Page 122 of Claim Me

She doesn’t reply. And I can’t sense her at all.

This is unacceptable. I’ve doneeverythingthese assholes demanded of me.

Except the suicide, I realize.They threatened to punish me. But… but it’s Issy who is paying for my disobedience.

Of course.

Assholes.I curl my fingers into a fist.You’re all a bunch of assholes.

And they’re stilllaughing. Enjoying my torment.

No, not justmytorment, but Issy’s as well.

My innocent sister who’s cursed with a deadly voice. Who’s lived so much of her life in a room without windows. Whose very existence has been ridiculed and hated by our coven.

Yet theymatedher to someone.

To whom?I want to demand.

Because whoever it is, I’ll incapacitate him. Maybe even kill him, since apparently Ayla knows how to break the forced-mating bonds.

That would have been useful information to know a few years ago, but something tells me she’s only recently learned how to accomplish that. Otherwise, she would have shared those details with Issy.

Did she learn it during the trials? Maybe shortly after?I’m not sure. But I’m going to find out. Then I’ll use that knowledge to free my sister.

Because these hooded assholes will not control me or my sister anymore.

I’m done.Weare done.

The death stone warms beneath me, reminding me of my last visit to this plane.My mates?I wonder, feeling their presence all around me.Are they bringing me back again?

“Fallon Doyle,” the patriarchs say in unison, their voices whipping around me and securing my focus. “You have failed us. We require recompense.”

“The recompense will be taken from Ishara Doyle,” one of the patriarchs says.

Patriarch McCarthy?I guess, only vaguely familiar with his gravelly tones.

“Yes,” the patriarchs confirm as a cluster of voices again. “Ishara Doyle will suffer for Fallon Doyle’s failures.”

“Unless you would like an alternative fate?” Patriarch O’Neely offers, that silky tone of his filled with sinister intent. “You could save your sister some pain, Fallon. But it’ll require your complete devotion to our cause.”

I narrow my eyes, this rhetoric growing tiresome.

I’ve devoted myself to their cause my entire life, and where has it gotten me?

Arrange-mated to a monster.

Grounded by an obedience spell.

Sexually assaulted.

Buried alive on countless occasions.

Used and abused.

Disassociated from my own magic.

Ripped apart from my twin, both mentally and physically.