Tragic Bonds (The Bonds That Tie #5)(10)

Bonded.

North’s mother had said, What you’re doing with the boy.

She couldn’t be… to her own son.

But she did.

And I’m forced to watch it all.

Every moment, every trauma and horror and sickening second of it all, until William Draven comes to call and North Draven figures it out, his own rabid shadows tearing the rapist apart.

I watch that memory too, except I watch that part with open eyes and a vicious sort of pride in my Bonded, even while my heart bleeds out for the little boy with a halo of dark curls on his precious, broken head.





Chapter Three





Nox



I wake up in a car.

It's hard to explain exactly where in the car I am. Every seat is already occupied, and I don’t actually have a body, but I know that my consciousness exists somewhere within the confines of the vehicle. I shouldn’t be this calm. I should be concerned about how the fuck I got here and where my physical self is, but there’s no question in me that this is where I’m supposed to be.

I’m safe here.

I’ve never really felt this sort of security before, this amount of rightness and contentment.

Once I get my bearings a little more, I look around at my surroundings. I only recognize one of the people in the vehicle, and even then it is a shock to see my Bond looking so young and so… fragile. That stubborn strength that shines out of her isn’t there yet, the little girl still untried and whole, none of the cracks and splintered pieces taped back together that she wears so nonchalantly.

Her hair is also black.

It's the first thing that strikes me, the fact that the usually silvery halo around her face is the same dark color as mine. There's a sort of innocence in her eyes as well that makes it obvious that I have fallen into a memory of hers that happened long before she was taken by the Resistance.

Something important changes inside of me.

Something I will never be able to doubt again, because that safe feeling is seeping into my bones, warming me from the inside out. No matter how much my mind would like to rage against that, to question it and poke holes in it, there’s no arguing with a soul-connection.

She couldn’t hide anything from me right now, no matter how hard she tried, and all I can feel is how right she is for me. Made for me, carved from the same stone and separated to walk the earth in search of each other. All of the feelings that I’d hated my brother and best friend for having, all of them fill me at once.

I don’t know what to do about any of those feelings, so I focus on what I can learn from this memory instead.

Oleander is crying.

They're the angry sort of tears, the type where frustration bubbles up inside of you and without another outlet, the only way that she can let it out is the silent stream of tears down her cheeks. She doesn't say a word even though the woman sitting in the car next to her is trying to speak to her. She’s very obviously her mother; the gentle hand that she strokes down Oleander’s cheek is so warmly affectionate that it’s entirely foreign to me.

Oleander doesn't flinch or shy away from the affection even though I can tell that her frustration is aimed directly at her mother. Something has happened to get them all into this car that has broken my Bond’s heart.

The protective urge in my gut is foreign and deeply unsettling.

The men all sitting in the car are tense. They surround Oleander and her mother in a protective circle, each of them darting looks in their direction constantly, as though checking in on them. This is what a real Bonded Group looks like, a healthy and loving one.

Something is wrong though.

The driver keeps checking the rearview mirror constantly, as though he is looking out for someone following them, and the man in the passenger seat with a laptop on his lap is barely concentrating on the data and finances in front of him. His eyes keep drifting somewhere between the road in front of us and the side mirrors. They’re all sitting uncomfortably as though they’re preparing for an attack.

Oleander hasn't noticed the danger that they're all in. I’d never asked her when her bond had kicked in and started talking to her, and North had never mentioned it, but it's obvious that it is not here in the car with us right now.

Oleander would be prepared for the impact of the SUV into the side of the car if it was.

The sound of her scream echoes throughout my consciousness, and I no longer need my lovesick bond whispering inside of me to know that it is a gut-wrenching sound.

I already knew that her mother and fathers had died in a car accident, one that was orchestrated by the Resistance, so this isn’t something that is shocking to me.

Oleander’s bond manifesting and tearing the souls out of everyone within a ten-mile radius is.

Her entire family included.





The tent is hot.

The air is humid, sweat dripping down Oleander’s face as she stares blankly at the canvas walls around her. She’s chained to a chair with the tech handcuffs around her wrists, the type that will send volts of electricity tearing through your body if you attempt to free yourself. I’ve seen the remains of prisoners who’ve died that way before, and it’s enough to turn even the strongest stomach.

She’s a little older now than she was in the car, at least a year has passed, and the silver of her hair is more familiar to me, though it’s a little darker than it is now, more gray than the whiter shade of the girl I now know as my Bond.