Shackled (The Lord Series) by Amy T

43. Jasper

She stutters slightly. “He and Ruchen p-put sco-scorpions on me on various occasions, and they let them… sting me….

there.”

What. The. Actual, F u c k?

I breathe through my mouth, trying to calm my rage, or else I might go look for Tyson and Rueben and punch them.

I direct the stream of water onto her pus s y until I think it is clean, as I don’t want to touch it until Mose takes a look at it, and 1 tum my attention to her legs and feet. Duct tape is wrapped around her toes. Odd.

I try to remove it, and Olivia screams out in pain.

“P-please.”

They did not!

Olivia collapses over me and has a coughing fit that lasts for several minutes.

Once she calms down, despite her s o b s, I remove the duct tape as I need to know the truth.

“G o d d a m!” 1 curse when I see the state of her toes. My b*dy trembles with rage, and if not for Olivia needing my help. I would have already gone looking for my blood-brothers. “Let’s get you comfortable in bed before I go grab my stuff.”

I pull the duvet to the side and put her on the left side of the bed and get her dressed before leaving the room. I don’t tie her as I don’t think she will do anything stup i d since her toes are broken.

My blood-brothers are in the kitchen and gang up on me the moment I set foot inside the main house.

“Are you serious about moving in with the Diseased C u n t in the guest house?” Rueben asks as I walk past them and head to my room. They come after me.

Once inside my room, I grab the backpack from the top of my dresser, unzip it, and shove some clothes and other items inside. “Yes,” I finally reply.

“I get that you are eager to get married, but she ain’t the one, Tyson says.

“I am not delusional enough to think we will make her our bonded, but I want to know who the one is?” When Tyson doesn’t reply, I look at Mose, “Rueben never had the intention to find a wife for us,”

Rueben rubs his face with his palm. Mose doesn’t look too surprised, he probably suspected it by now. “That’s not

true.”

“Oh? Then you are fine with me inviting Ada here and seeing if she would be interested in us?” Ada is the woman my first blood-brothers and I thought to pursue. Also, Mose took a liking to her. I still maintain contact with her, and she is in a relationship with a group of blood-brothers, but Rueben doesn’t know it, I only want to see what he will say.

“I already said after we bring down Senator Deymar,” Rueben says quickly.

143. Jasper

“Enlighten me of your plan as I thought we would use Olivia to tarnish his reputation, but so far, you and Tyson have been torturing her,” I point out. “You think that by breaking her toes and putting scorpions on her, she will be eager to f u c k us or look good on the camera?”

Tyson snorts. “I am not f u c k i n g her.”

“Good, because I don’t think she wants you to touch her either. Or any of us.”

“You think she will say no to us having our way with her?” Ansel chimes in.

“She will do whatever we ask of her but not because she wants to be with us, and I am not into f u c k i n g people against their will because that’s rape, and I am not into that shi t.”

Rueben grits his teeth. “Then what do you propuse?”

“To undo all the damage you and Tyson did, I have to start the training tonight,” I let them know. Tyson narrows his eyes. I don’t think training is the right word, but her being so submissive will make it easier to work with her. “She is my next project.”

Rueben heads to the living room and says over his shoulder. “I would watch my back with her.”

Olivia is afraid of her own shadow, and she doesn’t have what it takes to try to do something to any of us.

“Project?” Mose laughs. “She is not a horse.”

“No,” I agree, “but she has been abused.”

“How do you know that?” Of all the stupi d questions Tyson could have asked, he had to choose that one.

I don’t bother to answer, but instead, I say to Mose, “I need you to take a look at her. If you don’t want to, I will ask Maddock to come over.”

Mose sighs. “Fine. But I want one of your special cognac bottles.”

“Only if you stop putting spices in everything.” I say as I go to grab Miss Teapot and her basket. “Can you grab her food and bowls?” I ask Mose, and he shudders. He and my cat are not friends, but he still helps me.

Once I have everything I need for the night, including ingredients to make dinner, Mose and I go to the guest house. I put Miss Teapot’s basket in the little kitchen as she goes to explore the house and the bag of groceries on the counter before I go check on Olivia while Mose remains in the kitchen to start dinner before coming to see how Olivia is.

I am down the hall when I hear the sounds of glass breaking coming from the master bedroom. My heart pounds faster, and I rush to the room, wanting to see what happened.

The room is empty, but the door to the bathroom is open, and I remember clearly closing it before I got Olivia in bed. I run inside, and the first thing I see is Olivia with a piece of a broken mirror in her right hand, trying to cut her wrist.

“No!” I yell and jump to stop her.

She lets out a cry of frustration as I slap her hand, and the mirror shard falls on top of other broken pieces. My instinct

143 Jasper

is to scream at her, but instead, I pick her up in my arms, and she buries her head in the crook of my n*eck and starts sobbing. Then coughing. How the hell did she walk with all those broken toes?

I take her back to the room, and Mose is already there.

“What’s the commotion?” he asks.

“She tried to take her own life,” I reply. “Thank f u c k I stopped her in time.”

Taking care of her will be much harder, as I don’t trust leaving her alone, but I don’t think tying her to the bed will help establish a connection with her. I will have to think of a solution.

Mose spends the next hour or so looking at her wounds and applying ointments on her cuts and bruises, even on ber pu s s y. Lastly, he gives her some coughing syrup and something for the fever, and she quickly drifts to sleep. Fortunately, the cut she made on her wrist is superficial and not life-threatening. Mose bandages not only her wrist but her toes as well so they can heal properly.

“I think she has pneumonia,” Mose says once he is done with her. “It would be best if Maddox sees her, he can prescribe her antibiotics and what else she needs.”

“I will send him a message.”

“Good.” Rubbing the back of his n*eck, he adds, “About Rueben… if in one year he still doesn’t want to get a wife. I am

out.”

It is rare for blood-brothers to break links, but it still happens, especially when they don’t get along or don’t have the same goals, blood-brothers must be united and not divided among the group.

“I feel the same,” I let him know.

Mose remains with me until my food is ready before returning to the main house. I take a few bites of my food, but I still feel sick, so I push the plate to the side. I am not a fan of eating alone, anyway, but I remind myself I am doing this so I can help Olivia.

After cleaning the kitchen and the bathroom, I take Miss Teapot and go to the master bedroom, change my clothes, put on a pair of cotton pants, and climb into bed. I wiggle closer to Olivia, but not very close, not wanting to accidentally hit her in my sleep and do more damage to her.

Miss Teapot curls up next to me, and seconds later, she starts to purr..

I am drifting to sleep when Olivia starts to talk in her sleep, crying and saying Spencer several times, before stopping.

Who the f u c k is Spencer?