The Soul's Mark: Broken
Read The Soul's Mark: Broken Online
Authors: Ashley Stoyanoff
Book 3 of The Soul’s Mark Series
By Ashley Stoyanoff
T
ENTS
By Ashley Stoyanoff
Published by Ashley Stoyanoff Books
Copyright 2013 Ashley Stoyanoff
This eBook is licensed for your personal
enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people.
If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an
additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not
purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it
and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the
author.
Edited by Kathryn Calvert
Cover design by
Liudmyla
Supynska
To my sister Jonel, I couldn’t have finished
this without all of your support and encouragement—thank you for keeping me
sane. A special thanks to my mother
Jo-Anne, and my good friend Angelle—your
feedback and honesty kept me going when I wanted to give up. Further thanks to
my editor Kathryn. Without your technical expertise and assistance, this book
would not have been finished. Most of all, I would like to thank my husband
Jordan, whose unwavering patience and support has made it possible for me to
finish The Soul’s Mark: BROKEN.
The Soul’s Mark Series
The Soul’s Mark: FOUND
The Soul’s Mark: HUNTED
The Soul’s Mark: BROKEN
Coming Spring/Summer 2013
Waking Dreams, A Soul’s Mark Novella
The steam curled around him, fogging the
frosted glass shower enclosure. The hot water poured over Mitchell, soothing
his taut muscles and washing away the tension and stress from earlier that
evening. He let out a deep sigh before he turned the taps again, letting the water
run even hotter. He knew Amelia liked it to be blistering, and he wanted to
make sure it was perfect. She needed perfect. Deserved it.
Amelia.
Just the sound of her name floating through his head made him smile and his
skin buzz with anticipation. He couldn’t believe how amazing she had been
tonight. How strong. The way she had fought. The way she had confronted that
skeleton freak hunter. It was a little mind-blowing. Wasn’t it just yesterday
that she had found out he was a vampire and accidently locked herself in her
bedroom?
Mitchell let his mind wander; counting the
days since she had arrived.
Eight months?
No, that couldn’t be right.
He counted again, and then again, just to be sure.
Mitchell reached for the bottle of
shampoo. He had already shampooed his hair three times while he waited for
Amelia, but he figured that if he stalled long enough, she would come in. He
lathered up, rinsed, and waited. And waited. And waited.
His stomach was in knots, his nerves shot.
And as he waited, all the
what ifs
began to eat away at him. What if
she had a change of heart? What if she didn’t find him appealing anymore? What
if she wanted to move on?
Mitchell was just about to search through
the bond when he heard the bathroom door squeak open. His heart jumped around
in his chest like a rabbit running a marathon, and he flung the glass door open
so quickly that he was close to ripping it off the hinges.
“Dude,” Eric yelled. “Cover up, would
you?” He shielded his eyes and turned his head away.
“Get out, Eric,” Mitchell said. He tried
to sound annoyed, but he failed miserably, as an awkward laugh fell out. He
flushed, and grabbed the shower stall door, pulling it closed.
Through the frosted glass, Mitchell saw
Eric’s shuffling form facing the bathroom door, his hands still shielding his
eyes. “I’m just looking for Meg,” he said, his voice squeaking over the words.
Mitchell glanced at the waterfall that
sprang from the showerhead, and sighed before turning it off. He reached for a
towel, and wrapped it snuggly around his waist. “In my bathroom?” he asked.
“Are you decent yet?” Eric asked, shuffling
back and forth uncomfortably.
Mitchell laughed, and he felt his skin
flush again, red with embarrassment. “Yeah,” he replied, his voice a little
strained.
Eric turned around slowly, his hands still
covering his eyes. He spread his fingers to peek, as if he wasn’t entirely
sure if he should look or not, and then sighed in relief when he saw the towel
and dropped his hands. “I thought maybe she was in here with Millie.”
Mitchell wanted to point out how ridiculous
that sounded, but he held back. Instead, he said, “Did you try looking for
her?”
“Isn’t that obvious?” Eric said. He waved
his arms around and rolled his eyes. He fiddled anxiously, wringing his hands
together and shifting his weight from one foot to the other.
“I meant through the bond.” Mitchell eyed
Eric, taking in his gray jogging pants and hoodie, which was on backwards, the
hood pushing against his chin. There was a pinprick of red flaring in the
center of his panicked green eyes, and his hair wasn’t in its usual perfect
mess—it was just plain messy. Mitchell’s stomach sank.
The pinprick of red grew to the size of a
darning needle. “Oh, uh, yeah,” Eric said, and scrubbed at his face. He
couldn’t seem to stand still, shifting his weight from one foot to the other,
and the dot of red in his eyes kept spreading, washing the normal vibrant green
with crimson. “It’s like she’s sleeping. I can’t pinpoint a location.” He
looked Mitchell full in the face. “Where’s Millie?”
“She’s supposed to be here,” Mitchell
replied, his voice cracking on the words. He searched the bond frantically,
and his stomach sank further. The hum of an unconscious brain was the only
trace of Amelia he could find. His chest tightened, caving in, and all the air
rushed from his lungs.
“You don’t think that they left us, do
you?” Eric asked. The panic he had been trying to cover showed itself with a
slight tremor in his voice, and he rang his hands together again.
All the
what ifs
came back with a
vengeance, and suddenly Mitchell couldn’t breathe. He felt cold; a chill
rushed over his skin, and his heart felt as if it had exploded within his
chest. “Go get Luke,” he whispered, gripping at the pain in his chest.
“Dad.” Eric took a step towards him. He
looked so lost, so scared. His blazing eyes were wide as saucers and
glistening with tears. Mitchell wanted to comfort him, tell him everything was
okay—the girls were okay—but he couldn’t. The words were there, he could taste
them in his mouth, and they tasted like dirty lies. Mitchell knew Amelia might
leave, but Megan, not a chance. He was certain of it. She was love struck,
totally smitten for Eric. And knowing that made his stomach twist into
painfully tight knots, because if Megan was gone, he was certain that it was
not by choice.
Heat rushed over his body and his muscles
tensed. “Go!” Mitchell bellowed, and just like that, Eric was gone.
Mitchell ran to the closet, and quickly
began searching for his clothes, which was no easy task.
Where did she put
my stuff?
he thought, as he spun around inside the huge walk-in closet.
With every beat of his heart, it shattered again, like shards of glass pulsing
under his skin. Tears snaked down his cheeks and burned at his eyes. He dug
through the racks upon racks of dresses, blouses, skirts, women’s jeans… before
finally stumbling upon a shelf of his clothes at the back of the closet. He
grabbed the first things that touched his fingers, shed his towel, and began
pulling on a t-shirt.
“What’s going on?” Luke asked groggily from
behind him, just as Mitchell buttoned up his jeans. He wore a pair of red and green-checkered
pajama pants and no shirt, and he looked dazed, as if Eric had woken him from a
deep sleep.
“We can’t find the girls,” Mitchell said.
He spun around and emerged from the closet.
Luke narrowed his hazel eyes, looking him
over, and the color slowly drained from his face. “Did you check the media
room?” he asked after a moment, looking towards the ceiling. “The television’s
on.”
“That was me,” Eric said. “Meg and I were
going to watch a movie. She said she needed Advil and went to the kitchen but
never came back.”
“Amelia needed Advil,” Mitchell murmured.
His chest squeezed. He tried to tell himself it was just a coincidence. The
girls probably got a few bruises during the fight. But his subconscious
wouldn’t have it.
She left,
he thought.
And somehow, she had
convinced Megan to go with her.
He knew it was only a matter of time
before she would. He had never believed for a second that she would stay with
him, but he’d be lying if he said he hadn’t hoped she would.
“They wouldn’t leave, so stop thinking it,”
Luke said firmly, but Mitchell didn’t miss the doubt in his voice. Luke had
never believed that Amelia would stick around, and he had never kept his
thoughts a secret, at least not from Mitchell.
Mitchell closed his eyes.
Amelia?
he called desperately through the bond.
Amelia, love, please talk to me.
Tell me you’re okay.
The only response was the buzz of a
sleeping brain. But that didn’t make an ounce of sense. It was in that moment
that a new, gut wrenching fear rushed through him, and for a split second, his
brain actually started to work. If Amelia had left, she wouldn’t have stopped
to sleep. Not this soon. She’d be running, putting as much distance between
them as possible.
Mitchell’s eyes snapped open, and he
stretched his senses to their outer limits, listening for anything out of the
ordinary. He took in a lungful of air and caught a scent. His fangs extended,
sharp as knives. “Do you smell that?”
Luke cleared his throat, and Mitchell cut
him a look. Luke paled under his gaze. “Um, Lola and I …” Luke said, wiping
at his mouth and looking uncomfortable, “Err …We had um … company.”
“You what?” Mitchell growled, and then
physically shook himself, trying to get rid of the disgust that was flooding
over him. He scrubbed at his burning eyes, wiped his dampened cheeks, and
focused on the scent again. Floral with an underlying sweetness. “It’s
Amelia’s.”
Mitchell and Eric took off running, taking
different routes, searching for the source of the smell, before the words
completely left Mitchell’s mouth. He couldn’t think. The only thing that ran
through his mind was the scent of blood—her blood—and if he thought about it … He
pushed the idea out of his mind as quickly as he could, but it wasn’t fast
enough. Before he could banish it away, an image of Amelia lying motionless on
the ground flooded his vision.
