The Alpha's Gamble - Chapter 66: Chapter 66
You are reading The Alpha's Gamble, Chapter 66: Chapter 66. Read more chapters of The Alpha's Gamble.
MADELINE
A reeking stench of dried meat and soil was clouding around me and causing a clog in my nose and nausea to stir. I patted around me, it was dark, near black, and I dug my fingers into the dirt as I tried to push myself up.
Where the fuck was I? When I looked around to see where I’d ended up, I couldn’t make out much, but as soon as I sat on my ass, I grabbed my head and gasped. Shit, the pain was pulsating, stabbing, and putting immense pressure on my temple all at once. I felt it in my eye and dragged my fingers through something sticky. I dragged my fingers through my hair and brought them in front of my eyes, rubbing my tips together, and saw the faint crimson color of the blood.
“What the hell?”
Okay, Maddie, trace back your steps. Where was I headed again? I had breakfast with Noah, yes, and then I walked… I walked into town to get a coffee, and I bought flowers.
Where were my flowers? My midnight lilies were gone, and I couldn’t smell them over the nauseating scent of meat, a smell that normally made my stomach growl.
After the flowers I went… where the fuck did I go?
Oh, right, I got the message from Tilly.
Dread filled me when I remembered the text, she’d seen the tape, she knew about it, and I was heading to the food cellar to talk to her.
Once there, I remember her sitting at the table, and then what happened?
Come on, remember!
I turned around to leave. Shit, that’s when someone slammed me with something. Son of a bitch. But I couldn’t remember who it was, I don’t even know if I saw their face. A piece of my skin hung on my temple, and I touched the burning flesh. Dried blood rasped under my fingers when I dragged them down my face, and my bones were stiff and aching. With a shaky hand, I tried to trace the wounds, to feel how deep they were and if blood was still coming out, but all I felt were three round holes, all of them equally big and equally far apart. 'Shit...
The meat, the soil, that’s where I was. I was in the food cellar… and the food cellar only locks from the outside.
“No,” I breathed and fumbled up on my feet and ran to the door.
I pulled at the wooden planks and slammed my fist against the lock, but they didn’t budge. They were made to sustain immense damage in case any rogues ever tried to break in and steal the supplies.
“Hello?”
“Hello! Can anyone hear me?” My voice came out in cries, and my chest contracted like someone was using my ribs as an accordion.
“Hello?!”
Oh my god. I looked around and tried to get a clearer vision, but there was no light entering from outside, and my vision was blurry from the pain that spread across my face.
The darkness was getting impossibly darker, it made no sense, but it was, I swear it.
The air was being sucked from my lungs and the walls in this choking cave were closing in, about to crush me alive and then my bones would be found when there was an emergency and they needed the meat.
That could take decades or even centuries.
“Hello,” my voice fell to a whisper when the strength slowly withered from my core, and I felt the hollow pit of defeat and loneliness grow bigger.
Come on, Maddie, get up! Fight!
I banged on the door, but it didn’t even budge.
Hit after hit left my knuckles bleeding, and the skin got cut on the bristles of the wood.
“Let me out!”
The palms of my hands dragged down the wood and left behind a bloodied print showing exactly where my fall came. I pushed my back against it and curled my legs up to my chest, hugging them tightly while I swayed back and forth and felt myself shrinking into a five-year-old little girl again, scared and alone.
“No, no, no…” Please let me out. Please let me out. I’ll be good. Please let me out.
Someone was draining this place of air, they had to be. It was the only logical reason for my shallow breaths.
It got harder to breathe, it felt like I was sucking through a straw, desperate for whatever I could get, but I was getting less and less.
Shit, shit, shit. I never should’ve come here. I never should’ve let my emotions take over.
My father had burned those words into my head from the second I could walk, and I started shadow boxing the demons in my room.
They weren’t demons, though, now I realized that it was my mom who haunted me, nothing imaginary. Everything is very much real.
I should’ve stayed put, I should’ve waited for Noah and gone for a run.
A run. With what wolf?
“Hello?” I tried to connect with her. She should’ve woken up by now.
“Is anybody there?” No response.
Laughter and screeching, the same company I’d had for as long as I could remember.
But no wolf.
‘Noah, can you hear me?’ I waited for his answer, begged for it. Come on, out of all the times that I’ve never wanted to hear his voice, now was not one of them.
What was the point of me drinking his blood if I couldn’t talk to him when I needed him?
‘Noah?’
Where was my phone? Maybe I could call him.
It wasn’t in my pockets, and when I scrambled around on the ground, I couldn’t find it anywhere.
The little fuckers took it.
My breathing picked up, shallow and fast breaths, and my vision was blurring instead of improving. I should be healing.
Where was my wolf?
Where was Noah?
A reeking stench of dried meat and soil was clouding around me and causing a clog in my nose and nausea to stir. I patted around me, it was dark, near black, and I dug my fingers into the dirt as I tried to push myself up.
Where the fuck was I? When I looked around to see where I’d ended up, I couldn’t make out much, but as soon as I sat on my ass, I grabbed my head and gasped. Shit, the pain was pulsating, stabbing, and putting immense pressure on my temple all at once. I felt it in my eye and dragged my fingers through something sticky. I dragged my fingers through my hair and brought them in front of my eyes, rubbing my tips together, and saw the faint crimson color of the blood.
“What the hell?”
Okay, Maddie, trace back your steps. Where was I headed again? I had breakfast with Noah, yes, and then I walked… I walked into town to get a coffee, and I bought flowers.
Where were my flowers? My midnight lilies were gone, and I couldn’t smell them over the nauseating scent of meat, a smell that normally made my stomach growl.
After the flowers I went… where the fuck did I go?
Oh, right, I got the message from Tilly.
Dread filled me when I remembered the text, she’d seen the tape, she knew about it, and I was heading to the food cellar to talk to her.
Once there, I remember her sitting at the table, and then what happened?
Come on, remember!
I turned around to leave. Shit, that’s when someone slammed me with something. Son of a bitch. But I couldn’t remember who it was, I don’t even know if I saw their face. A piece of my skin hung on my temple, and I touched the burning flesh. Dried blood rasped under my fingers when I dragged them down my face, and my bones were stiff and aching. With a shaky hand, I tried to trace the wounds, to feel how deep they were and if blood was still coming out, but all I felt were three round holes, all of them equally big and equally far apart. 'Shit...
The meat, the soil, that’s where I was. I was in the food cellar… and the food cellar only locks from the outside.
“No,” I breathed and fumbled up on my feet and ran to the door.
I pulled at the wooden planks and slammed my fist against the lock, but they didn’t budge. They were made to sustain immense damage in case any rogues ever tried to break in and steal the supplies.
“Hello?”
“Hello! Can anyone hear me?” My voice came out in cries, and my chest contracted like someone was using my ribs as an accordion.
“Hello?!”
Oh my god. I looked around and tried to get a clearer vision, but there was no light entering from outside, and my vision was blurry from the pain that spread across my face.
The darkness was getting impossibly darker, it made no sense, but it was, I swear it.
The air was being sucked from my lungs and the walls in this choking cave were closing in, about to crush me alive and then my bones would be found when there was an emergency and they needed the meat.
That could take decades or even centuries.
“Hello,” my voice fell to a whisper when the strength slowly withered from my core, and I felt the hollow pit of defeat and loneliness grow bigger.
Come on, Maddie, get up! Fight!
I banged on the door, but it didn’t even budge.
Hit after hit left my knuckles bleeding, and the skin got cut on the bristles of the wood.
“Let me out!”
The palms of my hands dragged down the wood and left behind a bloodied print showing exactly where my fall came. I pushed my back against it and curled my legs up to my chest, hugging them tightly while I swayed back and forth and felt myself shrinking into a five-year-old little girl again, scared and alone.
“No, no, no…” Please let me out. Please let me out. I’ll be good. Please let me out.
Someone was draining this place of air, they had to be. It was the only logical reason for my shallow breaths.
It got harder to breathe, it felt like I was sucking through a straw, desperate for whatever I could get, but I was getting less and less.
Shit, shit, shit. I never should’ve come here. I never should’ve let my emotions take over.
My father had burned those words into my head from the second I could walk, and I started shadow boxing the demons in my room.
They weren’t demons, though, now I realized that it was my mom who haunted me, nothing imaginary. Everything is very much real.
I should’ve stayed put, I should’ve waited for Noah and gone for a run.
A run. With what wolf?
“Hello?” I tried to connect with her. She should’ve woken up by now.
“Is anybody there?” No response.
Laughter and screeching, the same company I’d had for as long as I could remember.
But no wolf.
‘Noah, can you hear me?’ I waited for his answer, begged for it. Come on, out of all the times that I’ve never wanted to hear his voice, now was not one of them.
What was the point of me drinking his blood if I couldn’t talk to him when I needed him?
‘Noah?’
Where was my phone? Maybe I could call him.
It wasn’t in my pockets, and when I scrambled around on the ground, I couldn’t find it anywhere.
The little fuckers took it.
My breathing picked up, shallow and fast breaths, and my vision was blurring instead of improving. I should be healing.
Where was my wolf?
Where was Noah?
End of The Alpha's Gamble Chapter 66. Continue reading Chapter 67 or return to The Alpha's Gamble book page.