Page 63 of Just One Bite

Chapter Fifty-Two

Olivia

“Parker. Parker. Parker.” My mind swims as I call out for him.

“I’m coming.” His voice is faint as I open my eyes.

My arms are tied behind my back, and there’s cloth stuffed in my mouth and covering my eyes. I manage myself to a sitting position, and my feet hit a plush carpet.

I’m so achy. My head is pounding. There’s a loud roar I don’t recognize. I almost drift out again until a train horn echoes through the room. That’s the noise coming from under me. The wheels over the tracks.

“I’m on a train.”

Parker doesn’t respond.

The ropes around my wrists are so tight it burns when I try to wiggle free.

“Ah, you’re up.” A male voice I don’t recognize is in front of me.

The light is blinding when he removes my blindfold.

Cane.

“Hello, Rabbit.” Cane’s yellow and green eyes pierce mine.

I haven’t thought much of him since that night in Noxx House. I’m next to the warm-yellow light of the bedside table. It’s some kind of luxury train car. I’m sitting on a thick ornate comforter, and Cane’s in a chair in front of me.

He removes my gag, and I unclench my aching jaw.

“Where’s Octavia? ”

He has to be blackmailing her or something. There’s no way she would do this.

“I don’t need her for this. It’s better if she doesn’t know where you’re headed. Sweet girl. Doesn’t have the stomach for unpleasant things.”

“Why did she …”

“Because I asked her to.” He leans back in his chair, the yellow light saturating his white hair.

“She wouldn’t.”

“It did take convincing with an added charm. But you know her, she’s very ambitious.

I think you underestimate how jealousy and envy can change a person.

How … watching someone getting all the things you want can put a sour taste in your mouth after a while.

Or when that someone comes in to pilfer everything you have for themselves.

For me, it took years, for her … just a couple weeks of watching you dominate.

You got into the company on the first try.

Instantly noticed for your natural talents.

Then you get the lead for the first- and second-year company.

That’s when she really started to come around.

She worked so hard for all of it, thought she’d have the lead. ”

I never suspected her. We spent hours together daily. She practiced just as much as me and was always around assisting the director. There was no indication. Not one frown or slipup. I thought she was happy for me.

“Naturally, we are in the same circle, so she opened up to me. Night after night. Drink after drink. It was so easy to do. Little doses of the charm. I could get her to do almost anything.”

My head throbs as I lace the pieces together.

He needed me alone.

“It was you. All of it was you.”

“Olivia. It’s going to be okay. Just stay calm.”

“Parker. I’m on a train. It’s Cane.”

“Don’t tell me you figured it out.”

I keep careful watch on Cane’s hands. He’s got on his expensive rings and a gold watch, but no weapons.

“No. I … didn’t have all the parts, but some things didn’t make sense.”

My throat is dry, and I close my eyes as a wave of dizziness runs over me. I’m warm and growing warmer by the second.

Why would Aster and Barrett, who had everything they needed, put their necks on the line to mess with Parker?

It never matched up. There were holes, but I didn’t want to see them.

Or I never gave myself time to think of them because I didn’t understand the danger.

I didn’t think any of them were capable of this.

“It always had to be someone with a better reason. Someone who hated Parker enough. Someone … psychotic enough to drug someone and then threaten my sister. That was you. You framed Aster and Barrett.”

“They never suspected it. And Aster and Barrett may be filthy rich, but they never had it in them. I dreamed of coming to Doxlothia. Surely, people there would finally match my ambitions. But most of them think too small. They’re not willing to get their hands dirty.

Not like this. Sure, they’ll blackmail or launch smear campaigns.

Do anything else, really, but stuff like this is …

beneath them. They wouldn’t even commit to slipping a date drug in your drink.

No that was ‘too far.’ Instead, they opted for some brainless idea to get you drunk.

Like you were going to just drink with them. Aster took all the drinks himself.”

My chest tightens. “You … had Octavia drug me at the party.”

His canine teeth peek out when he smiles. “Didn’t even need to be there. I was hoping you’d get marked by someone else. Anyone other than Parker. He’d be devastated, hopefully never talk to you again and then … you just had to be a linked mate.”

“Baby. Talk to me.”

“I’m here. Cane has me on a train. It’s hot. I feel sick.”

“I had to wake up seeing Parker’s name as the news spread. Do you have any idea how many times my father called me about it? Every day I had to hear my father’s berating.”

His whole family is obsessed with Parker. There must be history there. I take in a labored breath. The air from my lungs is hot in my throat.

“He wasn’t … happy. I had to think of something else. Aster and Barrett never would have thought about entering you in The Hunt if I hadn’t suggested it. They just wanted to do the framing, but I wanted it to hurt.”

The train is moving fast, but that’s not what’s making me dizzy. My limbs are heavy, and sweat is running down my back.

“What’s happening to me?”

“We’re quite a distance away from your mate.

You’re probably feeling a headache. The heat of a fever.

Your whole body is aching. I was disappointed to hear Parker was able to complete his bond with you, but that just opened the door to my greatest plan.

Mates have to be together once a bond is first completed …

if not, they become very, very sick. I imagine it’s worse as a human.

No regenerative cells to slow the process.

We’re on a one-way trip to the city. I’m not sure you’ll even make it before your brain is fried from the fever. ”

I’m too delirious to register the full weight of his words, but I hear him loud and clear. Cane doesn’t intend for me to get off this train alive. I try to wiggle my hands free, but my body is growing weaker by the second.

“Why do you hate Parker so much?”

“Haven’t you been listening? Because he always gets what he wants!” Cane’s yell echoes between us, and I flinch. Nothing but the sound of the train’s wheel hitting the tracks follows. We must be in a rear car away from the public.

He leans forward in his chair, skimming my cheek.

“You know, I saw you first. That day in the courtyard while you and your sisters were looking for your house assignments. When I saw you … saw your eyes, I imagined all the ways I could make you mine. I would have tried to talk to you if he wasn’t always around.

I tried to play nice with the smear campaign against you and your sisters, but that only made Parker want to protect you more.

I would have even given you up to be marked by someone else if it meant he wouldn’t have you. ”

Fingers clench in my hair, and he forces my head forward like he’s going to kiss me. I jerk away, and pain radiates in my skull. Delirious, hot, and aching everywhere.

“You’re a psycho,” I say, managing to loosen his grip.

“No. You don’t understand. Aside from the dead mother, Parker has gotten everything he’s ever wanted in life.

And his mother was highly regarded, respected, and loved by everyone on the Werewolf Council.

My family has always had to fight hard for our respect.

It’s toil. It doesn’t come easy. When I joined the Rage team, Parker joined too, but he was better.

I gave up on that dream, and good thing I did, because he became the youngest Rage captain at Doxlothia.

And then he gets not only the mate of his dreams but is a linked mate legacy?

With eyes that are meant for me and my bloodline?

Parker Owens’s name will be known forever, and I can’t escape it. He doesn’t get to have you too.”

“What are you going to do to me?” I whisper. I’m in no place to defend myself. I can’t hear Parker anymore, and that’s enough to make me panic .

“Me? Nothing. I won’t touch you. I’m not a monster. I’ll let that bond of yours run its course.” His thumb grazes my cheek, and I’m dizzy when I lean away. Those fingers move down my neck till they reach Parker’s mark. “Your temperature is already rising by the second.”

“Parker, hurry.”

“You don’t want to hear the statistics of linked mate deaths. Not good odds for him once you go. Then I’ll be rid of it all. They’ll find your body in the city. No murder weapon. No evidence.”

“You don’t have to do this. There’s still time to go back.”

“No one will know. After all, you’re known for running. I’ve got this little piece of paper, and you’re going to write on it for me. Let’s tell the story of Olivia Osborne, the mate who didn’t stop running until it killed her.”

I flinch away when he leans forward to undo my hands. There’s little relief in it.

“You’re too weak to move now anyway.” He grabs a pen from his breast pocket. “Now, let’s write that letter. Starting with a little note for your linked mate.”

My hand shakes as he places the pen between my fingers and I press the pen into the paper. I can’t think of Parker’s reaction to my death. I have to keep fighting. When I move, a hard object jabs into my hip. My phone is still lodged in my back pocket.

I just need to not pass out before I get it.

I try to blink away the emotion of it all.

The fear of Parker finding my body. The thought of never seeing him or my family again.

My mother wouldn't and didn't give death even the slightest thought.

She carried on with a smile and hope in her heart, and so will I.

“Okay, write what I tell you: Dear Parker, I’m sorry I couldn’t stay with you …”

This is just another performance, and I've been waiting my whole life for this one. I start writing, hoping I can stay awake.