Chapter 21

I could hear the door of my villa open. “Get off of her!” Maggie shouted.

“Or what? What you going to do?” Cherry said, loosening her grip.

Past her, I can see the figures of Maggie and the doctor. Standing side by side, their eyes turned yellow, and they growled at her and her gammas. They’re going to attack with no regard for their own safety.

Ada paced inside me, and the longer I watched them prepare to put themselves in danger, the angrier she grew towards Cherry and her gammas.

“Not our friends,” she raged inside of me as she took over.

From my mouth came a voice that didn’t sound like my own. “Stand down,” I strain out through the clutch of Cherry’s hand around my neck. “I will not let you be harm.” They stop as if almost in a trance-like state. They lower their heads slightly, though their bodies remain hunched as if waiting for my command. Fear flashes across Cherry’s face and she releases me. My eyes tinge in color at her, and I can feel the twist of my bones.

“No, Ada!” I beg, hoping to stop the transformation.

“Protect ourselves…and our friends.”

My control over Ada pales compared to her anger. I know it she emerges Cherry will be dead before her gammas can rescue her.

“We can’t kill Ansel’s fiancée. He will never forgive us, and she is the princess of Moon Shadow. There will be war, and it would be all our fault. We can’t do that to the people here. Please let me do this.”

Ada’s growls grow louder as I continue to try to reason with her, but everything I say seems to only make her angrier, and we struggle for control.

“Let me out!”

“No Ada! You have to stop! Please!”

In the mists of our struggle, the doctor yells out to me, “Lady Karin, look out!” but it’s too late to stop Cherry from grabbing my hand. She bends my fingers backward, and I wail out in pain. The fold of my hand tells me what I already knew; it’s broken.

“Now you’ll have no choice but to keep your filthy hands off what’s mine,” Cherry says. She stands and backs away. “Finish her off.” It doesn’t take long until multiple fists connect with my body. I ball my body, but it doesn’t stop the pain from Cherry and her gamma’s punches. There is a hollowness in my heart.

“Ada?” I whisper, but she doesn’t respond. “Please don’t leave me. I need you.” There is a small whimper from my core that is soon silent again. She cannot reach me, not with both of us growing weaker as the beating continues.

“Stop! You’re going to kill her!” Maggie cries out for the corner, but it’s in vain. The gammas won’t stop, and at times Cherry joins in again. Ada syncs with me and endures the brunt of the beating. The sound of the room muffles out, and the world seems to cease.

“You found me, mommy!” a little girl with beautiful blue eyes says as she looks up at me. The beam on her little face reminds me of every smile I’ve ever seen come from Ansel. She grabs my hand. “You have to find daddy now. Those are the rules.”

“W-who?”

She releases a fit of giggles. “Mommy, you’re silly. Daddy. You found me, and now you have to find him.” She tugs my hand, encouraging me to follow her. “I know where he’s hiding. Come on!” The gravitational pull I feel towards her leaves my stomach in knots. Without knowing her name, I love her. She may have Ansel’s eyes and smile, but she looks so much like me, it leaves me stunned. Following her, I realize we are in Ansel’s manor. Pictures of the three of us line the walls. We’re smiling, but it’s the large diamond ring on my finger in each one that catches my eye. Looking down, my hand shakes at the sight of it and a wedding band.

“Shh...he’s in there,” she points when we stop at the oak door of a closet. “He always hides in there.”

Hesitantly, I open the door and scream bubbles in my throat when Ansel jumps out. “Darn it. I should have known I couldn’t scare you two. I think I’m going to ban horror movies from the manor. You have become completely desensitized.”

“What is the matter with you?!” I shout, holding my chest. “You almost gave me a heart attack!”

He grins. “Well good thing I didn’t, or I would be stuck with this little bugger all by myself.” He picked our daughter up, and she wrapped her arms around his neck. “Jemma, you wouldn’t happen to know how mommy knew where I was, would you?” he says, playfully scowling at her.

She gives a toothy grin that melts my heart. “No way. She found you all on her own.”

“Hmm. I don’t believe you. I know you and your mother formed a union against me.” She laughs, and Ansel snuggles her, then puts her down. “Next time you better be on my side or no more piggyback rides.”

She looks and me and pouts. “Sorry mommy.”

“It’s alright, I understand. Piggybacks are a necessity in anyone’s life.”

Happily, she hugs my legs. “Now everything will be okay,” she said, then skips away.

“You were supposed to find me first,” Ansel said, pulling me in his arms. He kissed my neck. “We had a plan. Closet make-out session, then find Jemma, remember?”

“S-sorry,” I stutter out. “I guess I forgot.”

“Hmm. Well then, I guess you’ll have to make it up to me.”

“How?”

He clasps my face and brings his lips inches from mine. “I love you even when you’re toying with me. Now, are you going to continue to give me a hard time or are you going to concede and kiss your husband?”

The title alone is enough to make me smile, and I pull him close. “I concede,” I say, and kiss him.

The chaos of the world around me rings in my ears. Agony shoots through me, and through my swollen eyes, I can see Cherry glare. “What the hell are you smiling at?” she rages and strikes me again.

As quickly as it comes, the dream is gone, and I’m back in my torture. Gammas restrain the doctor and Maggie to keep them from helping me. Numbness takes over, and I soon no longer feel anything. The dream, so lifelike, leaves me feeling warm on the inside, and I almost want to beg for death to return to something I know will never happen in real life.

A piercing roar sounds through the villa, stopping the attack. Foreign blood mixes with my own on the floor and I feel the wood vibrate under me from a thud inches away. The crowd splits, and a massive golden wolf stands over a dead gamma with flesh still trapped in its paws. It shifts, and covered in blood, Ansel’s anger suffocates the room. He looks at me, then faces Cherry and the lines of his face harden into stone. “I highly suggest you all think about your next move,” he said.