Page 93 of Resisted
Without looking at me, Boyce held his ground. “Then we both go, if they get to leave.”
What the fuck are you doing?I nearly screamed through our connection.
He didn’t flinch.Trust me.
Trust him? How could I trust him when he was so willing to leave Bella without a mate after we’d spent so long searching for her? He knew firsthand what that would feel like, what that would do to her if we all died on this rock. How had it come to this? How had we all become trapped on this fucking miserable peice of land and put in a position where our whole subpack had to choose between saving more of our people or losing ourselves?
Trust me. Please.
He rarely begged, but trust him on this? Fuck, I wanted to. I wanted to so damn much, but there was a war inside of me that persisted, knowing that if I gave him all my trust, we could lose.What if he doesn’t let them go?
I’m not betting that he will let them go.
Wait. He wanted to sacrifice everyone, knowing the consequences? I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. I… I thought of all the times he’d blindly trusted me and hadn’t asked questions, hadn’t pointed out the flaws. He’d followed me into all sorts of questionable circumstances.
Do you know what you’re doing?
I watched as he swallowed, the only real sign he was under stress.
Sort of.
Good enough.
Just saying those words had all my senses on high alert, ready to defend and protect, even when I knew we were offering ourselves up as sacrifice. How had we not seen this coming? Had we been so blinded by our repeated successes that we walked into danger so cockily?
Boyce stepped forward. “Both of us, and they leave.”
“That’s what I said.” The way the words fell from his mouth had me nervous already. I shouldn’t trust him, but I did trust Boyce. Before I could even move from the spot where I stood, a poacher stepped forward, already snapping chains on my wrists. Fuck. Every instinct in me said to fight, to struggle against the restraints, to not give up until I won. But I trusted Boyce more than nearly anyone in this room, so I held still.
When the chains were tightly around us, the man laughed. “That was almost too easy.”
Too easy? What was too easy?
Before I could finish processing the question, a flame sparked to life before smoke filled the room. It was at that moment, the moment when disorientation became their only tool in gaining an upper hand among beasts, that I knew Boyce and I had made a grave mistake.Trust me, he’d said, and because he was my family, I had. But damn if trust wasn’t terrifying in this moment, when I could see nothing to match up with the battle that was meeting my ears.
These chains ensured I wouldn’t be able to lift a damn hand in an attempt to help. They prevented me from being at Roth’s side, from saving the men I’d been in more precarious situations than not with. These—
“Truth or dare,” Boyce whispered from beside me.
“What?” I blinked a few times in confusion.
“Truth or dare?”
“Dare. Always but—”
“There’s going to be a standoff, Vince,” he whispered, and though I could barely see him through the smoke, I knew he was there. “Right this moment, Roth and the others are going to take down everyone but the person with the detonator.”
“You can’t possibly know that.”
“I do,” he mumbled. “When that happens, I need something from you.”
“Anything.” Always anything. He knew that.
“I need you to let Bella come in here without argument.”
Let Bella walk into this room, this place of danger, without argument? Absolutely not. “You’ve gone fucking insane if you think I’ll let her walk into here willingly.”
“Where we all stand, there is no way any of Roth’s team will be able to disarm him without a button being pressed and this whole place blowing up. The only way we can all leave here alive is if that fucker is caught off guard.”