Alpha's Hunt

NEW. 62. Crazy Bitch

62. Crazy Bitch

۝ Elise ۝

The witch leaves the cell with Derek and I sit up, gingerly poking my abdomen.

Its healed.

Derek’s friend, who’s name I still don’t know, told me we’d be leaving tomorrow morning to go wherever it is I have to give the testament.

He said goodnight.

It must be night right now.

I wait until I can so longer hear their footsteps. Wait until there’s nothing but my own breath that I can hear.

I don’t know if Luke knows who’s taken me, if he’s coming or if Goldstein has made some demand. But I’d rather not wait to find out.

I seize up the wall, and imagine how many times as I young idiotic teen I practiced to climb up anything. Trees, walls, kitchen counters.

I feel my lips twitch into a nervous grin, a jolt of adrenaline in my spine.

My fingers find a hold on the wall, then my feet and then I’m climbing up, each step a bit closer to escape.

I loose my footing once, and fall right back on the ground. Hissing a few choice curses under my breath, I get up and start over. Only to fall down again. And again.

Finally, after a dozen failed attempts, my fingers latch onto the gauze of the vent, holding tight.

Breathing out a shallow breath, I pull myself up enough to see it clearly.

My throat tightens at how small it is. Barely big enough for me to fit in. An old panic settles in my stomach.

You could run when they’re moving you, that fear whispers in my head, you could wait until you’re there and then escape. You could wait for Luke. You don’t have to go in there.

Taking an unsteady breath, I pull the ring out of my pocket, pressing as tightly to the rough wall as possible.

I use the thin band to unscrew the big nails at the corners.

Tossing the unscrewed nails inside the unbearably small metal pipe with unsteady fingers, I don’t know what I’m doing. Only that I didn’t climb up so difficulty and scrapped myself all over for nothing.

The lid hangs off from one screw at the top left corner.

I look inside the small metallic exit, dark enough that I cant see anything, hear my breaths echoed in it.

Don’t do this, a childish fear, ingrained so deeply it seems to hold me in place. You cant do this.

I force my lungs to work, my gaze to focus on the platinum band in my hand.

I am Elise Attwood, Daughter of Elijah and Juliette Attwood, with the blood of a beta and a rogue in my veins, made into an omega for survival. I am Elise Attwood, champion of the Alpha’s Hunt, Luna Supreme of a whole damn continent.

I am Elise Attwood, and I will not be afraid.

I scramble into the vent.