The Awakening: Liam (Entangled Covet) (2 page)

Violent tremors started to quake his body. Unable not to, he gathered her against his chest and rocked.

Anguish ripped past his throat and into the air as his soul shattered.

Burying his head in her neck, he hugged her tighter, aware that her arms hung limply, never to hold him

again. Her eyes stared past him, never to focus on him again. Her parted lips did not move, never to speak

his name again.

“Ava!”

He sensed the movement behind him later than he usually would. As he turned his head, a sharp prick

pierced his neck.

The last thing he heard was a dark, menacing laugh, and a low whisper. “I knew you’d come.”

Then everything went black.

Chapter 2

Liam groaned as he rolled onto his back. Cracking open his eyes, he flinched away from the bright

florescent lights high overhead. Nausea churned his stomach and he inhaled, then exhaled slowly to calm

the storm brewing in his gut.

Though his stomach settled, the careful breathing didn’t help ease the suffocating compression on his

chest. Where was he? What’d happened?

He massaged above his heart.

Dark. Heavy. Deathly silent.

Memories of Ava’s lifeless body, the blood, so much blood, bombarded him. His therapists had warned

him that he didn’t know true torment yet. This vast darkness, the emptiness inside him, was the true

suffering—a constant reminder of the worst moment of his life—his mate’s death.

She’d been so terrified. Had she pleaded for her life? Or worse, pleaded for death?

A low rumble vibrated his chest as rage boiled deep inside him. The fury simmered, begging to be

unleashed, and he wished to set it free, wished that he and his beast were reconnected, so he could allow

the animal control of his feelings. Though they may be disconnected because of the
Dsershon
, his beast’s

rage gave him something else to focus on: avenging Ava’s death. The motherfucker who’d killed her would

pay. He forced himself to sit up and survey the room

The strange chamber was maybe twenty-by-twenty feet with no windows, except for an observation

glass close to the high twenty-foot ceiling. Bright-white, padded walls surrounded him. The starkness of the

color was only broken by a light gray door and a crimson curtain that spanned the entire width of one of

the walls.

Where the fuck was he?

He remembered the sharp prick in his neck, the blackness that overcame him immediately after the

menacing,
I knew you’d come.
Could he really have been waiting there for Liam? That whisper—if he’d

really heard it—implied as much, made his kidnapping sound deliberate. Which made no sense to him. He

could see no motive.

Did it really matter? The worst thing that could’ve happened to him had already happened. His mate was

dead. Nothing this fucker could dish out would ever compare to that torment.

If anything, it would be
Liam
who tormented the
killer
. All he had to do was come up with a plan to get

his hands on the bastard, then he could start.

Standing, he scanned the room, . Off to the left was a long, medium-sized cage a little taller than his six

feet two inches. He tested the bars.

Reinforced Steel. Thick. Unbreakable. Even for him. In the far right-hand corner, a portion of the room

had been sectioned off by a half-wall. As he rounded the corner, a tiny bathroom came into view. Enough

room for a toilet, sink, and shower. Lying on top of the sink was a pair of gray jogging pants and a T-shirt.

He blinked in disbelief. The killer had known he was going to bring someone here. He lifted the

garments, checked the sizes—a perfect fit.

What the hell?

I knew you’d come
.

Had some sicko targeted Ava to get to him?

Holding his arms out in front of him, he stared at the blood that caked his flesh from fingertips to bicep.

The dark red stains also saturated his clothes and stuck the fabric to his skin. Ava’s blood.

Had she
died
because of him?

The question knotted his gut and he was perilously close to losing the contents of his stomach again.

And he wanted to scrub his mind and body clean of that possible motive. Had that been the point?

Had his captor wanted to watch his victim, watch Liam, scrub himself clean and dress in clothes he’d

provided? Did it make him feel powerful? The numbness bubbled with rage, not from his beast but from

himself, and he relished the feeling—embraced it.

Turning his back on the bathroom, he stalked into his enclosure. He looked up toward the top of the

twenty foot high wall, to the observation glass. Just in case he was being watched, he stepped back, making

sure he was in view.

“
Fuck
you,” he said with lethal calm.

Using his sensitive sense of smell, he sniffed the air, searching for the woodsy scent all shifters carried,

but detected nothing except the staleness of the room. Not even the musky scent of a human.

The absence of smell, the inability to decipher if it was a human or shifter who had him, bothered him.

Who the hell could it be?

He stepped over to the door, touched it. Steel again. Solid. Nonetheless, he shoved against it. The door

didn’t even creak against the pressure.

No space between the edges for his fingers to pry it open either. He pushed at the small opening in the

middle of the door he assumed had been used to pass a food tray through. Again, nothing, not even a give.

No latch from his side. No windows. Not a goddamn thing to use for escape.

Except…

What was behind the curtains? He started toward them, making sure to keep his stride calm and

purposeful. If whoever had him was watching him, he wouldn’t see any panic coming from Liam. He

refused to show any fear. Wouldn’t give the man the satisfaction.

He’d taken no more than a few steps when the room went dark and the curtains slowly parted in the

middle, drawing back. Another room identical to his appeared. Squinting, he stepped closer to the glass.

There was something in the middle of the room.

It was flat and large, maybe six feet high and four feet wide, definitely made of wood. The board was

attached to a rusted metal axis that connected to the floor and kept it standing upright.

Why was it in the middle of the room like that?

A person dressed in black from the neck down and wearing a werewolf mask stepped through a door

on the other side of the glass.

His captor.

From his height and stature, Liam assumed it was a man. Leather gloves encased his hands. Other than

noting the man had a large weight-lifter build, he could discern nothing else. Not the color of the man’s

skin, his hair, age, nor species.

The man stopped beside the contraption and faced him. The feeling that he was being watched was

unnerving, and he swallowed.

I knew you’d come
.

The board slowly turned around the axis to reveal its other side.

He gave a wounded cry, and staggered forward. “No!”

Dea
, he’d been so wrong. This man
could
torture him.

Ava’s lifeless body was strapped to the board with leather bands that ran across her forehead,

shoulders, wrists, stomach, thighs, and ankles. Bellowing in rage, he charged the glass, prepared to shatter it

and kill this asshole. He rammed his body into the partition—and bounced off.

Stunned, all he could do was stare at the barrier between him and Ava. A fresh wave of rage washed

over him and he threw himself against the glass again, shooting pain through his shoulder.

The man withdrew a syringe from his pocket. What the hell was he doing? Liam pounded on the glass.

“Goddammit, leave her in peace!”

With relentless punches, he continued to beat his fist against the surface.
Thump, thump, thump

ricocheted around the room.

The man inserted the needle in the bend of her elbow. Immediately Liam’s blood heated in his veins,

causing him to freeze mid-hit. Gasping, he backed away, patting his chest in disbelief. Glorious warmth

spread to his extremities, burning away the darkness, until the lightness that was Ava reclaimed every recess

of his body and soul. His beast lifted its head, ears tilted forward, then stood on its four legs, giving a

mighty roar. A sputtered laugh burst past Liam’s lips.

How could this be possible?

She was dead.

He’d seen it, felt it. Held her lifeless body in his arms, but her life force now sang in his veins, stronger

than ever.

He snapped his head up, and his gaze clashed with familiar amber eyes.

Dea.
Ava was alive!

…

Ava Michaels blinked against the fuzzy, bright lights with a low moan. Pain sliced through her temples

and she squeezed her eyes closed. She tried to raise her hand to her forehead, but her arm refused to budge.

Forcing her eyes back open, she attempted to lift her head. Again she was refused the movement.

As her vision focused, panic replaced the pain in her head. The reflection of herself staring back at her

in all its horrific glory held her transfixed.

Her breathing escalated, coming in short, choppy spurts as terror squeezed her throat.

Blood coated every inch of her skin and she was strapped to large plank of wood.

She yanked against the leather. Nothing moved. No arm. No leg. Not even her head. The panic became

consuming, she felt wild, caged, terrified, and she screamed.

“Would you shut up,” an unfamiliar, irritated voice demanded.

Snapping her mouth closed, she strained her eyes to the side, registering for the first time the other

person in the room. Her gaze flew to the large window-like wall, seeing the masked man who held two

syringes in his hand. One empty. One full.

Fresh fear pumped through her veins. He’d surprised her, in her room, grabbed her, choked her. As she

fought the hold he’d had on her throat, she believed she was dying. She’d been wrong. A quick death

hadn’t been what he’d been after. Clearly, he had more in mind.

Thank God Emma had been at a friend’s house.

A muted
thump
came from behind the mirror. Her reflection shimmied then stilled. What kind of evil

was behind that glass, wanting to get out?

Whistling the tune to Andy Griffin, he pressed a needle into her skin.

“D—” she licked her parched lips “—Don’t.”

Warmth traveled up her arm then settled in her chest. The tension fled from her muscles and she

slumped back to the hard surface behind her. Her eyelids grew heavy and she blinked. When the man held

a glass of water to her lips, she opened her mouth and drank greedily, the tepid liquid running down her

chin and throat.

“I’m so glad you could join me.” There was an excited vibration to the man’s hand that made the cup

wobble against her lips. “We’re going to have so much fun together.”

The liquid lodged in her throat and she choked, spitting some of it out of her mouth. “What kind of

fun?” she asked between coughs.

“Never you mind that, but I promise, you won’t get bored.”

After he set the cup down, he came around to face her. The eyes that looked back at her were an

unnatural neon green iris rimmed by a thick black circle. Contacts. Had to be. No one had eyes like that.

No one human.

“W-who are you?”

He tsked. “Would I’ve dressed like this if I wanted you to know that?” He leaned close to her ear. “Fear

of the unknown is part of the fun. Isn’t it exciting? The wondering? The questioning?”

A slight accent underlined his words. Cajun maybe, but the deep raspy voice was completely foreign to

her.

“Why?”

The question came out slurred. Not surprising since his movement seemed sluggish, a trail of colorful

lights following each lift of his hand or turn of his body.

“For shits and giggles, of course.”

A roaring rushed through her ears as a wave of panic made her entire body shake. This man was flat-

out crazy. She looked back at her image in woozy despair. The amount of blood she was covered in made

her vision tunnel. Where had it all come from? Except a dull ache behind her eyes, and her throat was sore,

she didn’t have any pain. “The blood?”

“Ah.” Placing his hands on his hips, he stayed silence a moment before he shrugged his shoulders.

“What the fuck? Letting you in on that won’t hurt anything. Blood’s not yours. I wasn’t ready to actually

hurt you, so I had to get creative. I stole some pints of blood from the hospital to make it look real. Wasn’t

that genius?”

Everything was said in a pleasant, conversational manner, like grabbing a woman and pouring blood on

her was an everyday occurrence. Maybe for him it was and that terrified her even more.

“What did you have to make look real?”

Those eerie eyes blinked at her as if he couldn’t comprehend how she wasn’t following along with his

plan. “The crime scene. Jesus. How hard is it to understand that? If you’d simply vanished, everyone might

think you just took off or something.
Blood
,” he shook his hands at her, “lets everyone know you are