“All right, I’m here for the full story and I am not leaving until I get every last detail.”
Kiera had laughed and hugged her, and then, because she loved her friend and because some of it still felt too big and unreal to hold all by herself, she had started talking.
Now, though, her voice had gotten softer…because they had finally come to the worst part.
Commander Rarev and several other Monstrum warriors had gone down to Higgs’ ranch after Brux had rescued her and found his body in the warehouse. They had opened the back sections of the deep freeze and found the women there too—the missing women from nearby settlements and ranches, frozen and hidden among the slaughtered canthors like they meant nothing at all.
Kiera swallowed hard as they talked about everyone who had been found.
“They identified all of them in the end,” Iyanna said quietly, staring into the steam rising from her mug. “Some from dental records, some from family descriptions, some from DNA.” She shook her head and Kiera felt tears prick unexpectedly at her eyes.
“God, Iyanna, it was horrible seeing them hung on those hooks–just horrible. I keep thinking about them being there all that time. About how scared they must have been. About how scared I was when he came after me…”
She shook her head, unable to continue.
Iyanna’s expression softened at once. She set down her drink and put an arm around Kiera’s shoulders.
“It’s all right,” she said gently. “It’s over now.”
Kiera sniffed and nodded, though the knot in her throat was thick and aching.
“I know. I know it is. And we had a happy ending, Brux and I.” She laughed shakily and wiped at her eyes with the back of one hand. “I just hate thinking about it.”
“Of course you do.” Iyanna squeezed her shoulders. “You’re a normal person with a heart. Also, you were literally tied up in that same freezer, so I think you’re allowed to be upset.”
That drew a small, watery laugh out of Kiera.
“Yeah–you think?”
“I do. You should be giving yourself more grace,” Iyanna told her firmly. “Honestly, Kiera, what happened to you was traumatic as hell. Nobody expects you to just smile and move on like nothing happened.”
Kiera leaned her head briefly against her friend’s shoulder.
“I’m trying.”
“I know.”
For a little while they sat quietly together, the warm room wrapping around them while the chiming trees whispered outside.
Then, sudden and unmistakable, a warm masculine voice brushed the inside of Kiera’s mind.
“Sweetheart? Are you all right–I felt your sadness just now.”
Kiera’s whole body softened instantly when she heard his voice. Even now, days after the Soul—Bond had formed, the sound of his thoughts in her head still felt like a miracle. Deep and warm and rough with love and protective concern, his mental voice always wrapped itself around her in a way that made the whole world seem steadier
He was out with Dra’vik at the moment, helping reinforce the fencing around the Vorn’s enclosure. Commander Rarev had insisted on personally checking all the sanctuary systems after Higgs’ sabotage, and somehow that had turned into half the Monstrum in Kiera’s life deciding her fences needed to be stronger than a prison wall.
Not that she was complaining.
“I’m all right,” she told him at once, sending back reassurance before he could worry too much. “I was just telling Iyanna about what happened with the missing girls in Higgs’ freezer.”
A low, dark ache answered her through the Bond.
“I don’t like you thinking of that place. Don’t go there in your mind, sweetheart. Not if you can help it.”
“I’m trying not to, but sometimes it helps to talk things out with a friend.”
Brux didn’t answer with words. Instead, she felt a deep possessive tenderness that seemed to cradle her from the inside out.
