Chapter Nine

“Can you hear what they’re saying, Hayden?” asked Alexia impatiently as they both leaned very close to the bars of their cage without touching them.

Hayden sighed, exasperated, “For the last time, Alex. The silver affects my werewolf hearing, or my werewolf anything. I cannot hear any better than you can.”

Alexia leaned back and lay on the floor, “Jeez, fine. What are we going to do now? My parents must be worried, and your parents too.”

“I haven’t been able to mindlink them for hours. That’s unusual of me. And we don’t have phones with us,” Hayden replied, laying beside her.

Alexia sat up again, alert. “The voices have stopped. They’ve left.”

Hayden also sat up. “What now?”

“Be patient. I think I hear the door slam. To be safe, we shouldn’t attempt to break out until daybreak. I doubt they would come here during the daytime,” she suggested.

“The moon is still up. It’s probably a little past midnight. We should sleep,” Hayden said.

To that effect, Alexia yawned and lay down, “Way ahead of you,” she mumbled. She soon fell asleep, emitting soft snores.

Hayden chuckled at the sound, and curled up beside her as close as he could without touching her. Sometime later, Alexia turned in her sleep towards Hayden and he pulled her in closer, his heavy hand resting on her waist.


***

It was midnight and Arthur was wide awake, tossing and turning. His daughter had not returned since she stormed out of the packhouse.

All through the siege, she was missing. After the siege, they found neither her—alive—nor her body. The wolfie boy that went after her too was missing, not that he was concerned about him.

He hoped that he didn’t harm her in any way, because, although his daughter was a skilled huntress, she was no match for an Alpha wolf. And she wasn’t with any weapon because he made her leave it all behind. She was at a literal disadvantage out there.

His wife, Cynthia, stirred beside him. She sat up groggily when she saw that her husband was awake, troubled.

“What…is it, Arthur? Why aren’t you asleep at,” she glanced at the clock, “1 am at midnight?”

Arthur smiled briefly, “Nothing, dear. Go back to sleep.”

“If it’s about Alexia, calm your mind. You taught her well. She will come back here safe and sound. And as much as she may hate Hayden, the mate bond is between them. She won’t be able to resist it for long and he will want to protect her,” she explained.

“Now, come on. Let’s go back to sleep,” she said and kissed him on the cheek. Arthur sighed heavily, and lay down to sleep with a troubled heart.

***

A beam of sunlight hit Hayden in the face, and he stirred, shielding his eyes with his hand. He tried to get up, but he met some resistance.

He looked down to see Alexia holding on to his shirt, snuggling closer. He realized he had his second arm supporting her head, and he didn’t want to disturb her, so he lay back down.

Instead, he studied and admired every feature of her face while she slept. She had a sweetheart shaped face with small, laid back ears.

Her hazel-green eyes were closed, and fringed with long, thick dark lashes that fluttered with each breath she took, and rested gently on her cheeks.

Her nose was small and pointed, with a bump in the bridge that signified that it had been broken before. She had high cheekbones, with a dimple in the corner of her cheek. Her rosebud lips were full, pink, and pouty.

Hayden brushed the hair away from her face, and continued to look at her. Then she stirred, and her eyelids fluttered open. Dilated hazel-green eyes stared up at him, then narrowed.

She took her hands off him and put distance between them as fast as she could. She stared at him in mortification as he sat up and crossed his legs, without taking his eyes off her.

“Did…did I cuddle you in my sleep?” she asked slowly.

“And a good morning to you too, Alex,” he greeted with a smile.

“Answer my question, Hayden!” she snapped, with two pink spots on her cheek.

“Yes, I think you did. I just woke up a few minutes ago, and found you holding on to me like a baby monkey, with my arm acting as your pillow,” he shrugged nonchalantly, “Not that I hated it or anything like that; au contraire, I liked it very much,” he added with a grin.

With each word Hayden said, Alexia turned redder and redder until her whole face was red, and she buried her face in her hands and her hair fell around her face like a curtain, “Stop!” she whined, her voice muffled.

Hayden laughed, and moved closer to her. He pulled her hands away from her face and pushed her hair over her shoulders. Then she cupped her face in both hands and told her pointedly, “I don’t mind that you’re a cuddler. I don’t mind that you held on to me while we slept. I like that you are comfortable enough with me for you to hold me in your sleep. I like it. I like you, okay?”

Alexia nodded shyly, and smiled at him. He also smiled and brushed his thumb over her cheeks, before letting his hands drop.

“Turn around,” he instructed, and held up the hair tie he removed from her hair, “Let me help you with your ponytail. We need to bust out of this joint,” he said.

Alexia complied and turned around with her back to Hayden. He gathered her hair and, in the process, his fingers brushed the side of her neck where his mark was to be. She shivered, and he swallowed hard. It took all of his efforts not to elongate his canines and mark her right there. He finally put all the hair up, and tugged at the ponytail, “All done.”

She turned around and faced him, “How are we going to get out of here—”she gasped suddenly, and took off her combat boots.

She removed the insoles and brought out two different metal instruments from the two boots. She smiled self satisfactorily.

“Hidden weapons in your boots are always a must,” she said.

She examined the instruments and raised one of them up. It was like a big pen, but with different lockpicks able to come out of the tip. The other was a small pen knife. She raised her eyebrows and smirked, “Let’s bust this joint!”

Hayden reciprocated the smirk. Quickly, she put her boots back on.

She moved closer to the bars and found out that there was a latch and a padlock in it. Quickly, she fiddled around with it using the lockpick set. The padlock clicked open, and Alexia flicked the latch and opened the cage.

Hayden whooped and they high-fived. They crawled out of the cage and silently moved to the door. Alexia bent down and inserted the lockpicks into the keyhole. After twisting and turning it around, she heard the soft click of the lock giving away.

Hayden gestured for her to move back, and he put his head through the door. The hallway outside the room was empty, and there was a door on the other side. Hayden came back into the room and whispered, “The place is empty. The entrance is on the other side of a hallway outside this door. There must be other rooms in this place, but I didn’t hear anything, so we’re good to go.”

Alexia nodded, and together, they tiptoed out of the room.
They paused at the entrance of the two other doors in the building, listening for sounds or voices.

They only proceeded after confirming that there were no other people around. Finally, they reached the entrance and Alexia picked the lock. The door opened, and to their utmost surprise, a person was standing at the entrance.

Hayden had regained some of his werewolf strength, so he grabbed the man, smashed his face into his knee, and twisted the person's neck.

The man fell down to the forest floor, dead. His eyes were still wide open in shock.

Hayden grabbed Alexia’s hand and they stepped over the corpse. Then, they started running. Frequently, they would stop and look back to see whether they were being pursued.

After a while, Alexia dug her feet into the ground and stopped running. “In what direction are we running? Do you know where the packhouse is in this dense thicket?”

“Yes, Alex. Let’s go!” he urged.

Hayden continued to run, weaving them through trees and shrubs. Finally, they could see the backyard of the packhouse. They stopped and caught their breath.

“How do you reckon everyone will feel?” Alexia asked, after some time.

“Relieved, I hope,” Hayden said, chuckling. They walked out of the forest and into the empty backyard.

Hayden approached the back door, and as soon as he raised his fist to knock, Clara flung open the doors and jumped on Hayden, hugging him, “Babe! I was so worried.”

Reflexively, he put his arms around her and squeezed. Behind Hayden, Alexia’s eyes narrowed, and her mouth tightened into a frown. She brushed past both of them and stormed into the house.