Pregnant And Rejected

Chapter 35 She Is Dead

“Bastien,” Mom follows me, dogged even amidst her grief. She catches my shoulders, wrapping her arms around me before I can stop her. “I’m so sorry.” She keens. “She was inside.”

“No!” I say again, my voice a dull roar in my own ears, “You’re wrong. She can’t – she can’t be. I would know if she was dead, would feel it!” I insist.

My mother buries her face in my neck, her tears hot and wet against my skin. “I know.” She laments, “I know sweetheart.” Her small hands rub circles over the rigid muscles of my back. “But she’s gone.”

“How do you know?” I struggle to push her off me without hurting her, “Is there a body? Show me her body?”

Mom’s arms clamp down around me more tightly, squeezing me with her supernatural strength. “They already took it.” She whimpers. “It’s at the morgue,”

The phone line opens with a fuzzy click, dissolving into a strange, droning roar punctuated by splintering wood and hollow crackling. “Bas-en.” Selene’s terrified voice cuts out as she attempts to cry my name, “I eed. Th-re’s… el… Pl-elp!”

I listen to the voicemail over and over again on the way to the coroner’s office, trying to decipher any clear words or message from the jumbled sounds. Unfortunately no matter how many times I play the recording, I can’t make anything out.

I don’t want to believe it. I can hear the fire in the background, and I’ve seen what’s left of the cabin, but I cannot fathom that Selene might be dead. She was clearly in trouble, but that doesn’t mean she’s gone. After all, her phone cut out – if it ran out of battery she could be trying to find help this very moment and simply unable to call me again.

She isn’t dead. Axel says for the thousandth time. I would know.

How did this even happen? How did the fire start? And if Selene really was in the cabin when it began, why couldn’t she get out?

compulsively as

voice in the back of my mind wonders. And why did she reject me, if not for failing

to look at her. I can’t bear to see her guilt and pain. I can’t

leave the house?”

the cabin.” She explains hoarsely, “It seemed like the only place they could pin to Selene. Garrick’s house never occurred to us – I didn’t even realize

hand. “Why didn’t you

Despite her words, there is no venom

there to keep you safe.” I groan, “To prevent

was a cover!” I explode, “Somebody is trying to destroy this family any way they can. I lied to the enforcers to appease them,

were we supposed to know that?” She cries. “You

hotly, “I let them question her, that’s all! I know she didn’t have anything to

She believed you were against her, that’s why we followed the lead ourselves instead of going

my fault?” I demand, “It’s my

If anything it’s my fault… I’m the

is and “Stop it Alden barks from the front seat. “None of this is either of your faults. The only person responsible is whoever lit

the

for a long moment, until my mother returns her comforting touch to my arm. “Bastien.” She broaches genth, the salty scent of her tears filling the small space. “I don’t want it to be true either, but

“Until the doctor says otherwise, we have to assume this is another trick.” The car rounds the corner and

“De kane proclaims softly, “The

stand firmly. It