SWNOVELS Chapter 8
Vouchers
Chapter 8:Theo
A pounding rang through my head, and I fell to the floor as my right leg gave way beneath me. My gut felt like it was in a vice, and I swear I felt a rib snap.
“Theo,” Kylee yelled as she came running to my side.
What the f*** was happening?
‘Mate!‘
Ayla!
Fear and panic shot through me. Something had happened to Ayla. I was feeling her pain. It was bad.
‘Briggs, get up here. Now.‘ I called through the mind–link.
“Baby, what’s wrong?” Kylee’s panicked voice sounded beside me. She was feeling across my b*dy, trying to find the source of my pain.
She wasn’t helping. I pulled in as deep a breath as I could to help hide my reaction.
“Kylee, I’ll be fine. But I need you to go back to your room,” I ordered.
“Are you crazy? I’m not leaving you,” she shrieked.
“Kylee, I said go,” I snapped as Briggs entered the room. “Briggs, get her out of here. Take her to her room and make sure she stays there. And don’t f***ing tell anyone.” I put a
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command behind the last part.
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Briggs looked between Kylee and me angrily but nodded and grabbed Kylee by the elbow as she covered herself with a robe. When they were gone, I tried to pull myself up. I grunted as the movement intensified the pain. I had to get up. I had to find my phone. I had to find out where she was.
I saw my phone on the floor halfway under the bed. I cried out as I bent to pick it up just as Briggs came back into the room.
“What the hell is going on, Theo?”
“It’s Ayla. Something’s happened to her. She’s injured badly.”
“How do…”
I looked at him.
“The bond still isn’t broken?” he yelled as he rushed to help me up. “You said this was done. She turned rogue. How the hell is this even possible?”
“I rejected her. She and her wolf accepted it.”
“Her wolf accepted it?”
“She rejected me today. I accepted it…”
Realization dawned on him. “Kieran refused.”
“He won’t reject her or accept her rejection,” I confirmed. I searched through my contacts to find Ayla’s number. Kylee had put it in there for emergencies a while back. As soon as I found it, I clicked the call button.
“Do you have any idea where she would go?”
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“No,” I said, huffing as the call went straight to voicemail. I hung up and dialed again.
“You have no clue which direction she would go in? When she even left? Nothing?”
Again, straight to voicemail. “No,” I yelled.
“So she could be anywhere. She’s probably hundreds of miles away,” Briggs said.
“We have to find her.”
“We don’t even know where to start looking. How would we even go about this, Theo? We can’t exactly tell anyone what is going on.”
“You don’t understand,” I yelled, grabbing his arm tightly. “We have to find her. She doesn’t have her wolf.”
Briggs‘ face paled. “How can she not have her wolf?”
I turned away, the lump forming in my throat making it harder to breathe than it already was. “Because I broke her.”
I waited for him to respond. When he didn’t, I looked back to see the horror on his face.
“She wasn’t home when I got there. I tracked her down to some guy’s house. She was staying with him. Her scent was all over him. I was pissed off…”
“You’re f***ing her sister,” he bellowed. “You just f***ed her sister!”
“I know,” I screamed back. “That’s why I was so desperate for her to break the bond. So I told her exactly why I didn’t want
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her. I told her everything Kylee told me about her.”
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Briggs‘ nostrils flared as disgust flashed over his eyes. Then an eerie calm settled over him, and he stood face–to–face with
- me.
“Kieran, I want to talk to you,” he instructed.
My wolf shot to attention, coming to the forefront to listen intently, hoping Briggs would give him information on Ayla.
“There you are, old buddy,” Briggs said, but his tone had little friendliness. “I’m going to find her. And when I do, if she’s alive, I will bring her back here so you can accept her rejection just so you can do what’s best for her and free her from this bastard.”
Kieran whimpered in agreement. f**king traitor.
Briggs moved to leave but stopped at the door. “And Theo, make sure he understands that wasn’t a suggestion.”
Once I was alone, I forced my hands through my hair, fighting the urge to pace the room. I collapsed on the bed. The pain had already dulled. The connection was meant to alert one mate that the other is in distress, so they can come and protect them. The pain would come and go until either they found each other or… the injured mate was no longer in pain. For whatever reason that may be.
I couldn’t panic. Panicking wouldn’t do anything for Ayla.
I closed my eyes and tried to focus on the injuries I was feeling. Maybe I could piece together what was happening to her. The worst damage was the leg. It was a sharp pain that radiated from the bone outward. The feeling of torn flesh
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Chapter 8: Theo
came through along with it.
Her shin was broken.
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I could tell she had a head injury. She was struck on the left side, an inch or two above her ear. But I couldn’t tell the severity. The cracked rib was also on the left. That wasn’t telling me much. There are a number of things that could cause those injuries, including an attack by another werewolf.
A new surge came through. She was still in pain.
But this time, I was reminded of the pain in my gut. It was dull but distinctive, spreading across my lower abdomen. The injury felt familiar. Not much caused anything like that. The most common thing was a seatbelt.
I shot up in the bed.
‘Briggs,’ I said through the mind–link, ‘I think she was in a car accident.’
‘You sure?‘
‘Not a hundred percent but I’m pretty sure.‘
‘Well, it’s a start. I’ll listen to the scanners and check roads leading out of the territory. But I’m heading to her house first. Text me the address she was staying at also. And a description of her vehicle.‘ Briggs said.
‘I can do that,‘ I replied.
I picked up my phone again and checked my map history, forwarding the most recent address on the list and the details on her car.
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And that was it.
That was the extent of what I could do.
–
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‘Theo, a bit of advice – if you really don’t want her to be your problem anymore, then start acting like it.‘
That was a lot easier said than done. But he was right. There was a reason I chose Kylee. She was smart and strong and kind. She got along with everyone, and everyone loved her. I loved her. If we were going to get back to how it was before, I needed to stop avoiding her. It was time I started moving on.
First thing in the morning, I would make it up to her.
But I couldn’t tonight. Tonight, I needed to work on forgetting Ayla.