyed man stood up in his seat, wrapping a rough hand around my arm harshly. Christopher released my other arm, taking a step back.
“Yes, sir,” he muttered towards the black-eyed man. How could he just agree so easily?
Just then, a loud banging noise erupted as the pair of dark brown eyes grew furious and Nathan’s body stood up abruptly.
“Release her!” he yelled angrily at the man who was gripping my arm.
He began to walk forward, but Christopher was already there. To my dreaded horror, he applied a pair of silver cuffs onto Nathan’s wrists.
Before I could react, I was tugged away by the black-eyed man. He dragged me across the dining room and back into the winding, beige hallways.
“Stop! Let go of me right now!” I demanded, yanking away from the black-eyed man’s harsh pulling.
He kept a tight grip on my arm, though, refusing to let go. He took me into another room, closing the door shut behind him as we entered the room.
It was an office. The walls were still a boring, beige color, and to my surprise, the office’s floor was a smooth, red patterned carpet, similar to the dining room’s carpet.
With wide eyes, I whipped towards the man. “What do you want from me?”
A slow, annoying smirk crept up onto his lips. “Hmm, there are many.. things I want from you, but what is the main thing you ask?”
I shivered violently at what he said. I could only imagine a specific thing that he wanted from me, and there was no way I was going to do that.
“I want you to stay away from Nathan,” he suddenly shot at me, startling me. His tone of voice was so different from a couple of seconds ago.
I stuttered out my answer. “W-what?”
He nodded. “You heard me,” he continued, giving me a dark glare. “Stay away from Nathan, and I will not harm you.”
“I don’t want anything to do with Nathan!” I almost shouted back at him, tossing my arms up in the air. “He kidnapped me! Just like you!”
The man took a step forward, causing me to swallow when he moved closer to me. I took a step back in fear, attempting to work up another glare.
“Here’s my deal,” he began.
“Deal?” I interrupted, as my eyes grew wide.
He gave me a short nod. “Yes, a deal… My deal is that you are going to trick Nathan into falling in love with you.”
I gasped, staring at him in horror. “First off, how would a werewolf Alpha fall in love with a vampire? Second, I couldn’t trick someone into falling in love with me! That’s just crazy!”
He shook his head at me. “It is possible, and you will do it. After he is fully in love with you, I will come and take him back to where he belongs…”
“Take him back to where he belongs?!” I repeated, terrified. My eyes were wide open as I stared at the man as if he were crazy.
“In return, you will receive a special, secret reward,” he added on as if it were an afterthought.
I didn’t like the idea of a reward. Even though I might be a vampire, I would never do something as cruel as tricking someone to fall in love with me.
“What if I don’t do it?” I questioned.
“You’re dead,” was his simple, quick response.
My hand covered my mouth as I fought an oncoming cry of surprise. Why am I even here?! Why does this man want Nathan?
“So, do you agree with my deal?” he asked, the corner of his mouth curving slightly.
I glared at him. “I have no choice! You’ll freaking kill me if I don’t agree to this stupid deal!”
The small curve on the corner of his mouth turned into a full-blown evil smile as he almost laughed at me. I felt my arms trembling slightly as I contained the powerful urge to punch that smile right off his irritating face.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” he replied. “Good. I hope you continue in this plan, darling. Wouldn’t want to end up dead, would we?”
I shook my head blankly. He was cornering me towards the office’s door now. He reached behind me to open the door, shoving me towards the wall so that he could lead the way back to the dining room.
Instead of leading me to the dining room, he took me through many different beige hallways and I found myself standing right in front of the prison-like room that Nathan and I had been trapped in earlier.
He opened the prison room’s door, and shoved me in without hesitating. He gave me a slight warning expression, before terrifyingly winking at me and slamming the door shut in my face.
I faintly heard the sound of a lock clicking, and I knew that I was now trapped inside once again.
“Did he hurt you?”
I jumped at the sound of Nathan’s voice. My eyes flashed to his figure, which was slumping down in the cot.
His dark brown questioning eyes met mine, and I couldn’t help but to notice a slight emotion of pain in them. In answer, I found that the two silver handcuffs were still chained on his wrists.
The skin underneath the silver cuffs was raw and sore, with slight burns. I winced at the sight. As a werewolf, his skin should heal quickly, but with the silver tied tightly to his wrists and making contact immediately, he didn’t have the time or energy to heal.
“No, he didn’t hurt me,” I found myself answering his question. “Just a conversation.”
He nodded towards me. “That’s good… What did he say?”
I hesitated. “Just some stuff…” I headed towards the cot across from him and suddenly a wave of electricity passed through my body when I simply walked by him.
I stopped in my tracks, and turned towards him. “Nathan?”
I think he was a bit surprised that I used his first name, but he recovered quickly and replied, “What?”
“Why do I always feel sparks and electricity when we touch?” I finally asked, watching him carefully.
Nathan’s body suddenly stiffened quite noticeably and he shook his head firmly. I sighed, feeling a tiny bit of agitation with his reluctance.
“I have a right to know what’s going on,” I tried again. I stared at him hopefully, watching his dark brown eyes extremely closely.
He sighed, covering his hand over his face in frustration. He sat there for a few moments, before uncovering his face and meeting my eyes evenly.
“Do you know what a Soul Mate is?”
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hey! So, I changed the book cover..! I probably will change it back, though, since I'm testing about different book cover ideas. I'm really struggling towards creating an awesome book cover, so if you have any suggestions or made book covers, feel free to comment below or message me! :D
Also, thanks SO SO SO much, because I officially hit 50 followers! I'm SUPER happy and I wish I could take time to message every one of you guys how thankful I am!
Originially, I was going to just dedicate this to my 50th follower, this_girl_nerrissa (THANKS SO MUCH, BY THE WAY), but I decided I want to dedicate my chapters to people I feel like have supported me a lot with this book.
So, this chapter is dedicated to Dinasour23, whose comments made me smile a lot. :)
I love all of your guys' comments and I read every single one of them, even though I may not reply to ALL of them. I would love to dedicate a chapter to any of you guys.. so yea!
IF you enjoyed (I HOPE YOU DID! :D), then don't forget to drop in a quick vote and maybe comment! ;)