I wandered for over an hour through a pitch black forest on an island that didn’t exist. Nothing could have made me turn back. I was so close to finding Abby. My best friend had gone missing from a nightclub that I’d taken her to without a single trace. Within a month, everyone had given up hope but not me. I kept looking even though I didn’t have a single lead, until one day I got a message from her. No one believed the message was real, after all, it led me to coordinates in the middle of the ocean. But I wouldn’t give up. I called in all my favors and got a friend to fly me out here and turns out, there was something here. The mysterious island was just one more thing about this investigation that didn’t add up.

A light shone brightly in the distance and I made my way towards it. If Abby was still alive, she’d probably be there. I prayed she was still alive.

As I headed towards the light source, I heard leaves crunching underfoot. I cocked my gun and crept in the direction of the sound. Even from the back, I immediately recognized her. I whispered her name in shock, holstering my weapon as I looked around for others.

She turned to me beaming. “Kiera?!” Overjoyed, we embraced each other. “How did you find me?!”

I hadn’t imagined it would be so easy. I thought I’d have to fight through countless people. Actually, I thought I’d have to fight through beings I suspected weren’t people at all. Abby was right in front of me, outside, unguarded, not even tied up… in a sheer white camisole and lace panties?! “What are you wearing?” I could barely get her to leave the top button open and here she was walking around the woods half naked. What had those bastards done to her? I was tempted to find her captor and shoot him because if anyone deserved it, it was that monster. But that wasn’t the mission. I needed to get her to safety. “Never mind that, we need to go. Now! I have a chopper waiting on the other side of the forest. If we’re fast, we can make it out of here within the hour.” I grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her in the direction of the chopper.

She resisted me, attempting to break free of my grip. “I can’t leave, Kiera,”

I stared at her in wide-eyed confusion. Why the hell wasn’t she coming? What had they done to her that she was afraid to step out of an open cage? “What are you talking about?! Of course you can! Come on!”

She snatched her arm away from me. “Kiera, I don’t want to go.”

What the fuck was happening? I had a plane on the island. No one had seen us. All she had to do was go. “Abby!”

“No. I’m not leaving. But you need to. You need to leave. Run. Go back to the helicopter and go back home. Forget all about the email I sent you, about anything and everything I told you. Pretend none of it ever existed. You need to get out of here, Kiera! I’m begging you! You don’t need to worry about me. I promise I’m okay. Better then okay… but you won’t be if you stay here any longer!”

Like hell I would just turn around and leave her to be some monster’s plaything. I’d rather die on that island than abandon my best friend to a fate like that. She didn’t understand how dangerous the man holding her was. He must have shown her some small kindness, a little trust and made her believe she was safe, but she wasn’t. “Abby, everything you told me, how this man killed that woman in the club? It was true. I linked everything back to him. He’s a murderer!” But there was more too it. More she needed to know. Things I hadn’t told anyone because I was sure no one would believe me. “It was not easy finding any information on him, by the way. I spent months delving into his background and after discovering what he had done. I… I don’t think he’s even human, Abby! You are not safe here! You need to come home with me, where it’s safe and I can protect you!”

Abby seemed bewildered. “Months? What do you mean, months?”

Of course she’d lost track of time. She must have undergone so much torture at that man’s hands. “Abby… You’ve been missing for almost four months. Everyone thinks you’re dead… It’s rare that a missing person is ever found alive. But you can prove them wrong if you just come with me!”

I watched her weighing something in her mind. I silently rooted for her, hoping she’d fine the strength to break free of whatever mental chains that man had put on her. All she had to do was move. Once I got her to the plane and off the island, I could help her. She just had to move.

Instead she screamed so loud it hurt my ears. “MAX!”

Was that another name for her captor? Was he coming for her? Well, he wasn’t going to take her. Brainwashed or not, she was coming home with me.

Her eyes welled with tears, costing me precious time as my concern distracted me. “I never wanted this, but you gave me no choice.”

Before I knew it, two glowing green eyes came towards me from the darkness. I barely had time to scream as a wild beast pounced on me throwing me to the ground. Pain radiated from the back of my skull. The last thing I saw before losing consciousness? A mouth full of fangs.

I woke up in a windowless room filled with antique furniture. I touched the back of my head and came back with blood stained fingers. I had imagined a million different ways I could fail in my mission. Everything from being overpowered by her captor and getting my neck snapped to there being nothing but ocean at this location. The one thing I hadn’t imagined was my best friend calling for her kidnapper. Hadn’t even considered it.

With blurry vision I stumbled around the room looking for a way out. The walls were solid stone and the heavy wooden door was bolted shut. I reached down for my gun which had unsurprisingly been taken. I needed a weapon. An antique wardrobe caught my eye, I pulled open the top drawer to find it filled with lingerie. This was probably the room he kept Abby in. She’d appreciate being surrounded by such nice things, even if she was in a cage. I, on the other hand, wasn’t impressed as easily.

I opened the doors to the wardrobe and found whips, paddles and worse. Rage flooded my reason as I realized he’d probably used these things on her. He’d beaten her to the point where she didn’t know up from down. My poor Abby. I yanked at the wooden doors again and again until the hinges gave. Then I used all my weight to push over the wardrobe. With my head throbbing I used what little strength I had to stomp it to pieces. Once that was obliterated, I moved on to the next piece of furniture.

In the back of my head, I knew I was losing it. But I couldn’t hurt him. I couldn’t stop him. And I just needed to break something. All I could do was tear it all down until there was nothing left.

I broke off a piece of the bed to use as a stake. He wouldn’t catch me by surprise again. This time I’d run him through.

The door unbolted and I braced myself for a fight. He came in faster than my eyes could follow. In a whirlwind, I was disarmed and tied to a chair. I struggled against my binds. “I knew it! You’re not human!”

“No. I’m not,” he said coolly.

I turned to Abby who was watching me with such pain in her eyes, she couldn’t have chosen to betray me. “He’s done something to you. He’s controlling your mind. These things, they have powers, abilities. You have to fight it.”

“Yes. I know.” She was a scientist first. Even if she was being tortured, she’d observe any use of supernatural abilities. She probably knew more about his abilities than any human on Earth. I could use her knowledge in planning our escape if I lived that long. “He can read thoughts, but he can’t control them. I promised to help him protect his secret, and you know too much.”

Her words didn’t quite register. She made a deal? She wasn’t brainwashed or tortured? Instead she betrayed me because she thought his secret was more important than our freedom? She had to choose between me and him and she chose that murdering monster?! “You fucking bitch! After everything I’ve done for you! All the bullshit I had put up with for years, just to protect you, to keep you happy and safe! This is how you repay me?! By letting these fucking demons take me?! You are dead to me. Dead!”

The bastard got in my face and threatened me. “Either you watch how you speak to her, or I will gag you. It is your choice.”

Pretty sure this would end with me gagged, I took what little satisfaction I could and spat in his demon face. He went straight for my throat.

Good. I’d rather die than live as a slave. I glared, shooting pure hatred in his direction even as I struggled to breathe.

“No!” Abby pleaded behind me.

He released me, the chair teetering underneath me. He stood there shaking with hatred. If not for some need to prove to Abby he wasn’t a complete monster, he certainly would have killed me. Something he made a point of telling me in case I didn’t figure it out. “If it wasn’t for Abby, I would have drained you dry. I would be thanking her, as she appears to be your only lifeline. Be careful how you tread from here on out.”

If he thought he could frighten me into doing what he wanted, then he had a lot to learn about me.

He left the room and came back with the gag he promised. He tied the scrap of fabric so tightly around my head I felt like my jaw was going to break.

As he walked over to Abby, I started chewing through my gag. “You realize it would be far easier to just dispose of her now,” she gave him such a look as to make it clear that wasn’t an option. That expression was probably the first glimpse I’d seen of the my Abby since my arrival and it was enough to get him to back down. “Fine. What do you propose we do with her? She is not permitted to leave. Not with the knowledge of what we are.”

After a moment of silence he added, “Such a wild thing can’t be trained. She’d choose death first,” and I realized he was responding to her thoughts.

“So, not an option,” Abby blurted as in mid-conversation.

The beast that had attacked me padded up to them. So the vampire hadn’t turned into a wolf, he was it’s master. So Max was their pet? Blood stained the wolf’s fur. I had been injured but the blood from my wound couldn’t account for—

“He has taken care of the pilot,” the vampire said nonchalantly, like announcing someone had taken out the garbage. At Abby’s shock, he added. “We can’t save them all.”

John. I wailed against my gag and redoubled my efforts to break free of my binds. I needed to destroy that vampire more than I’d ever needed anything in my life. John hadn’t been garbage. He was a good man that stuck his neck out for me and Abby when everyone else had given up. He deserved better. He deserved retribution.

The vampire continued his discussion as if I wasn’t even there. As if my agony was some minor irritation he had to deal with. “So what do you propose we do with her?”

Abby’s frustration grew and she shouted, “I don’t know, Julian!” Then her eyes landed on the blood covered wolf. Was she wondering which of her coworkers had just died trying to save her? Did she regret choosing the vampire over us? Without John, I wasn’t sure how we’d get off the island, but I’d find a way.

Abruptly, the vampire said, “that could work.”

I looked up, wondering what they’d decided to do with me. The gag in my mouth starting to give way due to my efforts.

Julian turned to his wolf and said, “Maxwell, you are to take Miss Bates as your own. Take care of her as your own. Claim her as your own.”

Before I could even start to unpack that, the wolf’s body began to distort in grotesque ways. Parts bending and growing. Fur retracting. Moments later, instead of a wolf stood as large, naked man.

As if nothing had happened, he asked Julian, "what am I going to do with a woman?"

"Woo her. Bite her. I don't care. Just bring her to heel." He waved off Max as if the entire thing had been settled. I was just another piece of trash to be dealt with.

I spit out the last piece of gag. "To heel?" I snapped. What was wrong with this guy? Was he even capable of human emotions?

Max seemed to have some objections too. "You are my king, but you are not my Master. You can’t make me do this.”

But then Abby gave him the most pitiful look and I could see him caving. I silently begged for him to hold his ground. All this was madness and no reasonable person would have anything to do with it. But Max failed.

“Fine!” he yelled. “Because I care about you,” he said looking a the two of them. “Both of you. I’ll do it.”

“But I swear to god!” he added. “If she turns out to be as big of a pain in the ass as I think she’s going to be, I’m giving her back! You’ll have to come up some other dumbass plan.” He grumbled his displeasure. “But I promise I will try.”

Try what? Try to break me the way Julian broke Abby? Not in this lifetime, pooch.

Abby threw her arms around him and exclaimed, “I owe you. I owe you everything.”

My jaw hit the floor. She was eagerly thanking my future tormentor for taking time out of his busy schedule to torture me. Maybe there were alternate dimensions too and this really wasn’t my Abby. Who could possibly change this much?

He gave her a Kodak smile which would have been endearing in another other context. “Damn straight, you owe me.”

She finally remembered I was in the room and turned around to find me too shocked beyond reason. “I’m sorry, Kiera, this is the only way. I told you to leave. I begged you to leave!”

I just stared. What could I possibly say about what was happening. My best friend had just hugged the man she enlisted to break me. “But I have all faith in Max. He would never hurt you. I’m so sorry.” She and I must have had very different definitions of hurt. Because I was already in the deepest pain I’d ever experienced in my life. It hurt to breathe.

Max came in with a leather collar and I struggled once again against ropes I knew wouldn’t give. But at this point it was just reflex. He released me from the chair and bound my hands behind my back, while holding me in place with seeming little effort.

He walked me out of the room at the end of a leash. Tears of humiliation blurred my vision. I could barely see Abby, but I heard her loud and clear. “Don’t fight it, Kiera. It’ll be easier if you don’t fight it.”

That’s when I knew, my best friend, my sister, the person I would have died a hundred times for, she was lost, forever.