Page 48 of His Sold Fated Mate

“You okay?” Klaus placed his hand on my back.

I nodded. “Yeah, it just feels a little different coming down here this time than before.”

“Maybe that’s a good thing.”

I nodded as we continued down. We headed for the door, and I slowly opened it. The cauldron sat quiet like before. The room didn’t look different.

We stepped inside, and Klaus frowned, scrunching up his nose. “It stinks in here.”

“It does?” I asked, sniffing the air.

He nodded. “Yeah, like a rotting corpse.”

I didn’t smell it. I moved further into the room and looked the cauldron over to see if there was anything I had missed. I didn’t see any marks or anything carved into the cauldron. I looked into it, wondering if there was anything besides the water, but there was nothing inside. I was a little disappointed.

“So?”

I shook my head. “Sorry. I feel like I’m wasting your time.”

“You’re not.” He gave me a gentle smile. “This is all worth it. Now, let’s get out of here. This place creeps me out.”

I brought the diary back to the pack with us. I flipped through the pages over and over, looking to see if there was anything I missed.

“See anything new?” Klaus asked as he drove.

I shook my head. “No, but it’s just… There is so much emotion in this. I just wondered what all happened.”

Klaus’s face pressed together tightly. “Nothing good. I guess the council helped get in the way of things.”

It twisted me up inside thinking about it. How something so beautiful could be ruined so easily. She wrote about her love.

“Would you do it?”

He glanced at me. “Do what?”

“Ruin something beautiful?”

His jaw clenched. “I’d like to think I’m not like them.”

As I took in his face, I didn’t think he could. Sure, Klaus was grumpy and short-tempered. At times, he was easily irritated, but I didn’t see him as cruel. He was fair and just. He listened to reason.

I looked back at the diary and flipped it shut. “I wonder what happened next. Why didn’t she write in the diary after that day?”

Suddenly, I wasn’t in the car but standing in the middle of a street. The sound of screams echoed around, and I pulled my hands up to cover my ears. I winced at the pitch and turned around. The streets were filled with people running around scared for their lives. Blood splattered the pavement and the shrubs. The screaming only grew louder. I could hear a child crying and someone pleading.

I couldn’t look, but I couldn’t look away at the same time. I felt sick, suddenly wanting to vomit where I stood.

And like the snap of a finger, I was back in the car. My eyes were wide, and Klaus had pulled the car to a stop. “Aubrey?”

I unblocked my seat belt and threw the door open. I didn’t even make it out a step before my stomach revolted and I threw up into the grass.

My head spun as I knew those faces. They were Klaus people. I was standing in Klaus’s pack while this disaster played out.

“Aubrey.” Klaus was already around the car, his hand on my back. “Breath.”

I gasped for air, my eyes burning with what I saw. I wanted to shake the images out.

“Aubrey, talk to me.”