Page 49 of Awakened and Betrayed
“Bas, don’t hate that I have access to these delicious lips and you don’t.”
“If I move my hand down six inches, I’ve got access to a whole other set of lips that I’m sure are just as delicious,” Bastien challenges.
Valen coughs out a laugh, and the sounds drown out the small moan I’m pretty sure just escaped me. I’m still achy, but I’d have to be dead not to get wet at Bastien’s words. It’s no surprise that my awareness of the close proximity of these delectable males suddenly becomes the only thing I can focus on.
A knock on the door pulls me from my thoughts, and I feel everyone slightly freeze around me. Aydin pokes his head into the dark room. I can tell it’s him because he’s a giant and he’s currently doing this awkward duck under the doorway thing.
“I heard voices, is she awake?”
None of the guys answer, as if they’re giving me time to decide what I want to do. Sabin hands me a shirt, and I quickly pull it over my head.
“I’m up,” I announce, after I get myself resettled amongst the guys.
Aydin steps into the room, followed by Evrin. The door closes behind them as they shut themselves in with us.
“How are you feeling, Little Badass?”
His question hangs in the room for a second longer than is comfortable. I’m not sure how to interact with them after everything that’s happened.
“Is it normal for Awakenings to hurt like that? Everything I’ve read until now made it seem like a surge or a rush, and that sure as hell isn’t what happened to me.” I ask.
It’s not talked about a lot, probably because no one wants to freak young casters out about what they may or may not go through, but it happens. The more magic that awakens in you, the more painful it can be.” Evrin scrubs the back of his heavily tattooed neck with his palm. “No one really knows why it happens to some and not to others.”
Aydin inches closerto the bed as Evrin answers my question, and I suddenly find myself wishing that things between us could go back to the way they were before. I hate that he couldn’t give me the benefit of the doubt and see me as I really am, not the fucked up threatening version that Lachlan believes. And I hate that his presence feels like an awkward intrusion now, instead of the easy friendship we had before.
We stare steadily at each other for a minute as questions I’m tired of swallowing bubble up into my throat.
“Why Aydin?” I ask softly. “You should have known me better than any of them. You asked me to trust you, but why would you ask for something that you weren’t willing to give in return?”
Aydin wears a helpless look, and his hands scrub his face before falling defeated at his side. “Little Badass, I feel like whatever I say at this point is just going to tiptoe in the land of excuses.”
“I need you to try and help me understand. Because if you never do, I will always think that how you were with me was a lie, some kind of trick. I don’t want to think that way about you. But I can’t crawl out of the pit of hurt and mistrust on my own.”
Aydin’s eyes are still on mine, but I can feel a sudden disconnect. Like even though he’s here in front of me, his thoughts are somewhere else entirely. He drops down to the edge of the bed as if whatever he’s carrying has suddenly grown too heavy to continue to bear. The guys all tighten their hold on me almost at the same time, gearing up and literally supporting me for whatever Aydin is about to unload.
Aydin looks up at Evrin, and Evrin gives him a nod.
“A little over ten years ago, we were tracking some lamia. They had been glamoring humans out of money, and we were tasked with eliminating them. When we finally caught up to the nest, things took a weird turn. There were eight lamia, and it wasn’t much of a fight, but when Lachlan went to kill one of them, they recognized him.
The lamia kept asking how he was there. At first, it sounded like nonsense. We had looked everywhere for Vaughn and the others with nothing to show for it. I think most of us, at that point, had come to terms with the fact that they were gone, killed somehow. So when the lamia started rambling questions about how Lachlan was there, none of our thoughts went directly to Vaughn.
“It wasn’t until he said the name Adriel that it clicked. This lamia wasn’t seeing Lachlan. He was seeing Vaughn in Lachlan’s face. It was the first scrap of a lead that we had come across that might give us some clue about what happened to Vaughn, Eden, and Lance, and their bond mates.” Aydin nods towards the twins, and it registers that Eden and Lance were the names of their parents.
“We worked on that lamia for almost a month, but he was like the fucking Joker and Riddler in one. Nothing he said made any sense. He would scream on and on about how they were going to steal our magic, but we easily dismissed that as an empty threat. Toward the end though, he started going on about how ababydestroyed Vaughn. Or that thebabywas not what we thought.
“We never got anything but nonsense out of the lamia, and Silva ended him when none of us could take the nonsensical bullshit anymore. We walked away from that situation even more defeated. Lachlan wasn’t the same after Vaughn went missing, but the month we spent with that fucking crazy ass lamia seemed to break something in him.
“Years buried those memories, and then one day out of nowhere you popped up. As soon as your name spilled out into that car, it dug up the crazy ramblings of that lamia. None of us knew what to make of it, what to make of you, and it put all of us on guard.”
Aydin shakes his head, and he looks down at his big hands before looking back to me, his eyes pleading.
“You’re so powerful. You were before your Awakening, and only time will tell what you’ll be capable of now that all of your magic has opened up. Every time I tried to see you as an innocent female in all this, you would do something incredible, and I couldn’t help but wonder what that lamia meant. It was clear you were the baby he was talking about, so what did he mean when he said you weren’t what we thought?
“It felt almostimpossible not to be suspicious, and therefore, cautious around you. We were missing so many pieces of the puzzle before, then there you were, more or less dashing everything we thought we knew to the ground. What were we supposed to do, Little Badass?”
I look away from Aydin’s pleading eyes and find Bastien’s hazel orbs waiting for me. His emotions are masked, and I can’t get a read on exactly what he’s feeling right now. I suspect he doesn’t want how he feels to influence my decision about how to move forward with Aydin, or whether or not I even think that’s possible.
“I was a baby, Aydin. If somehow my existence killed Vaughn, and it probably did, what would I have known about it? How could you guys look at me, orthe baby,as the villain in that scenario?”
