Chapter 181
Carol’s POV
It’s been a few hours since Allen showed me that photo of Aiden with Katrina. I couldn’t believe it when I saw them together and wondered if the photo was manipulated. My eyes burned with unshed tears; whether they were manipulated or not, I didn’t like to see him with her. I knew Aiden and he would never betray my trust, but there was still a nagging feeling in my stomach that something was seriously wrong.
The way she was holding him as if her entire life depended on, it made me feel sick to my stomach. It almost seemed as if she was orchestrating that very picture. I wished I could speak to Aiden or hear from him more than anything. I needed to make sure that he was okay, but most importantly I wanted to get out of there, not just for me, but for our unborn baby as well. I stared down at my flat stomach, the urge to cry heavy in my chest, but I swallowed it down into the pit of my stomach, refusing to give in to these emotions.
My fingers splayed out on my belly, and I bit onto my bottom lip.
I needed to find a way to get us out of here.
“You should be eating,” a voice sounded in the darkness, making me jump in fright. I looked up to see Allen walking towards me with a tray of food and a bottle of water.
My brows furrowed at him and my frown deepened.
“I’m not going to eat anything you give me,” I tell him, my voice raspy from lack of water. “I don’t trust you.”
“Do you really think I would poison you?” He asked, raising his brows in curiosity and shock.
“You already did,” I nearly hissed. “You did something so I can’t use my powers.”
“It wasn’t harmful to you or the baby,” he told me, unlatching the small doorway so he could slide the tray into the cell.
It was a sandwich, a bag of chips, and an apple. It was a typical school lunch, and my stomach twisted at the sight of it. I wasn’t going to eat a thing he provided me. I didn’t trust him whatsoever.
“It’s a turkey sandwich,” he told me, eyeing me carefully.
When I didn’t say anything in response, or make a move to touch the food, he sighed and leaned against the cold metal bars.
“Carol, I would never hurt you or our child…”
Our child??
Was he out of his mind?!
“This is not your baby,” I said through my teeth, my anger rising to the surface.
His eyes darkened and a slow smile spread across his lips.
“Maybe not yet. But I’ll adopt him or her and we can be a real family. No one must know the difference. It’ll be legally mine,” he said casually.
He was truly a sick and frightening man.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked him, my eyes narrowed in his direction.
“I’m not doing anything,” he told me, grabbing onto the metal bars with his hands, his knuckles going white as he squeezed. “I’m not the one denying what’s between us, Carol. If only you could see that I’m the right one for you.”
I shook my head.
“You are not my mate, Allen,” I told him. “Aiden is my mate and he’s the one I love. He’s my husband; the father of me—”
“That’s enough!” He shouted, making me flinch from the force of his words. “You liked it when I kissed you and you can’t deny it.”
“I pushed you away,” I reminded him.
“Not at first.”
“I was in shock,” I growled.
He let out a laugh but there was no humor in it; it made me grimace.
“And what about the way you look at me? Huh?” He asked. “I can see the love and want in your eyes. All you must do is take it, Carol. Take what you want…”
He was delusional and it was showing in his crazed eyes.
“I don’t want you,” I whispered, feeling the fight drain out of me. “It’s never been you and it’ll never be you. Please, don’t keep me here anymore. You can let me go and we can pretend you never had anything to do with this.”
“I can’t do that, Carol,” he told me, shaking his head. “I was paid money to kill you. I promised someone that I would get rid of you and make it so you can never return. Right now, they think you’re dead or almost dead. It would look really bad if you just showed up. They would try to kill you themselves and I can’t let that happen because I love you.”
“Stop saying that,” I hissed. “You don’t love me. You barely know me.”
“That’s where you are wrong,” he said, shaking his head, a hint of a smile on his lips. “I know everything I need to know about you. Are you forgetting that we were once friends? Now it’s time we became more than that. We can become a family.”
“Please, stop,” I whispered, my lip quivering. I was losing control of my emotions, and I knew at any moment tears would spill out of my eyes and I would start blubbering like a baby. “I just want to go home…”
“I’m afraid you’ll never go back to that home again. The full moon is fast approaching; once it arrives, I’ll be able to get rid of the mate mark on your neck. That should sever the bond between Aiden and you slightly. Not entirely, but it’ll be enough so that I can mark you and create a bond between us. Then, your bond with Adien will break completely. You won’t have to feel this loss for long, my love. I promise.”
“You’re a crazy man,” I said; moisture hit my cheeks as tears left my eyes.
He shrugged as he backed away from the cell.
“Maybe I am,” he said, turning away from me. “But sometimes love makes you do crazy things.”
…..
Aiden’s POV
“What do you mean is record is empty?” I growled as I glared at Coach Sanchez. He was staring at his computer blankly, looking at Aiden’s records to find his address. Or at least he was trying to find the address.
“There’s nothing in his records besides his name and phone number,” Coach murmured, shaking his head as confusion cast its ugly shadows across his face. “I’m not sure how that’s possible. We are usually careful about stuff like that.”
“Then there has to be some kind of mistake. There can’t just be no record of somebody on the team. Where did he even transfer from?”
“There’s no record of that either,” he said, shaking his head.
“Didn’t you interview him?”
He shook his head.
“He was transferred from the Wisconsin team; his former coach sent me the information and I must have just put it on the back burner, not thinking to look into him. According to the coach, he’s not exactly sure where he came from before he made it to the Wisconsin team, but he wasn’t originally from there either.”
“Are you telling me a guy that none of know might have possession of my wife?” I asked, my voice rising.
“Has anyone ever been to his house?” Luca asked, folding his arms across his chest.
“Not that I know of,” the coach said, shaking his head.
“Aiden, there might be a problem back at your penthouse,” Oliver said through a mindlink. “Fiona is about ready to kick some ass if you don’t get down here right away.”
I cursed under my breath.
“I need to leave. Please, continue to look into Allen and let me know whatever you can find,” I ordered both Luca and the coach.
“I’ll have the stadium IT guys do some digging,” Coach told me.
I nodded and quickly left to return to my penthouse. The second I reached the door; I could already hear Fiona’s furious growl as she spoke to someone inside.
“How dare you get rid of her stuff?! What the hell is wrong with you??”
I burst through the door and saw that Fiona had Katrina in a headlock and she was about seconds away from ripping her head right off her shoulders. She was furious and it was showing all over her face.
“Thank God you’re here,” Oliver said, stepping beside me. “I tried to stop her, but she was too angry.”
“What the fuck happened, Oliver?” I asked, looking around the room questionably.
Something looked different and my stomach weighed heavily in my body like lead.
“Apparently Carol took it upon herself to get rid of all of Carol’s stuff and start moving her own things into the penthouse,” Oliver explained, folding his arms across his chest. “It seems your girlfriend is out of control.”
My eyes immediately snapped to Katrina who was struggling to keep away from Fiona who kept throwing cheap shots at her. My fury rose to the top.
“Katrina!” I barked, the entire penthouse shaking from the force of my voice, making them both stop in the middle of the fight. She turned her gaze to me and bit her lip, showing the face of someone who had just been caught. “What the hell have you done??”
