Wolves of Haven: Lone (15 page)

He tried calling Akia to give
her the heads up, but it went straight to voicemail, so he simply
said
call in
and
left it at that. Once he was done organizing the piles of clothing
on the bed, enough for both of them for the next month—not that he
expected them to be there that long—he arranged his suits in a
garment bag then zipped it up. The other clothing wouldn’t fit in
his Louis Vuitton bag, so he headed towards the storage room in the
basement of the building to find one that would.

Damian never used the basement. He
hated the smell, dampness, and the dungeon feel of it, so he made
it a habit to never venture to the belly of the building, as Akia
called it. She flipped him much grief about it, but promised she’d
kill any spiders that ever crossed his path for him since he was a
sissy boy. Akia used the basement as storage; bikes, camping gear
that he had never seen her actually use, and the old boiler that
was replaced by a new main floor boiler that fit in the closet
instead of requiring a large portion of the basement.

Once down the narrow staircase
leading into the darkened bowels of the building, Damian rolled the
large, steel door open then gagged when the stale, musky scent
slammed into him. He covered his nose with a handkerchief then hit
the light switch on the wall. Slowly, one by one, hanging workshop
lights flickered on, illuminating the hallway leading under the
building. Each wood-lined bay was labeled and housed various items
that were neatly organized. He hated to admit it, but Akia had
apparently started to renovate the basement without him knowing it.
The last bay had a few oversized bags that would fit their clothing
for his trip to Haven, and he started to reach for one when the
sound of dripping water pulled his attention to the back, stone
wall at the end of the hallway.

“I don’t remember this being here,”
Damian mumbled under his breath. He touched the wall, but it felt
different and warm, so he pushed against it slightly, and it moved.
“What in the…” his words trailed off as he pushed the wall
completely inward, and it rolled away with a groan of protest. His
hand searched the inside wall, trying to locate a switch, and when
he did, the room illuminated by a single overhead light, and his
eyes widened.

Along three of the four walls were
large, iron cells that bolted into the stone beams running the
length and width of the room overhead and the rough cut granite
slab floor below. Stone lined the back wall of each cell, and the
sides were made up of bars that separated each cell from the next.
Riveted into the granite floor were industrial sized, d-ring
latches, one on each side of the cell, and threaded through each
were heavy iron chains that attached to thick leather and iron
collars that were waiting for a neck to fasten around.

With a shaking hand, Damian touched
the bars of the closest cage, pulling back fingers dusted with
dried blood. Four out of the dozen cells had barred doors barely
hanging on, their hinges had taken more abuse and strain than they
were ever intended to, and those cells’ bars were bowed and bent
from the force of a body being violently thrown into them
repeatedly, compromising their integrity, so those cells had been
abandoned. He stepped into the cell that’s door was leaning against
the bars, the hinges bent to the point of not being able to move
anymore. His fingers caressed along the deep gashes in the stone
wall; they were caked with dried blood and hair.

“Oh, Latria Mou, what have you
done?” Damian whispered as a tear rolled down his cheek.

****

Gray light filtered in through the
sheer curtains over the windows and illuminated the white washed
room in soft light. The dreary, overcast morning veiled the grounds
in a dense fog that snaked through the open window and rolled
across the floor, circling the bed. The flames of the candles on
the nightstands flickered and danced, filling the air with the soft
scents of vanilla and jasmine. The chandelier marking the center of
the room painted the bedding and walls in rainbows from the light
passing through each dangling crystal.

Softly Akia moaned as she
stretched, working the knots from her body before slumping back
down on the mound of feather pillows behind her. The high thread
count bedding felt amazing against her nearly bare skin, only the
thin, cotton camisole set hanging on her toned body guised her
femininity. A soft growl rolled from the base of her throat before
her eyes snapped to the doorway.

“Beautiful,” Varg murmured under
his breath. He stood leaning against the doorway with his thick
arms crossed over his bare chest; the thin coat of golden hair
covering the expanse of creamy flesh did very little to guise the
strength and corded muscles underneath; his broad shoulders caused
his body to form a perfect triangle of strength that pulled her
attention to the patch of curly, dark blond hair peeking out from
the waistband of his cotton pajama pants that hung dangerously low
on his hips.

Akia gathered the blankets up
around her, pulling them up under her neck. “Get out,” she
hissed.

He smirked; his wide lips pulling
up on one side before he started across the room.

“What do you think you’re doing?”
she demanded.

“I remember the last time we were
in this bed together,” he said, his voice even deeper than it
usually was, and heavily laced with desire.

She glared at him.

Varg crawled up on the bed
alongside her, his brown eyes moving over her face many times. “Do
you have any idea how difficult it was to get the taste of you from
my tongue? Your scent,” he said with a snarl before pulling his
rugged nose up the length of her neck, inhaling deeply as he went,
“haunts me like a demon in night, and yet during the day there was
no reprieve.” His large hand pulled the covers down, caressing over
one of her breasts, pulling down the delicate, thin material as he
went, then growled when the small, dark pink nipples instantly
pebbled. “No other woman has spoken to him as she did, possessed
the both of us as you had,” he huskily whispered in her ear, his
large, calloused-roughened hand sliding in the front of her shorts,
and his cock twitched when his fingers caressed down the strip of
silken curls.

Akia gasped; her eyes fluttered and
back arched into him.

His calloused-roughened fingers
teased her clit, and as it hardened under his touch, Akia’s hips
slowly started rocking to match his torturous rhythm.

“We will not allow you to run away
from us again,” Varg snarled in her ear before sliding his thick
fingers into the moistened heat of her.

Akia growled under her breath as
his fingers slid in and out of her tight depths, her hips rocking
to meet each intrusion, causing him to go deeper until she was
riding his knuckles.

“You are mine,” he hissed then
smashed his mouth into hers and aggressively kissed her. Her eyes
fluttered before they snapped open and locked on his; liquid amber
burning between gold and black.

Akia’s eyes snapped open, and she
struggled to catch her breath; she was overly hot, in a strange
room, and wasn’t alone.

A thick arm wrapped around Akia’s
waist then pulled her back into him. She inhaled deeply through the
nose then sighed and relaxed into his embrace: Faelan. Looking back
at him, she saw Rafe’s arm wrapped around his waist as he spooned
Faelan from behind. “That is a sight I could have lived without
ever seeing,” she mumbled under her breath. The blankets in front
of her moved, so she pulled them back and found the disheveled
black hair of Connell who was fast asleep. Soft whimpering pulled
her attention to the foot of the bed where a blue tinted ball of
fur slept, using Connell’s legs as a pillow, his paws treading
bedding as if he was running in his sleep.

A chuckle from the doorway pulled
Akia’s attention, and she shook her head. “Don’t ask,” she
said.

Beowulf smiled. “But I am most
certain the tale is nearly as amusing as the visual,” he
teased.

She sighed. “I suppose. How did I
get here?”

“You fell asleep on your dinner
plate, and Connie carried you to bed,” he explained. “Fae refused
to share, thus he crashed the party, so to speak. I am not entirely
sure how Rafe got involved, but when I returned from my run he was
cuddling with Fae, then Kid crawled up to join the party, feeling
left out.”

Akia pushed her hair back from her
face. “Huh, I don’t remember that. I must be more exhausted than I
thought.”

His smile fell. “Can we talk for a
moment?”

After the nightmare she just had,
she needed to talk to someone or else she was going to completely
lose it.

Carefully she crawled out of bed,
covering her brothers back up before following Beowulf from the
room and down the hall.

“What’s on your mind, Father, other
than the obvious?” she asked with a chuckle.

“Much,” Beowulf admitted. “I am
concerned about the pills you are taking,” he said, and her face
dropped. “Please tell me what is going on,” he pleaded, pulling her
to a stop when they reached the foyer.

Akia fingered the pendant
around her neck as she struggled to find the words that would
explain her actions without telling him everything, but without
lying. “Father, for years I’ve been working with Connie to come up
with a medication cocktail that will regulate my estrous cycle.
We’ve got it pushed to every thirty weeks, which is a god sent. We
also started working on something that would, hopefully, keep Eve
restrained beyond the restriction of lunar phase. Due to
h
yperthyroidism, a standard pill a day
wouldn’t work, and it wasn’t until trial and error for nearly six
years that we found a combination that apparently worked: high
dosage
estrogen plus progestin twice a day
at scheduled times. And for Eve, a high dosage of
Risperdal twice a day…it’s an antipsychotic that’s
used to treat people with
Schizophrenia and
Bipolar disorder. With the help of Connie and…an outlet that shall
not be named, I wouldn’t be here. I honestly wouldn’t be. If it
wasn’t for them I would be a big hot mess, as Fae would
say.”

Beowulf’s eyes were wide and
complexion extremely pale.

“I have to…subdue myself
monthly to coincide with the calendar,” she continued in an ashamed
whisper. “The risk is too great, so I medicate with
flunitrazepam…Rohypnol in order to attempt to
subdue her, and if she gets out, it’s a means to retain no memory
of it.”

Beowulf pulled her into him and
hugged her tight. “I had no idea,” he whispered. “I’m so
sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Akia said. “I finally
have control. It took a while, but I have it now, and that’s all
that matters. I’ll need the cellar for the black moon. It’s already
calling out to her, and I’m not strong enough right now to do this
without help, and Connie will have to medically intervene since I
ran out of the house without my anti-Eve kit.” She swiped her hand
across her eyes to wipe away the tears that she very rarely shed
then stepped back from him. “Father, I need to ask you to do
something for me without asking why. Can you do that?”

Beowulf nodded. “Always, you know
that.”

She struggled to swallow the lump
in her throat before speaking. “I need you to send Varg away, far,
far away…only for a little bit. I cannot be around him with my
approaching cycle. It is far too dangerous for me since I don’t
have my outlet available. Eve is already rearing her head in my
subconscious, and we don’t see eye to eye when it comes to what we
need and want.”

Tenderly he patted her cheek. “If
what I’m sensing is true, that will not be necessary,” he said then
headed towards the dining room for breakfast.

Akia watched his retreating form;
that was not the response she expected from him. She was ashamed by
the means in which she goes through to fight what anyone else would
embrace, but she was different than the others thus they wouldn’t
understand. As much as her family was ridiculously open about
everything, regardless of one or two members not saying much most
of the time, and when they did you wished they hadn’t, Akia was
extremely private. It took over a year before she started opening
up to Damian, and even that was simply the present and not talk of
the past. Strangely enough, Damian was the same way when it came to
his family and past, and that level of commonality was refreshing
to her.

When she left Haven, it was
to get away from the past, from mistakes, and from him. Finding
Damian was unexpected, but he was exactly what she needed. Now that
she didn’t have him, with Eve flooding her unconscious mind with
what
she
wants,
and with her object of release being under the same roof regardless
of Akia being able to stay out of the same room as him over the
past week, only iterated how much she needed
Damian…

But she needed him for more than
simply a release.

“Damn it,” Akia grumbled and
hurried after Beowulf. “Father, please don’t think badly of me,”
she pleaded, entering the dining room then stumbled to a
stop.

“Good morning.”