She just snorted and got up. “You know nothing. I don’t care where you want me to go, Cal. It doesn’t matter. As soon as the baby is born, you’ll take it, and then you’ll let me go free, right?”
Cal hadn’t thought about much of what the future held. He didn’t want her in the cell to begin with, and the idea of it going back to normal wasn’t something that he could imagine, so he didn’t want to imagine anything at all.
“You’re that eager to leave? You already have plans?”
She sighed loudly and then Ali went and sat on the edge of her bed. Her heart was racing a little faster, and she wasn’t feeling all that well. At first, Ali had been happy to see him, but now she wasn’t as enthused. He was being a jerk, and as long as she’d been in the cell, she was done playing games. He didn’t want her, that was clear. He wanted his baby. She’d pieced together how important the firstborn to a line was from Michael. She wasn’t going to pretend that he loved her anymore. It was hard to in the jail cell that he’d put her in.
“Like I said. You really don’t know anything, Cal; that’s why I can’t talk to you. You’re going to think what you’re going to think, and no one is going to be able to change your mind. I give up. Well, I gave up a couple of days after you left me in this cell. Yes, I want to get out of here, and if you can’t understand that, then you’re the delusional one.”
“I’m just keeping you safe.”
“From what?”
He didn’t have an answer immediately. He was happy to see her, and his gaze was taking her in like she was the last sunset for a nightwalker. Calum had to get his fill but knew that it wasn’t going to ever be the same agan. He wasn’t even thinking about the next five minutes, let alone what was going to happen after the baby was born.
“Let’s get you out of here and into your new room.”
“By room, you mean cell?”
He did, but he wasn’t going to come out with it, not now. She was in the mood to argue, and he wasn’t. While she said she didn’t want to say a word, her mind was screaming at him, and it was impossible for him to silence the sounds. She was very angry, and part of him didn’t blame her. He’d done it rashly, but now it had been so long, he didn’t know where to go from here. She was just going to try and escape like she had done in the past. Maybe her scenario was the way that it was going to have to be because now he couldn’t see it ending any differently.
Calum had painted himself into a corner and desperately wanted a way out of it. He’d never known that love would be this complicated. He also never thought that he would fall for one of the enemies either though. None of it made sense, and his head hurt from thinking about it.
“Let’s just go, Ali. You can see for yourself.”
She wasn’t too excited about it. It was going to be more of the same. It didn’t matter how many pretty things he’d brought to her, or rather, sent to her while she was in the cell; it was still a cell. She had no privacy, and she had no freedom. None of it was what she wanted, and Ali just wanted to be free again.
Ali didn’t argue or put up a fight when he opened the door and she was able to walk out of the cell. It was hard for her to see what was going on, but Ali just knew that she was going to have to withstand a little while longer. Michael came to see her almost every day and he’d filled her in on what was going to be different with the pregnancy. It wasn’t going to be completely foreign, but there were some major differences.
Time was the biggest difference, and instead of being pregnant for nine months, she would only be pregnant for three. She was almost there, and Ali hoped that once the baby was born that something was going to change. She didn’t know what, but she was done with the way things were. Anything had to be better than it was at the moment.
The village didn’t look much different to her after all the time she’d been locked up. She tried to remember what it was like before and the differences and the biggest one was Cal’s house. It was something that she’d learned about from Michael, the nature of how he got rid of Trenton and his coven. Ali hadn’t felt anything about it at the time, besides a spot of sadness because she really did like his house. It was beautiful, and it was a shame.
There was another house in its place, but it was nothing like the old one. It was hard for her to imagine the smaller place as Cal’s, but she was soon to learn that it wasn’t as different as it appeared. They may have burned down the house, but that didn’t mean that the parts that were underground were messed up. The tunnels were still intact, and he stopped in front of the room where they had mated for the first time. The ritual leaped into her mind, and she tried to shut out the images, knowing that it wasn’t going to do her any good to think about it.
“What are we doing here? You don’t think that I’m going to have sex with you, do you?”
She asked in such an incredulous fashion that even if Cal did, he didn’t now.
“No, look. Everything you need is here, and you’ll be safer from the sun. You can move around without having to worry about being burnt. I thought you’d be happy.”
It was thoughtful, but she was far from being happy. Ali didn’t want to see that as a good thing. She wanted out of these little prisons he was putting her in.
“So, after the baby is born, I can leave, right?”
Cal’s jaw tensed, and he looked back at her. “Is it really so bad here?”
She waved her arms around another cell and made a sound of aggravation. It was quite clear that she did think it was that bad.
“You don’t trust me, and you haven’t come to see me in a month. I’m carrying your child and what happens when he’s out of me? What then?”
He didn’t have an answer, and Cal wanted to tell her how he really felt. He loved her and wanted to be with her, but he didn’t know if they could ever go back. There was too much in between them now, wasn’t there?
“I don’t know, Ali, but I still won’t let any harm come to you.”
“Will you let me go?”
Cal didn’t want to agree to that because he knew that at the moment it was the only reason that she was there with him. Ali would be gone if she were allowed to leave. It wasn’t even about the baby, the one that everything was supposed to come down to, no, Cal was thinking about losing his mate. He’d lost her once before, lived for weeks that felt like months without her by his side, and he didn’t want to do it again.
“I don’t want to let you go, Ali.”
