Slade Read online

  Table of Contents

  Slade

  Copy Right

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Epilogue

  From the desk of…

  Where to find me

  Other books by the author

  Slade

  Series: The Broken

  Book Five

  By: Serena Simpson

  Copy Right

  Slade – The Broken - Copyright © Decemeber 2018, Serena Simpson

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, including electronic or mechanical, without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.

  Cover Art by Peri Wolford

  Published by Serena Simpson

  Chapter One

  Slade stepped out of the front door carefully checking his surroundings. He didn’t want his brothers or their mates to know where he was going. This was the part of his life that he guarded jealously. There was no way for him to know that he couldn’t escape the bright blue eyes that zeroed in on him as he crossed the garden.

  The property he owned with his brothers was massive. They each needed their own space to become what the scientists made them. Created. Sometimes referred to as the freaks of the galaxy, but never to their face. They were dangerous; Slade was dangerous. He never acknowledged that. In the years he had lived on the Earth, he pulled his nature inside using it only to lead his family.

  What use did the world around him have for someone as broken as he? The beauty of the garden disappeared as he crossed over into the area that was surrounded by trees. He walked through it marveling at the red, orange, and yellow leaves of fall. The Earth had its own beauty. It rivaled the purple leaves of the pleasure planet and the blood-red leaves of Hell.

  Beyond the trees was a small section of nothing but dirt and rocks. That’s where he was headed. It was his sanctuary. He stopped his head shaking without his consent. This place wasn’t a sanctuary it was a shrine. His head dropped; his chin hit the top of his chest while his eyes closed.

  For a minute, she stood before him bathed in the perfection of his memory. A smile caught at her lips. Her eyes the perfect color of citrine sparked with life. Her voice vibrated with her excitement. Brie. His shoulders shook as the realization that he would never see her again once again flooded his memories.

  Slade took a seat on the rocks that he piled together to work as a chair. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the gift she had given to him all those centuries in the future. A simple gold band just big enough to fit on his wrist. His pinky shook as he hovered over it. Inside was the last bit of Brie’s consciousness. Every time he called on it, it got a bit dimmer. Soon this last connection with her would be gone, then he would be forever alone.

  He slid the band back into his pocket jumping up with a start to pace the small area of the shrine. It wasn’t much. It was hard to have something worth remembering in the exposed elements. Yet, this would have made her happy. That's why it was here.

  It had been months since he last let her out. Would she be upset, or disappointed in him? No, not Brie. She always had the patience of a saint when it came to him. His hand moved; it shook. He was going to let her out at the risk of this being the last time he would ever lay his eyes on her.

  He blinked his green eyes as his hand trembled. He categorized the movements. When he fought—the scientist that created him, created him to fight those that were invading their planet—his hands never trembled. It didn’t matter how close to death he came; he never gave away what he was feeling.

  He caressed the warmth of the band. Legs no longer strong enough to hold him dropped him into the makeshift chair. His tailbone smarted from the contact. He refused to flinch as Brie coalesced in front of him.

  “My Warrior.” Her voice came out with the sound of bells. His eyes closed as the warmth of it wrapped around him.

  He opened his mouth only to snap it shut as the sound of his teeth colliding rang through the air. He wanted to greet her properly. He needed to say My Female, but the words wouldn’t come. They refused to pass his throat that was now swollen with a desire he couldn’t name.

  “My Brie.” It was all he could manage to say.

  “I have missed you.” She smiled moving a bit closer to him.

  He knew she wasn’t really there. It was one small portion of her lingering conscious he was talking to. His Brie had been sent into the sun to burn the shell of her body. It released her to find the mate that was the other half of her soul. It released her to find someone who wasn’t him.

  “I am sorry,” he choked out.

  “For what?”

  “It has been months since I last released you.” How could he explain that it was reckless of him to leave her alone for so long?

  “You fear the end.”

  His Brie never did mince words. “Yes.” Even now her form was shadowy. Soon the band would be empty, and she would be with the one the universe paired her with long before either of them was born.

  “I too fear the end, even though I know it’s a beginning.”

  “No talk of philosophy. If I remember correctly, we could spend weeks on one subject and never agree.”

  Her eyes lit up as her head tilted in agreement. She walked over to him her hand hovering over his. Her fingers caressed him. Though he couldn’t feel her touch, his mind supplied what was missing. The weight and the warmth of her hand on his.

  “Brie?”

  She sat on his lap, her hand hovering over his heart.

  “One last time My Warrior. I want to sit close to the male who was mine for such a small time.”

  Slade felt something foreign in his eyes and on his cheeks. He would check with his brother Mekhi later. He was the physician in the family. Part of him must be broken.

  Brie’s finger hovered over the tear on his cheek. He couldn’t see it, but she showed it to him through her eyes. It shimmered silver in the sunlight.

  “The way is forward Slade. It was never backward.”

  “Slade,” he breathed out. “You never did say my name enough.”

  “Then I ask the gods to allow your mate to utter your name every day.” She backed away from him until she was standing a few feet away.

  The crushing reality that life was going on without her to hold him or love him settled on his shoulders like a weight used to hold a ship in place. There would never again be a Slade and Brie that time was over. The tremendous hold he exerted on himself wavered before it disappeared.

  A scream of pain left his lips as his knees hit the ground before him. His shaking body curled into a ball on his side, and he cried for everything he ever experienced with Brie and for everything he would miss. He mourned. The sound of
wailing came from his soul.

  His Brie was gone, and he was alone. During his days, he could ignore it, pretend it didn’t exist as he spent his time being involved with his ever-expanding family. At night, it was a different story. He told himself he didn’t need anyone to hold close; he didn’t need to feel a pair of arms tighten around him. He was created, a shell without a soul.

  The lies he told himself rang hollow to his own ears.

  “Finally,” Brie breathed out. It was so faint that he barely heard it.

  He laid there for minutes, hours, or days. There was no way for him to measure the passage of time. His heart broke and was slowly sown back together.

  “It will never be what it was when we were together.” The words were torn from him even as he knew she wouldn’t understand.

  “It will be different. Not better or worse.”

  “You always believed.”

  “I spent a lifetime with you. How could I not believe?”

  “Are you leaving?”

  “Not yet. You will know when it is time to set me free.”

  “It will never be time,” he growled. The wildness he kept at bay trying to set itself free.

  “Then I will stay with you forever.”

  He knew better, she would leave. There was no other choice for her. The one she was meant to be with was waiting for her to completely cross the veil.

  “You allow things you can’t change to bother you.” Her kind smile softened the blow of her words.

  “I love you, Brie.”

  “That’s the beautiful thing about love, our hearts are big enough to love more than one.”

  He lifted the band and the small sliver of her consciousness that was still with him disappeared inside. He laid in the dirt for a long time.

  *~*~*~*

  Mila sat on a private street at the bottom of a long driveway. She tilted her head up unable to see the house she knew was at the top. The tips of her crescent-shaped nails bit into the palm of her hands. Her arms shook while her mouth twisted into a frown.

  She didn’t want to do this. Her life was couched in terms of her fighting for freedom if given a chance she would run. Hiding preferably under her bed with lots of covers was all she could think about. Her arms shook, she knew she needed to get a grip on her emotions.

  “You don’t have to do this.”

  Her head turned to look at Me’akal who was in the driver’s seat. Me’akal wasn’t his real name—his real name was filled with vowels not one constant in sight. It was also unpronounceable with her human vocal cords. Why? Because Me’akal wasn’t human thus how he got the name Me’akal because he wouldn’t answer to the name Mack. She ignored him, it seemed the right thing to do.

  “I have to do this. What will it take, ten minutes? Twenty tops.” She hated her—the woman whose name she refused to say—it was all her fault. Mila didn’t have to die only to be resuscitated and told that her life was no longer her own. She was the one who should be living, laughing and having children. Ok, true she was living, but she wasn’t laughing until Me’akal did something crazy, and she definitely wasn’t having children. She looked at Me’akal and shuddered at the thought of having his kids.

  Me’akal was hot. He was disgustingly hot, but he was like a brother or a father. He turned and smirked at her. She was sure that Me’akal could read her thoughts, now she needed to prove it before she could gut him with a rusty knife.

  “The days not getting any younger.”

  “I don’t want to do this. Why is my life all kinds of screwed up?”

  “Do you want to trade histories or compare them?”

  She shook her head. The last thing she wanted was to be Me’akal. “Let’s switch.”

  They traded spots. Mila got in the driver’s seat and put on her seatbelt before she started the car. She looked over to find a huge hound sitting in the passenger seat. She made the mistake once and only once of calling him a dog. That lesson had been easy to remember.

  Her body shuddered as she began to climb the long driveway. She wouldn’t survive the confrontation; it was a given. All she could do was free those that were trapped in the house. As long as they lived she would finally die in peace.

  Chapter Two

  The house in front of her was a mansion. A-frickin' mansion. What did she expect? Of course, the big bad had money. She shook herself before looking over at Me’akal. He was on alert, but no more than usual. She waited for him to growl to alert her that everything was about to go to hell. Instead, he gave her that lazy look he got when he was a hound. The one she swore meant he was laughing at her.

  “Alright get out the car. All we have to do is go in. I pull out the weapon I have to kill the big bad. We spill his guts, set the female captives free and then if luck is on our side, we escape with them. The world will be free of the big bad, and I will be able to make a life for myself until the blessed peace of death comes for me.”

  Mila raised her hand in a high five. Me’akal left her hanging. Damn hound, he could raise one of those dinner plate sized paws and give her a bit of encouragement. There were things she didn’t want to think about and the big bad was one of them. No, the name of the evil lurking on the earth wasn’t the big bad, but it was how she came to think about it in her years alone.

  That’s the reason she was here, to fight. She knew it was her destiny the day her life was saved. Such a small thing. She and her sister were walking the edge of the river. They did it all the time, but it was different that day. She felt hands push her in. Her sister grabbed for her; they both fell in. Her sister… well, she didn’t know for sure what happened to her. All she knew was that she died that day. It changed her life. Now she would face the evil that tore her life apart.

  Yeah, so to her, it was the big bad. To give it any other name was to face the possibility that she wasn't enough to destroy it.

  “Let’s go. The fight waits for no man or woman in this case.” She admired the large outdoor kitchen as well as the pool and the lazy river. This place was beautiful enough to make anyone, including her stop and enjoy the scenery. That’s what evil does, she reminded herself with a shake of her head. It pretended to be beautiful to catch you off guard.

  She bit the inside of her lip before she knocked on the door. She hated announcing herself to the big bad, but she needed to make sure her sister was safe. She didn’t put it past the monster to be using Quinn as a shield.

  “Who is it?” A female voice called from behind the door.

  “It’s Mila, Quinn’s sister.”

  There was a shrieked Mila and then the door was being thrown open.

  “Mila!” Quinn wrapped her arms around her jumping up and down like a Mexican jumping bean.

  Mila couldn’t help it. She allowed herself to be caught up in the excitement of seeing Quinn again. When she lost her biological sister, she never expected to have someone who could fit into that role again. Then Quinn came along and loved her despite her weirdness.

  “I missed you,” Quinn screamed. Then she placed a big wet kiss on her cheek.

  “Quinn, how many times have I told you not to kiss me! My prince charming will think I’m already taken if you keep doing that!”

  Quinn’s laughter filled her heart with joy.

  “I swear your true love won’t mind me. He’ll fight for you Mée-la!”

  It felt good to hear Quinn drag out her name. It reminded her of when they were teens shopping in the mall or catching a movie while giving the local boys the eyes.

  “Come in,” Quinn dragged her through the doorway.

  “What is that?”

  Mila looked up to see a group of young people, teens and children huddled against the side wall. One was staring and then let out a blood-curdling scream. She pushed Quinn behind her and turned looking for the big bad. There was nothing behind her except Me’akal.

  She turned around in time to catch children turn into cats. “What the hell!” she screamed as trembling bits of fur huddled together.<
br />
  “Mila,” Quinn clutched at her arm. “Back away from it slowly.”

  “Back away from what?”

  “That.” Quinn pointed her finger at Me’akal. He laid down after rolling his eyes and placed his head on his paws. An audible sigh came from his mouth. Yes, it sounded more like a growl, but she had been with him for years and knew the difference.

  “Are you scared of Me’akal?”

  “Me’akal?”

  Mila tilted her head and tried to remember how she felt when she first saw him. His fur was black except for the tips that looked like they were dyed a flame red. He was huge. No one was confusing him with a dog. She was sure there was no four-legged creature on the earth as big as he was. Well not counting a bear.

  “He’s friendly. What about those puffs of fur? I’ve heard they can be deadly.” A snow white one was silently making her way across the floor. She wouldn’t have known the sex, but it was definitely a female before it became a cat.

  “Is the big bad doing genetic manipulation? My God, did they hurt you?” Damn, she should have come when her friend first called her and told her she was being stalked. At the time, she thought it was by humans. As much as she wanted to come and defend her, she knew she wasn’t ready.

  That didn’t stop her from sneaking out of her room to come save her friend. When Me’akal caught up to her, she could barely stand. He shook his head, his eyes looking sad as he picked her up and brought her back. Her health had been compromised to the point that she almost died. It didn’t matter to her; she felt Quinn was worth it.

  They both watched as the white ball of fluff stopped in front of Me’akal. She raised a dainty paw and then leaped up and hit him in the nose. He gave a soft growl, and the white cat skittered backward. Me’akal raised his head and shook it like he was caught in the rain before lowering it on his paws.

  “That flea ridden ball of fur hit Me’akal!”

  “She is not flea ridden.” A woman with an incredible smile said as she broke away from the others coming to stand in front of Mila. “That’s Ivory, and she’s my… my…”