AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Aaron had kept me away for a few hours today.
Despite his attempt at subterfuge, I’d seen right through it, knowing his goal had been to give them some time to reconnect.
Nevertheless, I’d gone along with it.
I’d allowed it.
Because I’d wanted to see what it would do to Asher and the monstrous side he’d given full reign to.
And it had definitely done something.
There was a spark back in his eyes now. Not one borne of hellfire either.
It was flickering, sure, being kept from flaming any brighter by the dark still let loose.
But it was at least contained now.
Stable.
I was sure any significant provocation would alter that.
That would be an asset with the coming battle, though.
Now that I knew he could contain that monster, it altered things.
It provided a stable weapon to wield against the enemy, specifically, Carson. With the personal element of it being his son, it would make it all the more shocking and hard-hitting for the sadistic shit.
It was Aurora’s presence that had allowed for this, stabilized Asher.
I’d thought that Aaron’s threat had been the thing that had finally caused Asher to pull back during his attack on me the other night. But as we’d spent time together today, he’d informed me that Asher would never have believed he’d actually cage him. He’d just used it for shock value. So, it had, in fact, been Aurora.
Not her alone, though.
Not beyond that moment, anyway. Not to this extent of him continuing to hold it at bay, to be able to function and feel and exhibit the care that he was to her and the other two.
It was the fact that the four of them were together again.
They balanced one another out.
And, as much as it pained me to admit it, it was a positive and empowering dynamic.
Despite noticing how they’d cared for my baby girl via those many messages Aurora had shown me, I’d backtracked and tried to deny it, to only look on the bleak side and see the worst of what it meant for her if she stayed with them.
Some of that had been tainted by my own past, though.
The guilt and disgust that haunted me when it came to a certain situation, and seeing their relationship had brought it all back to me.
But seeing them with her up close and not just through second-hand intel, accounts and reports from my sources, photos, was different. It made their connection undeniable.
And it proved to me that it wasn’t like my experience.
That experience being something I had barely been able to acknowledge to myself over the years, let alone speak to out loud, and thereby give it breath.
Years back before the Infidels had ventured into their sickening dollhouse business, before Carson had become so incredibly twisted and so far beyond redemption, he and I had shared a connection. Him, me, Isobel and Valerie. Until he’d wanted something deeper with me and tried to exert a sort of ownership. That was when I’d seen the first spark of that dangerous obsession state with him. We’d broken it off. Valerie had become Samuel’s wife, and Isobel and I had gone back to our lives, becoming a couple, getting married, then, later, having Aurora.
But she’d gone back to him without my knowledge and he’d transferred his obsession to her.
It was why he was so determined to track me down, so consumed with it, because of that connection, why he’d tortured me the way he had. It had been a lot more than business, than punishment for me coming after his dollhouses. It had been personal.
