Darkness Unleashed by Belinda Boring Read Free Book Online Page A

back of my shirt; ripping me away from Helena and slamming me down hard, face first, into the ground. Before I could react and fight against my captor, silvered cuffs snapped around my wrists. The contact sizzled against my flesh, reducing my strength dramatically.
    “ What the . . .?” I asked as I was roughly turned over.
    Mason’s furious face stared down at me.
    He’d found me.
    The cold look I received from him told me everything. He knew. He might not know I was Amber, but he knew I wasn’t his beloved Darcy. Bucking against my restraints, there was no way I was going to let him take me willing. I was still part vampire and even though it would be harder, these handcuffs wouldn’t hold me for much longer.
    “ I don’t know who you are, but these are Enforcer cuffs. Unbreakable,” Mason growled.
    “ Maybe, but pity we can’t say the same for your heart. I’m going to enjoy watching it shatter.” The line between love and hate grew murkier as I spat in his face. I was sick of seeing him look at me as though I was beneath him. I was done allowing him to make me feel like I was nothing.
    In that second, I knew I could hate Mason O’Connor much more than I could ever love him.
    Hate was a far superior master.
    “ I’m going to bury you,” he whispered menacingly. “I’m not going to rest until you’re out of my wife and destroyed.”
    “ Then tick tock, lover. You better act fast because she’s not going to last much longer.”
    “ What do you mean?” Mason thundered, lifting me off the ground enough to slam me back down.
    That’s when I started laughing. Once I did, I couldn’t stop—over and over until tears filled my eyes and spilled over.
    Even as Devlin compelled me to sleep, my hysterics echoed in my mind, joining me in the darkness
     
     

Chapter Five
    Mason
     
     
    The waiting was torturous.
    The thing that was occupying my wife sat on the other side of the one-way mirror I was watching through, similarly chained to the table and chair as Morgan, the rogue witch Devlin and I had accused of causing all the deaths in town, had been.
    Fury pulsed red hot through me the longer Devlin interrogated the hijacker.
    Every now and then, Darcy would look over to the mirror and smile, the sight of it crushing me. That ‘thing’ had taunted me back at the vortex, words filled with lies about how my mate was slowly dying inside of her and that time was running out. My head reasoned with this new information and I tried convincing myself it was merely a stalling technique and way to get under my skin.
    The very thought of Darcy slipping even further away from me, out of my reach, terrified me. It made standing here, while Devlin conducted a proper interview to establish who we were dealing with, pure insanity. On the way to the Council offices, where dungeons were maintained beneath the building, I’d argued hard for my case to simply magic the truth out of Darcy.
    It’d been on the tip of my tongue to shake it loose through a little rough handling to pry the traitor’s mouth open—a stronger incentive to confess than simply sitting quietly in an enclosed room.
    So far, Devlin and Darcy were at a stalemate.
    Darcy.
    It wasn’t Darcy. It was the thing inside her. The very dead thing I would destroy the second I knew how to.
    I didn’t care who it was or why this had happened. Those answers were irrelevant now. I was way past being understanding and tolerant. Someone had come gunning for my wife when she was at her most vulnerable. Once I dealt with the imposter, my next stop would be to visit that betraying bitch downstairs, Helena.
    We’d welcomed her into our home. I’d entrusted the woman I loved to her care and this was how she repaid my generosity. Her involvement had rattled Vivien hard as she greeted us when we pulled up with the duo. She’d been completely blindsided, having taken her long-time friend into her confidences and inviting her into her inner circle. Helena had been privy to