PREDATOR OR PREY?pisode
1196 Words
Sienna's POV
"Who attacked you?"
His voice is flat. Cold. He doesn’t even try to sound like that. He has just transformed back to his human form and all his bones are snapped back as he moves. This one is hot… I feel like I am going to drool already
“f*****g snap out of it, dummy!” I murmur internally
I press my hand harder against my side and let my whole body shake. "I don't know….” I do that trick up my sleeve, that one where I make my lips quaver so much that they can fall off. “A wolf. Big. Vicious. Bad Wolf" My voice draws on the last two words
But I get my voice back. I make it rough and real because I haven't slept in two days and the cuts I made on my own side this morning are still stinging. "Please. I'm hurt. I need help."
He takes one step forward. Just one. Cautious.
Want to know what a truly messed up life looks like? Try being the girl bleeding on a warehouse floor while the man she was sent to kill stands over her deciding whether she's worth saving.
That's me. Sienna Vaughn. Former Alpha princess. Current nobody. And every single thing about this moment is exactly where I planned it to be.
"What is your name?"
"Sienna," I breathe. "Sienna Vaughn."
Another step. He's still watching me with those eyes that feel like it can kill be… or f**k me till I drop dead. f**k Sienna focus!
I feel exposed in a way I didn't expect. Like he can see through the performance. Focus! Focus! Focus! I can’t flop this. Reaver will kill me if I do not bring him Kade’s head
He's smarter than I planned for. I knew he would be good but this is different. This is someone who has been lied to enough times that he reads the air before he reads the words.
Keep going. Think of Lily. I need to save Lily
My sister, Lily is dying. Silver poisoning, the modified kind. She is not responding to basic treatment. Mother Zuri exact words were three months. I have been hearing those two words every single day since. Three months. Three months. Three months.
Fifty thousand gold bars would save her. Fifty thousand gold bars would get her the real treatment, pull her out of Reaver's hold, and give us both a chance to run somewhere nobody ever finds us.
Kade Archer has a bounty on his head for exactly that amount.
I had six days to set this up. The dead wolves scattered across neutral territory? That was me. Found three rogues killing humans two nights ago and gutted them. Left the bodies after. Then I drew the trail here, to this abandoned warehouse where the light is bad and a man can walk into a trap without ever seeing it coming.
I amuse myself sometimes. My ability to plan. I really do think I am beginning to enjoy this too much and I shouldn't.
"Where did he go?" Kade says.
"I don't know. He just left." I reach out with a shaking hand toward him. "Please take me with you. I don't want to die. I have a pup, please."
That one always works.
He crouches. Puts one hand under my legs, one at my back.
And then he looks at me.
He actually looks at me the way someone looks when they give a damn whether you're okay. Like my pain is a real thing to him and not just an inconvenience to manage.
Moon goddess.
I cannot remember the last time someone looked at me like that.
My hand slows on the blade.
Half a second. One single stupid half second where Lily's face flashes in my mind and his face is right there and the two things crash into each other and I lose my timing completely.
It is enough.
Fuck!
Fuck!
Fuck!
His hand catches my wrist. Hard. Fast. Faster than anyone I have ever gone up against in three years of doing this. I do not feel like a trained assassin right now. He is stronger. He twists. I gasp and fight but the grip is iron and we are struggling, the blade swinging between us with neither of us fully in control.
The silver edge of my blade catches his side.
Not deep. But silver is silver.
The silver will move fast. The silver will kill him. Which is exactly what I need to happen. But right now, I do not know what comes over me. Suddenly, I do not want him to die anymore
“Indecisive bastard!” I swear at myself.
I drop the blade and reach for him instead. "I can stop it, I know how to stop it, please just listen to me for one second… I can save you… please"
He drives a knife into my stomach.
The world folds.
Is that silver? Did he just stab me with silver?
My legs stop working and the floor comes up and I am pressing my hand to the wound and thinking Lily. Lily. Lily. I was supposed to come back. I told her I was coming back.
He yanks my hair and my neck snaps back
“Who sent you!?” His voice is weaker
“My Lily… my Lily…”
“Who f*****g sent you!?” His voice rises several crescendos as he yanks the blade out of my stomach and presses it to my neck
"Shadowcrest," I managed “They're planning something bigger. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
I mean it. I am so f*****g sorry
Goddess help me, I mean every word of it.
Goddess please forgive me
I don’t want him to die anymore. I can save him.
“Leave…” I gasp. “They are going to kill you… they… are coming”
“Who is coming?”
“Alpha… Reaver…”
In that half second where he looked at me like I was a person, I actually pulled back. My hand actually slowed. If he had been one second less fast, if he had been one second less precise, I would have let the blade drop and tried to help him instead.
Three years with Reaver and I finally find my one soft moment on a warehouse floor over a he-wold who is now bleeding because of me.
“Why does he….” Kade is saying
The door explodes inward. Reaver. His wolves. The sounds of fighting tear through my narrowing world and I cannot track any of it. My hand on my wound is slick and useless.
I fight as my eyes close. I fight to keep them open
Is this what death feels like?
Am I going to die?
No! No! No!
I don’t want to die!
I don’t want to leave Lily behind!
Goddess please help me!
Goddess please forgive me!
I promised her I was coming back with good news!
And Kade… I think about the look on Kade's face in the half second before ever
ything went wrong.
Goddess, please I need some more moments with Kade!
- Writer
