ANASTASIA MULBERRY

Unlike Harvey who kept leaving them in their room for prolonged periods of time, the doctor returned shortly after, not that either Thea or Anastasia wished to see her again. It was even worse that while she had left Harvey behind, she had brought a small group of other people; all wolves.

"Ladies, we have some good news for you." Heena, the doctor announced with a large, bright smile on her face as she closed the door behind her, the three other wolves having already piled into the room behind her.

"You're going to let us go?" Thea asked in a small, hopeful voice at the same time that Anastasia snorted aloud and rolled her eyes.

Heena merely pursed her lips and glanced down at the small stack of papers in her arms, the other three wolves all stood behind her with their arms crossed over their chests; completely silent which gave off the impression that they were simply here to observe.

Even though Anastasia wasn't a werewolf herself, she had no doubt in her mind that all three of these men were werewolves. The three of them stood tall and proud, broad shoulders and muscled arms, all of them with a dark edge in their eyes.

There was also the fact that the one on the edge, standing closest to her had all but bared his teeth to her in a menacing fashion when he had caught her staring. Instead of looking away quickly, Anastasia made a point to sneer at him before turning her bored and distasteful gaze on the doctor who was still shuffling through the papers.

"Unfortunately, neither of you will be let go anytime soon but look on the positive side." Heena smiled widely but before she could continue, the redhead was quick to jump in, not for one second doubting that there was no positive side.

"You say that as if there's actually a positive side." She made a point of rolling her eyes again, not the least bit impressed with or hopeful with all that they had to say next. "But please, do proceed with your good news."

Heena sent Anastasia a sharp look but chose this moment to bite her tongue, especially when being watched over by the others. Instead of lashing out like she was very tempted to do, she pursed her lips and turned her gaze on the other prisoner; the calmer and weaker one of the two.

"Not that we're all that surprised, but your bloodwork has come back perfectly fine!" Heena announced with a large grin, almost as if excited with the possibility of what all of this meant, but when a low, warning growl sounded from behind her, she gulped rushed to continue speaking. "We mixed your blood with that of a powerful werewolf and just as we had expected, it came back perfectly unlike the others which displayed many warning signs."

"Which powerful werewolf? How powerful a werewolf are we talking about?" Anastasia questioned as her eyebrows knitted together in the middle; her mind perplexed. When Heena simply sent her a sharp look instead of responding, Anastasia continued forward with the questions. "And how did you get the blood of a powerful werewolf?"

"That is none of your concern, human!" The middle wolf spat at her with a sharp glare in his eyes, clearly not impressed with her excessive questioning.

However, Anastasia was far from concerned and even if she was, she had no plans of showing it. These people were the kind that fed off fear so the less emotion she showed right now, the more it would work in her favour later when they wouldn't eb able to plan her next moves. It was just unfortunate that she couldn't project those thoughts to Thea who had resorted to silently crying now, the tears only briefly stopping to blink up at their kidnappers.

In silent agreement with her superior, Heena continued to push forward, purposely brushing off Anastasia's questions to the side without so much as a second though.

Anastasia frowned deeply as she watched them all closely; even more suspicious than she was before.

"One thing that we didn't expect to see was that Thea's blood turned out to be a better match than Anastasia's."

"Why didn't you expect that?" Anastasia asked, a confuddled expression on her face as all these people seemed to do was talk in riddles.

"While you seemingly had a normal birth, Thea barely survived which makes sense since you're mated to an Alpha."

"And Thea?"

"To be completely honest, we're not quite sure why or how that happened." Heena shrugged with a nonchalant expression on her face which once again, made Anastasia silently question how this lady had managed to become a doctor.

"What does this all mean?" Thea asked in an exasperated voice, having been unable to keep up with all of this information as her mind was still muddled with the thoughts of her son.

"It means that you're probably mated to an even stronger werewolf than her." Heena simply shrugged in explanation before continuing forward, simply because they weren't interested in the mates of these surrogate woman but rather, how quick they can get a wolf pup in their uterus'.

"Anyway, it's a definite that the both of you can carry wolf pups to full term so fortunately for us but unfortunately for you, you won't be leaving any time soon." Heena sneered at the both of them, feeling absolutely no remorse or guilt for their actions and mistreatment of both these females.

"My mate's going to come for me." Anastasia lifted her chin in defiance as the promise passed her lips, fighting off the fear inside her that doubted Marcellus even knew she was missing.

"We highly doubt that." Scoffed one of the wolves from behind.

"Why do you say that?"

"Let's just say that while you're here, we've got him busy with a few things. Anyway, by the time that he figures out something is even wrong, he won't ever be able to find you."

"Yes, he will." She insisted, needing herself to believe it otherwise she would run out of hope. And hope was a dangerous thing to lose.

"Even if he does, we're going to be long gone by then."

"Long gone?" Thea questioned with wide, wet eyes. "What do you mean? Where are you taking us?"

"Just leave it up to us. It's nothing for either of you to concern yourselves with." He dismissed with a roll of his eyes and seemingly finished with this conversation, him and his fellow wolves turned their backs on them.

When the door opened and the three werewolves piled out of the room without so much as a glance back at them, Anastasia was surprise that it then closed, leaving them alone in the room with the doctor.

"You're not leaving?"

"Unfortunately, not." Heena scoffed and rolled her eyes, unmoving from her spot near the door, almost as if she either feared or was disgusting by both the females. Probably both.

Despite Anastasia and Thea's best attempts at getting the doctor to talk to them and answer their questions, Heena remained unaffected and completely impassive as she busied herself with reading over the papers despite having done so already twice before.

It was only when a knock sounded on the door that the woman moved, but once to slide it open and exchange the stack of papers for two pot noodles.

"What are you doing with those?"

Heena rolled her eyes as she walked over to Anastasia's side of the room.

"You two need to eat." Heena explained as she handed them both a pot of noodles and a plastic fork to eat them with.

"What? No water?" Anastasia replied dryly as she stared at the noodles in distaste, having never enjoyed them, not even during her college days when money was tight and she wasn't good at cooking either.

"They must have forgotten." Heena stated with a simple shrug of her shoulders as she returned to her position by the door, wanting to disassociate herself from the two prisoners as much as possible.

"Well, call Harvey and he'll get us some water." She murmured quietly with pursed lips as she twisted her fork in the dry noodles which appeared to have needed some more water to have been done properly.

"Harvey isn't your personal water boy so I don't think so." Heena snorted with a dark look in her eyes and as Anastasia stared back, the doctor growled and bared her teeth, her eyes darkening until she could no longer be able to differentiate between the colour of her iris and pupils.

"I don't understand how you can expect us to be able to eat this without any water to wash it down with."

"I hate to break it to you sweetie, but this isn't a restaurant."

"Well, no shit!" Anastasia snorted as she lowered her head to take a mouthful of noodles; her hunger for food greater than the lingering taste she had never grown to become fond of. "But seriously, why can't you tell Harvey to bring us some water? It's basic human decency!"

"Stop fucking saying his name!" Heena roared loudly as her eyes flashed again; suggesting that she was battling with her wolf to stay in control.

It was only then that Anastasia realised why Heena was getting so worked up. Holding back the twitching of her lips, she forced a thoughtful expression on her face; all for show.

"Why do you have such an issue with me saying his name?" Anastasia feigned innocence as she continued eating her noodles, completely aware of the effect that her words and tone were having on the doctor. "We're good friends, you know?"

"The kind of friend that kidnaps you and gets you stuck in child trafficking?" Heena snorted and rolled her eyes.

"That's just technicalities." Anastasia hummed. "But with the way that things have been going on between us, I'm sure I can do a lot more than get a bottle of water out of him?"

"The way things have been going on between the two of you?" The doctor asked with an unpleasant grimace on her face, suddenly very interested in this prisoner; and not because essentially, she was just a surrogate to them.

When she didn't receive a response from the woman in question, Heena took a few steps closer until finally, she was stood right in front of Anastasia. When that still didn't elicit a response, she dropped to her knees in front of the woman and looked her straight in the eyes; her gaze dark, dangerous and unwavering.

"Tell me what you mean by that."

"I'm not the kind of woman to kiss and tell." Her lips curled up into a coy smirk as she blinked up at the woman. "But between you and me, we did a whole lot more than kiss."

While the admission was enough to drive Heena crazy as Anastasia was talking so crudely about her mate, it was the wink that threw her over the edge.

Unable to control herself even though she would most definitely come to regret this later, Heena raised her hand and backhanded the woman without so much as a warning. Although Anastasia had expected this; hoped for it even.

"Don't you dare speaking about my like that!" She roared as she delivered yet another slap, unable to bottle the rage that now consumed her. "My mate is not a cheater so stop fucking lying about it!"

Instead of retaliating, Anastasia made a show of trying to move herself out of the direct line, even going as far as to throw herself to the ground while clutching her head.

"And my son?" Thea questioned in a desperate voice.

While she was genuinely concerned about her son and his safety, she also couldn't help but fear for the safety of Anastasia, especially after having been struck by Heena; the woman who looked dangerously close to reaching out and strangling the woman on the ground, her eyes still dangerously dark.

"What about him?" Heena asked with a distasteful look on her face as she glanced over her shoulder at Thea.

"Where is he? What have you done with him?"

"I don't know."

"What do you mean you don't know?" Anastasia couldn't help but ask even though the side of her face was now red and throbbing painfully, but she couldn't help but fear for the safety of Thea's son.

Heena turned her head back to face the woman in front of her and instead of answering, she glared at the woman and snatched the pot noodles out of her hand.

"I'm not finished with that!" Anastasia protested but it was no use as Heena stood up and headed over to the same with Thea however, the latter had barely touched hers with the whole ordeal that had unravelled in front of her mixed in with the worry regarding her son and his safety.

"Please, just tell my son is okay." Thea all but sobbed as she reached out and wrapped her hands around Heena's arm before she could walk away.

Flinching in disgust, the doctor rolled her eyes and yanked her arm out of Thea's grip which was easy as the former was a werewolf and the latter, not quite.

"The both of you are so annoying." Heena's lips curled up in disgust as she trekked away from them both and came to a stand in front of the door, ready to leave. "But your son is too old for us to be interested in him, so you have nothing to worry about."

While she had technically answered the question, there was still a lot left unanswered however, in her desperation to get away from them both, the door had closed and locked behind her before either of them could even open their mouths.

Much to Anastasia's surprise, Thea threw her head back – not the least bit bothered or concerned with the way that her head banged into the wall behind her – as a large, shrill scream sounded aloud. As the sound faded only to be followed by another one, Anastasia sighed and pressed her hands over her ears, a pitiful expression on her face.

Unlike her, Thea hadn't had the chance to come to terms with the situation as very quickly, they had their blood taken now, the results of their blood test revealed. While she had, had the opportunity to scream, cry and thrash out to her heart's content, until she felt like she could think clearly again, it was now Thea's turn and as she personally knew that screaming was effective, she allowed the woman to do what was needed.

Neither of them was sure how much time had passed after Thea had screamed until her throat turned raw and dry, her eyes red and out of tears,

"Are you okay?" Thea asked in a small voice as the door closed, her shoulders slumped in defeat.

"My face kind of hurts." Anastasia couldn't help but wince as she spoke, the skin of her cheek stinging and her jaw aching slightly. For a small, seemingly innocent woman that gave off the impression that she was being manipulated and controlled by her superiors, but that wasn't enough to stop her lips from stretching up into a slow grin.

"What? Why are you grinning like that?" Thea couldn't help but ask in a panicked voice as she blinked at the woman in front of her, worrying if somehow that slap had given her a concussion. Or worse.

"Because I've just got my hand on our ticket out of here."

"What do you mean?" Thea couldn't help but question again however, the words soon died on the tip of her tongue as she was met with yet another grin but this time, it was followed by something sharp and shiny.

-

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Layla Knight

21.11.2020