Removed.
My heart is ripped out of my chest as an agonizing emptiness fills me.
The scream that tears out of my throat is nothing short of devastated.
My ears ring as I start clawing at my bullet-proof vest. She can’t be gone. She can’t. Did they kill her? Is that what broke the bond? My hands try to reach the spot above my heart where the bond used to sit. Maybe if I can rip my chest open, I can find it. Maybe it’s just hiding—
“Hayden!” Sam is shouting in my ear, shaking my shoulders. “What happened?!”
Somehow I’ve ended up on my knees.
“She’s—” I can’t get the words out. My alpha roars at the loss of our mate. My only reason for living, for putting up with this hellhole. Dead.
“He needs to shut up!” Someone—Rory, maybe—shouts, and it’s then I realize there are voices and footsteps heading our way.
“They killed her,” I say quietly.
They’re all going to burn in hell, and my lighter won’t cut it.
My eyes land on the floor next to Sam. He stupidly dropped his grenade launcher when he came to kneel next to me. He loaded three rounds, and shot off two upstairs.
There’s still one left.
Faster than I’ve ever done anything, I stand, and grab the weapon. Then, I sprint in the direction of the voices.
“Fuck—Hayden, wait!” Sam shouts behind me, and then Declan says something, and then they’re all arguing.
But I don’t care.
Because these fuckers are about to pay, and I don’t care if I take myself down with them. I round the corner, and there they are, halfway down the hall, weapons raised. Bullets fly past me as I raise the launcher and pull the trigger.
I’m yanked backwards by my vest, and I laugh deliriously as I fall on my back, looking up at Sam and West, whose expressions are a mix of fury and worry.
And then…boom.
The walls shake, and the lights flicker.
“What the hell did you just do?” Declan hisses as he and Rory pass us to assess the damage.
There’s more shouting from down the hall, and Sam angrily takes the weapon back from me. “What do you mean they killed her?”he snaps. “You can’t just say shit like that and then take off with my fucking M32 grenade launcher!”
“My bond is gone,” I spit, getting to my feet. “Not muted, not suppressed. Fuckinggone. Do you know what the hell else does that?”
“We’re in an experimental facility, dumbass.” Sam’s jaw is tight. “They could be doing any number of things—that doesn’t mean she’s dead. I refuse to believe it until I see it.”
More gunfire from the direction Rory and Declan went.
“Guess we’re not doing this stealthily anymore,” West mutters.
fifteen
Jo
Brooks watches with mildly amusing horror as Helaena moves from the guard’s collapsing body and makes a quick swipe at the leather strap over Kole’s chest. He roars, his arms flexing as he rips free of the restraints.
“You little—” Brooks makes a move for Helaena, but before he can reach her, Kole’s unbuckled the straps around his legs and has the doctor by the neck as more gunfire sounds somewhere on the floor.
“Helaena,” Kole says cordially, like he doesn’t have an evil doctor choking behind his fist right now, “would you mind removing Jo’srestraints and her IV?”
