Chapter 49: Chapter 49

Chapter Forty — Nine

James

“I think I found a way.” Michael announced aloud, and I knew by his twisted smile that his idea must include something sick.

Elijah looked at Michael and gave him a look that tried to call out his shit. If she did not sway from his probing, from a guy who was famous for making people spitting their secrets out, then what sort of sick plan of his could actually help?

Elijah's look was mean and one of incredulousness. Not to mention, he looked frustrated as hell. Like he would kill someone just to take his frustration out.

Everybody waited for Michael to continue and explain his so — called Way, but he did not speak again. Instead, he picked Janet's hand and scurried her, his way. For once, I felt my hand twitch to stop him. She had suffered enough for our selfish selves. However, his next words stopped me from doing anything stupid.

“Come on, James.” He instructed me. He tugged Janet but she stood her ground. Not only that, but he looked at her and sighed heavily.

“We need your help. One last time.” Michael told her. Janet just looked at Michael, not saying anything. While my mind ran at the speed of light. What could he possibly need her for? How would she help us in this situation? What does he have in mind?

“Please.” Michael pleaded. My eyebrows shot up high in the air, in shock. It would not have surprised me if they shot off my head.

'Please?' Did he really just say that?

I did not say anything out loud, but everyone knew that it was a very not — so — Michael like thing.

Maybe Janet knew how unlikely it was for Michael to plead because she agreed.

“Okay.” She told him. Michael gave her a small smile and jerked his head in my direction, telling me to follow up.

I gave Elijah one last look, who stared after Michael, like he was being stupid, before following Michael and Janet. With that we got out of there.

All of us walked back inside Tenebrous jail. The walk back to her cell felt way too long. My heart started pounding inside my chest, preparing for the worse. It was not going to be good if I was feeling like this even when I had not even seen her.

We walked and walked until we reached her cell. Opening the door we stepped inside, and my shoulders tensed knowing what I would see. Although I realized that I was actually not prepared for it. There was no way in the world I could actually be prepared for what I saw.

She was bleeding from everywhere.

There was not a place which did not seem to look beaten.

Linda's nose was swollen, and it had changed color to blue. One of her eyes was black and shut in half. A small part of her ear was gone. The corner of her lips were busted open. She had cutting knife marks all over her. The blood was oozing from those cuts.

The worst thing was that there were too many cuts to even count from. And above all, her one finger was missing.

All in all, it was all pure torture. It was such a horrendous sight to witness that the hair on my arms stood up as my skin broke up in goosebumps.

Michael let out a shaky breath, seeing the condition. His reaction was completely opposite to mine, because I sucked in air as a flood of emotions went through myself.

Pain, hurt, misery, anger, hatred and pure rage. Wanting revenge whoever put her in this condition. I knew who did this. Knew very well who was behind it. Yet, I could not go after the person who caused her this condition.

Elijah.

And for what purpose? We WERE the very people who asked him to do this. On what behalf will I be seeking revenge? Even knowing that we were the main reason for this.

Among all of us, only Janet seemed unaffected, but that thought soon disappeared when I saw her hands shake a little. It was hard to gauge why she was shaking. Because of how terrible Linda looked or because she was angry and wanted to hurt her more than she already was? And maybe she was holding herself back from doing anything stupid.

Knowing Janet, I knew that it must be the latter one. Her loved ones had died in the very war that Linda commenced. I could not blame her for her anger nor would I stop her if she cursed or hurt her. Linda brought this on herself.

That's how I convinced myself.

She brought it to herself and thus deserved the consequences as well.

Despite telling myself everything that helped me the situation as it is and her half bruised condition I could not deny the fact that the sight of her this bruised and beaten up, was actually painful to me. Deep down, I felt like a shard of glass was poking me inside my head.

I was pretty sure Michael was feeling the same.

“Came here to see the work for yourself?” Linda asked us. Though, her voice came out a little gargled, with her mouth spitting blood. My eyes darkened at her words. Elijah told her that we had asked him to tell the truth. But then I was annoyed with myself realizing that it bothered me, even though it made no difference and her knowing that we had asked Elijah to do this did not really matter. In the end, the fact was that she was a traitor and deserved as much as pain she was getting.

I had a doubt that Elijah told her on purpose, knowing that it would hurt her.

Or maybe not.

Maybe he told her on purpose. That she was betrayed by her mates like she betrayed us.

It was possible that she did not even care. After all she destroyed our world without giving a second thought about it. Maybe she never loved us or even felt the mate bond to feel pain for us.

When nobody moved or answered her, she threw her head back and laughed like a maniac. Still, her laughter came out with blood — spit.

Instead of replying to her, Michael grabbed Janet by her hips, pulled her towards him, tilted her head and kissed her savagely. All froze at once for a second, too stunned to realise what was happening.

Then the second passed and Janet returned Michael's kiss just as savagely.

And then I realised his way of dealing with this.

Jealousy.

No matter if Linda loved us or not, we had mated, which connected us more than surface level. It was deep within our skin. None of us could stand, watching our mate seeing with another person if they crossed the line.

And right now, Michael was crossing the line today. And so was I.

I jumped in and joined them.

I grabbed a hold of Janet's hips and jerked it towards me. I pushed aside Janet's hair, baring her neck to myself and started kissing it.

Not so weirdly, I wanted to stop and so did my wolf. My wolf even cringed back to the taste of some other woman that was not our mate, but I forced myself and ignored it. Michael opened the top two buttons of Janet's shirt and dipped his head into her breasts while I turned her head around and kissed her like I meant it, eating her alive. Janet reached out and grabbed a hold of my neck, deepening the kiss. My hand snaked around her waist and started to descend. We played with Janet like this.

For a long time.

However, both Michael and I did not cross the line that was meant to be kept. We played with Janet like this for a long time but still did not get any response out of Linda. It was like she was immune to this.

A growl echoes around the room and both Michael and I stopped our exploration to look at the source of the voice.

Linda's eyes shone with a hint of anger and a smirk kissed my lips, watching her reaction. Maybe Linda saw something in my eyes because her anger disappeared from her eyes and her own swollen lip curled into a smirk.

Mirroring mine.

“It's weird that you are still ready for this, even though they rejected you over and over and over again.” She told Janet. Janet tensed on Linda's words and even before I knew what was happening and what was going on, Janet pulled herself out of Michael's and my hold and strode towards her and before any of us could move, she raised her hand and slapped Linda hard, across the face.

The impact of the slap and the slapping sound was so hard that even I felt the vibration in me. Linda's head moved to her side, but she did not let out a sound.

Eventually the moment passed and Michael jumped into action. He walked towards Janet, grabbed her by her arm and dragged her out of the cell. I also followed them.

Michael led us out of the Tenebrous jail and back into Elijah's room. This time none of the guards stopped us. Right after we entered, we were met with a very self-satisfied Elijah. Like he knew that we would return like this. That the outcome would be the same.

“Your plan did not work, did it?” Elijah asked. Janet twisted her arm out of Michael's hold and snarled.

All of a sudden, the door busted open. In came, one of the bodyguards from outside.

He was panting and looked like he had seen a ghost.

“Adan is here.” He said and swallowed hard.

“With the rest of the people.” He announced and everything quieted down.