Page 77 of The Enforcer’s Rejected Mate (Red River Rejected Mates #1)

Chapter

Fifty-Five

CORDELIA

I figured out how to unhook my chain from the bed.

It wasn’t hard even in my weakened state which makes me question the whole thought process behind keeping me prisoner.

Once I’m free, I go up to the bars and test them out, hoping to find a weak point like I did with the chain but they’re solid.

I bet Keiran thought the bars would be good enough to keep me here.

I throw myself at the door and try to find a leverage point but I get nothing except for a sore shoulder.

I hold my hands out in front of me. The cuffs are still fastened tight, no matter how hard I pull on them there’s no getting them off.

Silver chains drag behind me while I walk and that gives me an idea.

I used the chains on Keiran before, maybe I can do that again when he comes back.

I pick up the chain and wince when it burns my hands.

“Hells,” I whisper and keep wrapping the chains around my leather covered wrists until I’m able to whip them a little easier.

The first person to come near me is going to end up with a face full of chains.

Once I’ve got my chains sorted I walk up to the window.

It’s too high for me to reach and I’m too weak to jump.

I can see outside from it though so maybe if I’m loud enough I can get help.

“Help me!” I scream. “Can someone hear me?!” No one comes but that doesn’t stop me. I keep calling for help until my voice is hoarse and I hear the door at the end of the hallway open. It’s Keiran. I can tell the second the door opens. He’s pissed, his scent more acrid than cloying.

“Are you insane? Shut the fuck up!”

I turn away from the window to see him standing on the other side of the bars. “Fuck you. I don’t listen to you.”

“What the hells are you doing off the bed?” He leans forward, hands on the bars and I hide my hands behind me so he doesn’t see my cuffs. “What happened to you? You were never like this with me before.”

“Like what?” I ask, glad he’s dropped the fact that I absolutely did free myself. If I’m patient, I’ll find an opening to escape. I can feel it.

“Defiant.” Keiran makes a disgusted face. “You used to hang on every word I said. There wasn’t anything you wouldn’t forgive me for. You loved me more than you loved yourself.”

His words land like a punch. He knew the whole time. My eyes water because he’s right. I did.

“So you knew that the whole time? That I loved you more than me? That you could do anything to me and I’d let you? Just like you knew I was your mate?”

He looks uncomfortable and moves away from the bars. “It’s just one of those things, Cordy.”

“Stop calling me that,” I snarl at him.

“You were never going to be good enough for me,” he continues like I didn’t speak.

“So why am I good enough now? What changed?”

He turns to face me. “I need you now, that's what changed.”

I drop my eyes to the floor. “I used to think you were my friend. That you loved me. I can’t believe I was that wrong about you.

” I look up at him. “You were never anything special, Keiran. My love made you special because I made excuses for you. I created a version of you that didn’t exist to love because I couldn’t believe that anyone would be so cruel.

Now I see you for exactly who you are, and you know what?

The bondrot is making sure everyone else sees it too. ”

He growls low. “Save your fucking words for someone who cares. I’m going to get what I want from you. I win .” He pulls the keys from his pocket and unlocks the cell door. The clang of the key turning is deafening in the silent cell.

I bring my hands out from behind my back and let the chains uncoil. “Come on then.”

Keiran enters the cell and leaves the door open behind him. There it is, my opening. I drop low into a fighting stance and Keiran sneers.

“Don’t make this harder than it needs to be.”

“I dunno, I’m pretty pissed off at you right now.”

Keiran doesn’t react. He’s only a few steps away from me.

We both size the other up and then he lunges for me.

I throw myself to the side and swing my chains at him.

They make contact and he snarls in pain.

I can smell his burning skin when one of them wraps around his throat.

I grab the chain with both hands and yank as hard as I can to pull him off center.

It works but only for a second. Keiran turns and backhands me so hard that I almost pass out.

I hit the ground and try to keep fighting.

The chain is around his neck still. I kick a foot out and loop the chain around it before I pull with both hands to jerk him forward.

Keiran’s head snaps forward before he grabs the chain and stops me.

“Fucking bitch. Useless omega.” He comes for me but we both hear the door open with a resounding slam. From the sound of it, it hits the wall. Pine and fiery ice hit my nose.

It’s him.

“Thorne!” I scream, scrambling back from Keiran. He stops me from getting away by yanking me back by the chain. I slide back on the floor towards Keiran with a shriek. “Thorne! I’m in here!”

Keiran yanks me back again. My shoulder aches from how hard he’s pulling and It feels like my wrist is going to snap but I keep fighting him. Thorne appears in the cell door a half second later and roars.

“ Get away from her !”

Keiran lifts me by the chain, forces me up onto my feet with another pull of the chain. “She’s mine.”

“You lost the right to her when you rejected her.” Thorne steps into the room. Behind him I can hear shouts. It sounds like there’s a commotion. Smashing glass and breaking furniture. Whatever is happening out there is an outright brawl.

“You’re outnumbered,” Thorne tells Keiran. “It’s over.”

“It’s over when I say it’s over.” There’s a snick of a knife unfolding before Keiran holds it to my throat. “You think I’m going to let you have her? If I can’t have her, no one can.”

Fear and anxiety washes over me. The fear feels like a bucket of cold water hitting me in the face.

My breath freezes in my chest. I gasp and choke, trying to get a breath in but it’s no use.

There’s no getting out from under the fear that’s settled over me because it’s not mine.

It’s Thorne’s feelings. His fear at losing me chokes me with how strongly he feels it.

It’s panic and anxiety so loud it drowns everything out, or at least it feels that way until?—

“Sweetling, look at me.” My eyes come to his and he smiles at me. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for fucking things up at the dance. I’m going to get you out of this. We’re going home. I promise.”

Home.

Keiran grabs the chain and pulls me against him. “You’re going to tell him you don’t want him. Reject him or I’m going to kill you.”

My eyes water. There’s so much I want to say to Thorne.

That I know Cassidy was lying, that I want to go home with him, and that I do trust him.

I don’t know if I’ll ever get to say those things to him but I do know I won’t say what Keiran wants me to.

My next move is a gamble, but being free is worth the gamble.

“Reject him. Now.”

“No.”

I feel the shift in Keiran. He’s about to strike, but for once, things go my way.

Even if I’m weak right now, I can fall just fine so that’s what I do.

I drop to the ground and the blade grazes me but there’s nothing but air waiting for Keiran when he slices the knife across the space where I used to be.

“You’re never hurting her again.”

With me out of the way, Thorne is on him in the next second.

I roll to the side and the chain on my wrist gets dropped when Keiran takes on Thorne.

Thorne lands two punches in quick succession.

Keiran’s not quick enough to dodge the knee Thorne throws.

He doubles over, the knife dropping to the ground before Thorne grabs him and throws him into the cell door bars.

Keiran hits the bars like a ragdoll and crumples to the floor like a puppet whose strings have been cut.

Then he gets up, movements jerky and uncoordinated.

He falls back against the bars and looks between us both before he shakes his head and sprints from the room.

I don’t know what I expected but it wasn’t that.

“Did he just run away?” I ask.

Thorne nods. “He did.” He moves and I know he’s going to go after Keiran so I hold out a hand to him.

“Don’t.”

He looks at me. I see the war across his face. The need to protect me, to put Keiran down indefinitely. His sense of duty and anger, all of it comes through our bond.

“Please, don’t. Stay with me.”