The Eve of Darkness

Chapter 16

"So, from our reports of the original incident, the hunter's cabin that we found Aria in has two stories, a basement, four bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a kitchen and living area." Jude placed his hands on his desk as he leaned over an open file filled with pictures and documents. "Basically, the place was set up to look like any other normal Montanan cabin in the scenario that someone mundane stumble upon it. However, the basement, where they kept Aria, is also where they seemed to keep a lot of documents." 

Aria glanced up and around at the mention of her time spent with the hunters before her rescue. Camden, who was closest to the end of the desk, stood to the right of her, and his hand that was securely around her waist seemed to tighten for a second at the recollection of her torturous experience.  To Aria's  left, Xiomara stood with her arms crossed as she listened to Jude's debrief intently. Beside Xiomara was Orion, a pack warrior who was selected by Xiomara to participate in the trip to the cabin as well.  

"What is it that we are hoping to find there?" asked Orion, his hands resting at the small of his back as he gave his full attention to the beta. 

Jude hummed to the question and slid a photo out from the spread out papers, pushing it towards Orion so the warrior could take a look at it. The image depicted a general view of the basement room, which seemed to have been taken from the basement staircase.

"Last time we were there, Camden and I only did an initial sweep and I took photos with my phone. We weren't able to do much else because we were worried about Aria's critical condition." He gestured towards another stack of papers that seemed to have an essay written on it. "Once Aria was safe and Camden was with her, I came back here and wrote down everything I could remember when I was running around the house and investigating before getting to the basement. However, the one room that we didn't really search around besides taking photos and rifling through some drawers was the very basement in which they kept Aria." 

Aria took a deep breath and reached for a photo from the spread on the table. One specific image showed the table that the hunters would place their tools on when they were done using them. A long taser was on the table, which they had used hours before Aria was rescued. If she looked at the picture long enough, she could still feel the way the electricity ripped through her skin like a razor, proliferating through the water that she'd been doused in, stabbing her lungs with painful shocks. Looking at the image brought a foul taste into the back of Aria's throat, which, unfortunately, did not go unnoticed.

"Are you okay?" asked Xiomara, her eyebrows furrowed as she looked at Aria up and down. "You look like you are suffering from Montezuma's revenge." 

Aria couldn't find the breath to spare in trying to understand that reference. Camden's form tensed as he slightly turned his body towards his mate, his head tilting as if he were trying to hear her sickness. 

"Yea, I just—" 

Any words to dissuade Xiomara and Camden's worry were lost as bile climbed up Aria's throat like a flaming squirrel running up a tree branch. Aria ripped her mate's hands away from her and ran towards the trash basket beside Jude's desk. Any lunch that she'd eaten after their outing into the nearby town was lost as the Sola upchucked everything that was in her stomach. 

"Fuck," she spat out, rubbing her forearm against her lips, shutting her eyes tightly, and focusing on taking deep breaths. A tremor had found its way into her hands and for some reason her legs seemed unable to support her weight when she tried to stand back up. Her stomach churned with an uncomfortable feeling as sudden waves of memory of her experience bubbled up in her mind like an unwanted song repeating over and over and over and over and—

"Aria! It's okay. My love, you're okay. Come back to me, baby."

Aria's eyes snapped up to stare at her mate, who was fussing over her as her breath heaved. She took a second to catch her bearings, letting her eyes flick over Camden's troubled features as he sat on his knees before her, waiting in desperation to hear if she was okay.