My Rejected Heart by Soccerluv4 * (epub e reader TXT) 📖

heavy footsteps echoed down them, as slowly feet emerged from my vantage point, then legs, then a torso, until a very familiar head surfaced in front of my eyes.

Zane walked down stiffly, crossing the few feet between the stairs and my cage and stopping just before me. He stood there, staring at the wall above me. I moved my eyes down his body, to his right hip – which I now noticed, was sporting a handgun nestled behind the waistband of his jeans.

“Zane,” I whispered, tears threatening to spill from my eyes. He only looked at me, his face blank before turning away. However, in the few seconds that he did look, I saw a familiar spark in his eyes. Something told me he wasn’t the bad guy I thought he was. Call me crazy, but I trusted my gut on this.

“Did they put you up to this?” I whispered, scared that someone might overhear me. That was probably unlikely though, seeing as the only people in here were me and Zane.

He looked at me again, his face softening for a second, before he snapped out of it and looked straight ahead.

“Zane,” I tried again, trying to sit up a bit. It was difficult, considering my hands were locked up, but I used them to my advantage, pulling my hands out a bit and grabbing the rod in between them as hard as I could to scoot myself up.

He glanced at me, timidly this time, before looking at the stairs. A glimmer of hope rose up in me. I just needed to break his resolve a bit more if I wanted a chance out of this hell.

“Zane, talk to me. Please!” I begged, a few tears spilling from my eyes.

He sighed, turning over to me and walking close to my cage cell.

“Arianna, I’m sorry. I have to do this. You don’t understand, they – they have my sister. “He hung his head down in shame.

I recoiled, shocked by the sudden news. Zane had a sister? And she was apparently here, being held against her will? My mind suddenly flashed back to what he’d said before the whole sister revelation, and my body froze.

“Do what Zane! Do what!?” I whispered harshly. The worst possible scenarios came into my head: me being shot, me being strangled, me being beaten up. Basically, my death. It chilled my bones.

“Are – are you going to kill me?” I wasted no time cutting to the chase. If I was gonna die, I sure as hell needed to know now, if I had any wish in figuring out a plan to get out, alive that is.

“I’m sorry,” he spoke softly, his head cocked to the side in pity. Dread filled me immediately. His apology was evidence enough. I was gonna die, and by his hand.

My resolve broke, as I slumped once more to the ground. This time, I let myself stay that way, watching as Zane looked over at her in morose.

A month or so ago, if I’d been in this exact situation, I would’ve accepted death gladly. My heart was just as torn as my family, and all I could see as an escape, was death. Albeit a selfish one, I just wanted to leave the world behind.

But now, as I looked at how much had changed since then, I wanted to cry out loud. It wasn’t fair. I escaped my horrible life and found hope in the form of Drew, and now I was being finished off after finding a glimmer of happiness.

My mind was reeling, as thoughts of Drew, my family, my baby brother filled it. I had so much to lose. A while back, I would’ve just seen my pain, but now, there was so much I needed to experience. There were people who needed me and I them. I couldn’t let this happen to me.

A twist of a doorknob interrupted my thoughts, as a heavy set of footsteps echoed down the stairs, followed by a pair of timid ones.

A man whom I didn’t recognize came down the stairs, with a young girl. His hand was wrapped roughly around her forearm, pulling her along with force.

Zane’s body shook so hard I could see it from inside the cell. Not that I was judging, considering I was at the same level as him on the nervous factor.

“Have you had enough time to think?” He laughed menacingly, smirking in Zane’s direction, before sliding his creepy eyes over to me.

“Or, do you need,” he continued, “some motivation?” He laughed again, a sinister one in which each chuckle reverberated in the dark dungeon.

He threw the girl down at Zane’s feet, watching humorously as they both hugged each other and cried.

“Zane, Zane please don’t let them hurt me!” The girl, who I assumed was his sister, cried out.

“I won’t, I promise!” He replied back, wiping her tears away and hugging her tightly.

I wanted to cry. There was no way Zane was willing to kill me. But if it meant his sister would be free, he’d do it in a heartbeat. I really had no hope left, as I watched the two siblings reconnect after what seemed like forever.

Zane’s sister looked to be around 14 or so, with the same brown hair as Zane, but was longer and straighter than his. Her eyes, however, were a light brown, almost translucent. She was a beautiful young girl, but had been through a traumatic hell.

My heart went out to the girl. She deserved to get out of this more than I did, considering I walked into my situation, but it was more than likely that she was kidnapped into hers.

Suddenly, the guy looked up, his eyes glazing over for a few minutes. I knew that look. He was talking to someone via mindlink.

Taking two strides with his ginormous legs, he grabbed the young girl by her arm, and started pulling her away.

Zane made a move to grab her, but he just looked at him with those fierce eyes and he backed off immediately.

The man walked a few steps, before his eyes glazed over again. When they focused again, he stood there, as the door to the place opened at the top of the steps.

Small footsteps echoed down, as what I presume was a woman, entered in. Her head was bent down, and her long dark hair blocked any view of her face.

She walked over to the man and stood in front of him.

“Look up,” he barked at the woman.

On command, she raised her head slowly, and my heart felt like it skipped a beat.

“Mom?”

My heart thudded in my chest so loud I’m sure everyone in the room heard it. The woman’s head snapped over to me, her light brown eyes looking at mine.

 She looked bone thin. The sorry excuse for a dress that covered her body looked like rags haphazardly sewn together and passed off as clothing. Her face was taut, and her cheeks were nonexistent, evidence of severe malnourishment. The hair I once envied now lay limp against her pale skin. She looked like a ghost of my mother, but I knew it was her, here in the flesh.

 Tears poured out of my eyes, as what I only hoped to be true had just become a reality. When I first heard that my mother might be alive, the optimistic side of me was hell bent on finding her. The other, more realistic side, knew it was a long shot.

To think that my optimistic side, for once , won was the greatest shock of my life.

 The man laughed, interrupting the shock my body was experiencing at the moment. Out of nowhere, he swung his arm, hitting my mom across the face so hard she fell onto the cement floor.

“NO!” I cried out, yanking the handcuffs so hard they were drawing blood on my wrists.

She fell to the floor hard, cupping her face where he’d hit her.

“That’ll teach you to defy my orders,” he bit out, kicking my mom for good measure.

Tears kept flowing out as my blood pressure rose. The son of a bitch had the nerve to hit my mom!?

I yanked so hard on the handcuffs that my wrists started bleeding even more profusely. An inhuman snarl raised to my throat, shaking the room with its power.

The man who’d hit my mom even seemed a bit surprised, but recovered quickly. He yanked her off the ground and stood her up. Releasing Zane’s sister, he put her in my mother’s hands and gave her a push towards the stairs.

With one smirk, the man looked back over at me and spit in my direction. The spit didn’t even land close to my cage, but I was still seeing red. My body emitted another growl, so guttural that it literally shook the place.

The man’s smirk disappeared as he gave me one last snarl before running up the stairs.

My thoughts flashed back to my mom, and how scared she must’ve felt when he hit her. The blood in my body began to boil again as I thought of the bad man’s grimy hands hurting my mother.

But despite what that horrible man did, I was still in a state of shock. My mother was actually alive! My mind didn’t want to accept it, but it was there. Plain and simple. My mother was alive! How she was, I don’t know. But the fact that she was made me so incredibly happy that I almost forgot the situation I was in.

“I’m sorry to have to do this Arianna,” Zane said quietly, breaking the silence. I wanted to lash out at him for interrupting my thoughts and reminding me of my dire situation.

I didn’t even look at him. I just stared outside the cell, my jaw clenching. This was how I was gonna die: by my friend’s hands, after just seeing my mother, and my mate not knowing a thing about it.

Drew! I had completely forgotten the fact that I could communicate with him to help me!

I tried to speak through to him via mindlink, but I couldn’t reach him.

Zane saw me trying and gave me a frown.

“It’s no use Arianna. They’ve drugged you. You can’t shift, or communicate with anyone. They did the same to me.”

I wanted to scream in frustration, but instead I just looked down at the ground.

As if the situation wasn’t bad enough, Drew had no connection to me whatsoever. A part of me hoped that Drew would notice I was gone, and try to find me. He was my only hope of getting out of this alive.

‘Drew,’ I thought silently, ‘Where are you?’

Chapter 25

 

 

Exhausted. That’s what Drew felt when he cracked his knuckles, his neck, and his back before getting up from his desk.

The entire day consisted of monitoring border patrols, checking security protocol, and dealing with alphas in neighboring territories of the danger lurking around.

He didn’t even have time to see his mate. A smile appeared on Drew’s face at the thought of snuggling against Ari as he slept.

Groaning slightly, Drew walked up the stairs, grateful to hear the silence of the pack house as everyone slept. He’d done his job, and he was ready to call it a night.

Stepping through the door of his room, he was surprised when it was found empty. He looked