Page 46 of The Delta’s Rogue (Crescent Lake #4)

“Sebastian.”

My name is a ghost of a whisper on the wind, a flash of gold in the distance, the hint of a rainbow in the middle of a storm. There and then gone again as if it never existed in the first place.

I rise to my feet, gazing at the blackened sky above me.

There are no stars and no moon, no noises beyond the faint voice barely reaching me—the voice that seems to call my name.

It comes from everywhere and nowhere, from within my soul and yet from lifetimes away.

It’s so soft, so subtle. I’m unsure if it’s actually a voice or a trick of my mind, a figment of my imagination.

A bridge extends before me, disappearing into the endless darkness and stretching farther than I can see. I glance behind me, but there is nothing there. No door, no bridge, no landscape. Just more darkness. More emptiness.

“Sebastian.”

There it is again. The voice.

I whirl around, searching for the source of my whispered name, but I am alone.

Tentatively, I step forward, towards the length of the bridge. The darkness around me, as thick as tar and as sticky as molasses, compresses and squeezes. It prickles against my skin like tiny shocks of electricity, raising my hairs from the static swirling in the air.

But I press on. I fight against the strange shadows and the conductive energy, and continue forward, staying in the center of the narrow bridge extending into nothing .

I need to make it to the other side of that bridge. Something is there, waiting for me. Something, or maybe someone. Whatever—whomever—it is tugs on the strings of my heart, urging me onward.

“Sebastian!”

The voice grows urgent. It’s filled with anguish, fear, and immeasurable sorrow. It pleads with me, begging me to reach it. To touch it. To embrace it.

To save it.

I roar and charge forward, fighting the deepening pressure and strengthening current of the inky atmosphere. Desperation fills me—both mine and the voice’s—and it fuels my power, giving me the boost I need to break free from the clutches of the darkness.

A blinding white light and a noise louder than thunder throw me backwards, launching me off the bridge and into a free fall through the infinite, starless void.

My stomach lurches, and my eyes fly open. With a heaving chest, I sit bolt upright in bed. A cold sweat covers my body, my ears ring, and my hands clench the covers so tightly my tendons ache.

As my heart races, I scan the room. It’s pitch black except for the light shining from the numbers on my alarm clock.

Three o’clock in the morning.

I collapse against my pillows with a sigh and cover my face with my hands. Then I throw the blankets off myself and climb out of bed, shuffling through the room while rubbing my eyes.

There’s no point in attempting to find sleep again. I’ll lie awake for hours, tossing and turning in my bed, until the sun comes up and I give up and start my day.

Such has been my routine the past few days since Dominic showed up at our pack, with information about Sarina and King Malachi’s request for our pack to help find her.

I trudge through my apartment, not bothering to turn on the lights. I don’t need them to follow the path to my living room. My enhanced eyesight means I can see well in the dark, and I’ve lived here long enough to navigate it on autopilot.

I grab my book and Sarina’s blue blanket, then continue out of my apartment and into the main common areas of the packhouse until I’m in the large kitchen.

I boil a kettle of water to make myself a cup of chamomile tea—the only thing that’s helped me get even a small amount of sleep.

Two cups before bed every night, and the occasional cup in the early hours of the morning when my body, mind, and lycan are all fighting sleep.

At this point, I should steal a box of tea from the kitchen and place it in my pantry, so I don’t have to make the trek down here every night before bed.

The kettle whistles on the stove, the piercing squealing brash and disruptive and too similar to the imaginary screams that haunt me in my waking nightmares about Sarina. I dart forward, lift the kettle off the burner before it grows too loud, and pour the boiling hot water over my tea bag.

“Mind making a cup for me too?”

I jump a mile into the air and almost drop the kettle of scalding hot water. A few drops land on my hand, sizzling the skin a little. I hiss, shaking them off, as I glare at the intruder.

Madeleine. My little sister. Dressed all in black with her long, dark brown hair pulled into a French braid that hangs over her shoulder.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I growl. “How’d you sneak up on me?”

She flicks the braid behind her back, crosses the room to me, and grabs a teacup for herself from the cabinets. “Probably because you’re exhausted and distracted.”

I pinch the bridge of my nose and bite back my annoyance with her.

It’s not her fault I’m exhausted. It’s not her fault I can’t sleep well.

My brow furrows, and I inhale, leaning closer to her. “I can’t smell you.”

She snatches a bag of tea from the box between us and places it in her cup before pouring the water over it. “I took a scent blocker.”

I freeze, palms pressing into the cold countertop as I stare at her. “Why?”

She scoffs and turns away from me with her teacup in her hands, walking to the other side of the kitchen. “You can drop the ‘overbearing, protective big brother’ act. I had patrol duty.”

“I don’t remember scheduling you.”

“Dawson did the schedule for this week. Wesley asked him to since your focus is elsewhere right now.”

She leans against the counter opposite me, mimicking my stance with her teacup clasped between her hands. Her violet-blue eyes survey me over the rim, concern replacing the confident attitude she displays in public—an attitude I’m pretty sure she picked up from me .

“Are you okay?” she asks.

My shoulders curl in on themselves, and I run a hand over my face before placing them both on my hips.

My mouth opens to say “yes”, to brush off her concern so she’ll leave me in peace, but what I say instead is: “I don’t know.”

Maddie freezes mid sip, eyes widening.

My confession is unexpected, surprising both of us, but she’s the first person to ask after my state of mind. Everyone else is too scared of my reaction to check in with me.

“You’ll find her, Seb.” Her voice is steady and sure, filled with a conviction I wish I reciprocated.

“What if we don’t?” The broken and defeated words leave me before I can think about them or stop them, before I can hide my shattered soul behind my cocky, snarky mask.

She angles her head to the side. “What does your gut tell you? Your gut is usually right.”

“I’m too afraid to listen to it. I’m too afraid it will be wrong,” I admit. “This is the one time I can’t afford to be wrong.”

I wrap the blanket around my shoulders, and with my book in one hand and my steaming cup of tea in the other, I meander into the large living room on the main floor, ending our conversation before it gets too morbid.

The living room is empty at this time of night, but a fire glows in the fireplace, maintained by those who, like Maddie, are heading in from or out for their patrol shifts throughout the night.

A shiver runs down my spine as I toss an extra log into the fire after setting my tea on the coffee table.

We’re well into spring, but for some reason, I can’t shake the chill off tonight.

I don’t know if it’s from the temperature outside, the strange dream I had before I was thrown from sleep, from my unexpected conversation with Maddie, or from the overwhelming sense of wrong surrounding me since I learned of Sarina’s situation.

Maybe it’s all of the above.

But as I sink into an armchair in front of the fire, pull the blanket tighter around my shoulders, and sip at my piping hot tea, the chill in the air sinks further into my veins and muscles instead of lifting.

I scoot the chair closer to the flames and clasp the teacup in my hands to absorb more warmth as I drink it .

While the temperature of the tea doesn’t help, the calming herbs soothe my frazzled, fried nerves. I may not get any more sleep tonight, but at least my thundering heart is slower and my jumbled, racing thoughts settle.

I finish the tea and place the cup on the hearth, then settle back into the cushion of the armchair, resting my head on my fist.

The last few days have been nothing short of exhausting.

We’ve made zero progress, even though we’ve worked almost nonstop.

Most of our discussions have ended in arguments since Sarina’s pack and Dominic will only give us limited details about their mission.

The only thing we can agree on is ensuring that whatever plan we make to rescue her takes her safety into consideration above all else.

There’s no point in rescuing someone who’s dead, after all.

My lycan growls at that, and I don’t blame him. None of us want to consider that possibility, but the longer we take to find her, the more likely it becomes.

I slam my head against the chair’s back and grip the arms, piercing the fabric with my claws and blinking away the tears of frustration in my eyes.

Deep, focused breaths set my chest rising and falling—the only movement I make as I sit in the packhouse living room—preventing my mind from wandering any further down that twisted path.

As I sit there, I sense that tugging on my soul again, that itch at the back of my mind that sounds like my name being yelled across a vast canyon. I sit up straighter and open my eyes, and for the second time tonight, I find myself on that strange bridge.

This time, I’m not alone.

There, in the center of the bridge, back turned to me, is a petite female with pitch-black hair.

Sarina.