SWNOVELS Chapter 105- New Plan
In the light of this room they could see the bulk of her injuries. Muscles would twitch, flex, or tremble just forcing herself to stand so still.
“Take that collar off,” Ezekiel muttered, gritting his teeth as Quoba fought to take over and run wild through the halls.
Jessamine had thought he was talking to her, and slowly her arms shook there way up and her hands gripped the band. At once, as warned, she completed the circuit and a shock of pain coursed through her body. Her legs gave out and dropped her to the floor like all of the bones had left her body at once.
“Jessa!” They both called, dropping after her to their knees.
Bronx pulled her into his lap and brushed the hair from her face. She was alive, eyes closed and chest heaving up and down quickly. He eased her to a sitting position and her hand clasped his shirt as her eyes reopened.
“Where is he?” Bronx demanded. “Take me to him.”
She stood as quickly as she could, taking their hands in her’s, sparks shooting through their palms at the sudden touch. The door opened and as if on a mission she led them down hallways leading away from the way they’d come. At a door near the beginning of a hallway she finally stopped towing them along and, again, waited for them to enter first.
“What’s this? There’s no way he’s in a cell?” Bronx looked at the door skeptically. They had seen the Martin on the stage, so clearly there hadn’t been a coo to overthrow him. Maybe the door led to another hallway or office.
Ezekiel was less patient for an answer and slid the bolt away just as someone inside rasped, “Alpha?!”
The door swung open further and he saw who he thought he had heard. “Kai!”
“The Luna, she’s down the hall at the….” As Kai began to blurt out his concerns Bronx followed into the room guiding Jessamine along and he sighed in relief. “Take the collar off, they rigged to give her a low dose of the drugs continuously all day.”
“When she tried it nearly stopped her heart!” Bronx argued.
“Because she touched it.” Came another voice from the corner that they hadn’t even noticed contained another person. “Kay, nice to meet you, heard lovely things. Take it off! Her pain is immeasurable.”
Ezekiel hastily moved to her and clasped either side, pinching the buttons with his thumb and forefinger. As he did the pins poking into her skin retracted and her body slumped again, this time Bronx caught her and she leant against him, a ring of pin pricks and needle marks around her throat.
“Jessa,” he breathed, her heart racing again as her body tried to comprehend the absence of the constant pain.
“Give her time, it’s been a long 24 hours,” Kay explained, using the pick to remove her cuff before moving to Kai, to allow her mates this time.
“What happened to her?” Ezekiel asked Kai.
He shook his head as he rubbed his bruised wrists from the shackles. “I swore to her I would not tell you. She begged me, as my Luna, to never share the details. Please Alpha, don’t make me break that promise.”
Ezekiel growled at him, more from frustration then anger and turned back to her. Her breathing slowed and she blinked without looking at either of them.
In the background Kay was breaking the chord to the camera in the room and checking the hall for anyone coming. “Kai this is you, put that hearing to use and listen for anyone coming while they sort out things with Jess.”
“Sure Kay.”
Bronx looked at her suddenly. “Kay? You treated her wounds, and trained with her. You filled her flashlight with that gel?”
When she nodded both him and Ezekiel presented their hands. “Thank you. You’re the reason she’s alive and that we’re together. If you take over for your people, we will work with you to eradicate the problem.” Ezekiel replied both grandly and cautiously.
“Hey the first one to my grandfather can have his head and it’ll be a race for the privilege of ending that prick, but I’ve got a few others on my list I also wouldn’t mind burying tomorrow before I think about rebuilding my people.” Kay assured, taking stock of Jessamine’s injuries.
Bronx was gently stroking her arm when Kay grazed a thumb over her upper thigh and he growled at her. Jessamine moved into the sound, gripping his shirt as she broke the disconnect between her will and her movements but the pain that prevented her from connecting words to speech still lingered.
“Enough,” Kay hissed , shoving his hand off her stomach as she checked over a bruise she knew to be there for growth or signs of internal bleeding. “I guarantee I know more about first aid than you, and we don’t have a lot of time for your wolven formalities. They’re likely focusing their attention on the cameras that show the rooms with buyers and their purchases. If we’re lucky they’ll assume you chose one of the ones not monitored.”
Jessamine couldn’t do it, she couldn’t get passed that feeling of pins stabbing into her neck every time she tried to speak. That day had been the longest, trapped inside her own mind and paraded around the house to her old classmates and rivals. Anytime she had moved without permission pain had invaded every cell in her body. With the freshness of the wounds, it felt like the collar was still there and she wasn’t sure she could take another.
As they felt her emotions they could feel her fear and pain. As Kay worked her way over her injuries she finally reached her neck and they felt the pain spike. Leaning down they left gentle open mouthed kisses over the puncture wounds, helping them to heal quicker.
The pain faded and was replace with small flames that warmed her face. Jessamine’s other hand moved to grab Ezekiel’s shirt as they calmed her panic with the gentle touch.
Pulling them in close she smelt their hair, the one part of them that still smelt like them. “I missed you, my loves,” she whispered.
“We missed you,” they said at the same time.
Everything ached, not that she wasn’t aware what was happening to her, but the drugs kept her from feeling it fully. She tensed in their arms, feeling it all at once and hissed a breath in through her teeth.
With her eyes closed she admitted, “everything hurts but I’ll live.” She knew they felt the sadness those words gave her and continued before they could ask. “I may not be able to have pups. I don’t know if he was lying,” she blurted quickly.
Ezekiel brushed her cheek with his finger and kissed her temple. “We can find out for sure when you’re ready and, no matter what we find out, I love you.”
Bronx nodded in agreement and kissed her crown. “That wasn’t a factor in how I feel for you.”
“Yes, yes, adorable, time to go.” Kay interrupted. “Jess get up, I need you on point.”
“She is in pain, I’ll take point and Bronx will carry her.” Ezekiel countered.
“We planned this,” Jessamine muttered, moving to her feet.
“Last night she came back wrecked and we agreed to make a move. When she came back tonight I would have me and Kai unlocked to jam the door from locking and sneak out after the bidders left. There’s usually a party upstairs with the influx of money.” Kay informed. “She had managed to map out which needles struck when and we stuck her hair pin between her skin and the needle before a few doses so she could burn it off.”
“They caught Kay doing it on the cameras and that’s when it changed to more frequent injections and deeper pins to eliminate the gap around her neck.” Kai added. “But in that gap she took stock of her injuries.”
“So as long as you haven’t done anything further, she’s already told me what she’s capable of in her condition.” Kay eyed them both carefully, as if challenging them to admit they had done something with her.
“Of course not!” They gaped.
“I love you for coming, our success rate wasn’t high,” Jessamine admitted, “but what was your plan?”q
Bronx turned to his watch. “In eleven minutes, Azural will be upstairs causing a problem. You told him he’d need scuba suits to get passed the plants, so that’s what we gave him. Full facial oxygen masks.”
“But Jessa, we could get you out now. We have a car at the entrance of the tunnel, and we can leave the rest to them,” Ezekiel offered, still looking at her with so many injuries.
She shook her head and pointed to the corner she had been in with her words written in blood and her tallies. “This ends tonight.”
She felt the anger rising in them and prayed they could harness it for her now. “Are those marks how many days you were down here?” Bronx asked in dismay.
“No,” Kay and Kai answered for her at the same time.
Jessamine made a joke about them speaking at the same time and then launched into the hall. Ezekiel and Bronx bounded after her in complete panic, as she landed a right hook against a small weaselly looking boy.
“Want to dare touch my fucking tits now, Finch?” She landed two more hits to his face before aiming to break his nose.
He pathetically reached for his pocket and a communication device and Kay yelled at her, “Jess! Stop playing with him!”
Jessamine grabbed his head with both hands and snapped his neck before dragging him back into their cell. She handed the device to Kay and pilfered his pockets of anything else useful, also handing her a knife.
“He deserved a little pain before he died. Disgusting pervert,” Jessamine spat on him as she moved back to the door, ignoring the heat in her chest that her mates felt in seeing her fight and stand up for herself.
“I would have liked to do worse,” Kai muttered, envisioning him strung up on the wall with that knife just sticking out of him somewhere.
“When you seek revenge you are distracted from the goal,” Jessamine muttered. “Quick deaths for all but him. We’re not out of the woods yet, that collar was new. Who knows what else they’ve got up their sleeve.” She shook her head. “My ears are still ringing, Kai can you hear any footsteps?”
He traded places with her at the door and she turned to her mates, pressing a quick kiss to both their lips. “I missed you, I really did, more than anything, but we don’t have time to say and do everything I want to. Let’s consider it motivation, yea? Get this through as fast as possible so I can show you what I missed at hom… is there even a home? The fires..? No Jessamine, you’re literally still in a cell, there are too many things to talk about to pick and choose one.. Ugh, just one, did you get my letter?”
She looked desperately at them but their returning smiles didn’t match her worry. They were too busy revelling in the fact that she was alive and acting like herself.
“Yes love, I got the letter, Azural relocated his pack within our wall the day after. They’ve been camping in the banquet hall while we still do repairs.” Ezekiel assured and a small, five year old rock was lifted off her chest.
Feet clambered passed their door and Bronx tapped his watch to confirm.”Come on, we gotta get that gate open for those on the ground level.”
“You guys go ahead,” Kai grinned. “Me and Kay are going to end tonight’s events down here first.”
Jessamine clasped both their hands individually and gave them a hug. “All buyers are bastards, kill indiscriminately and without mercy,” she spoke into their embrace and she opened the door.
Those behind her were left with silly smiles on their faces. “She’s really a different breed,” Kay gleamed, following behind her and giving her another hug. “Be safe,” she begged and moved to the next door, unlocking every door down the hall to check for people with Kai doing the same.
Jessamine gestured with her thumb the other way. “I wont be caught at a disadvantage again. First thing we’re going to do is turn the water off and manually override the sprinkler system.”
They followed dutifully as she led them down a corridor and into a passage that ran between the walls. The twists and turns went on until she found the room she was looking for. She turned the water off and set the sprinkler into maintenance mode so they couldn’t be tripped by anything outside of that room and directed the men to break the equipment for her. This would not be fixed with anything they had one site.