Shackled (The Lord Series) by Carlos
223. Rueben - Doubts IV

I never saw Ansel this angry. Not to mention that he broke a sturdy oak dining table. How strong is he? Mose and Jasper are just as shocked as I am.

"Fine, no Elders then," I give in, wanting Ansel to calm down. "How are you dealing with it? What do you know that we don't?" Ansel rubs the back of his neck. "I'm having a meeting with Cirro in a few days. He's been digging into some stuff for me." This irks me more than I like to admit it. "Are you going behind our backs now?"

"I'm just doing my duty," Ansel replies.

"What is that supposed to mean?" I try to make him speak.

Ansel runs his fingers through his hair. "I don't think you'll understand even if I tell you." He looks at me, his brown eyes a little strange. "But they had Indy and I had no other choice." Who is Indy? It's the first time I heard this name. "In the beginning, I tried to resist, but... the fucking pain....." Ansel suddenly seems to snap out of some sort of a dark hole. What the hell was that about? "I'll go buy a new table."

"At this hour?" Jasper asks.

"Yeah. Do you want to come with me? This way, we can buy something nice for Olivia to let her know we are sorry for how big of an asshole we have been." Looking at me, Ansel adds, "And not from a fucking thrift store."

"A gift sounds like a good idea. I'm also coming," Mose says. After grabbing his coat, Mose tells me, "Make sure Olivia knows she has been a good girl."

Right.

I wait for them to leave before I go over to Tyson's office. Even if he has a room, he barely spends any time there. Besides, Isak and Steven are staying in his room for the moment.

From the second I enter the office, I start pacing around, trying to sort out the mess inside my head, which ends up annoying Tyson.

"If you only came here to walk around, you can go ahead and patrol the farm," Tyson raises his tone at me.

I stop and look at Olivia. Even thinking of her as Olivia and not as the Slutty Nun or as the Diseased Cunt is hard. A blanket is wrapped around her and she's trying to make herself as small as possible. Then it hits me like a ton of bricks. She fears me. Tyson might have done some really messed up shit to her, but she really fears me. I should be happy about it, but the truth is that I don't like it. And it bothers me. Because I should be angry, not concerned for her. "Back in the kitchen, I felt her anguish. I don't know what to make of that."

How can I feel her?

"You know what's going on, but you are too stubborn to admit it," Tyson sighs.

I liked Olivia from the moment Camila introduced her to me but I kept my distance because she was so fucking young and I didn't want to come out as a creep to her. But I would do everything possible to be around her, even touch her from time to time. There had been moments when I would try to convince myself that she was a dumb teen because I liked her too much. But what Tyson is implying is pure madness. "She can't be our soulmate. She can't! I refuse to accept it." Tyson goes over to Olivia. "Do whatever you want, man. Believe it or not, I don't care."

I fold my arms over my chest. "Why are you doing this?"

Tyson puts Olivia in his lap, the blanket still around her, and she hides her face in his chest. "Because I'm tired, man. So fucking tired. Of the hate, of the fucking drama. I just need this to be over." He kissed the top of Olivia's head. "I don't like the person I turned into." His arms come around her and she whimpers. "I thought that by breaking her, it would make me feel better." He leans his head on the sofa. "But it only made me into a monster." He makes Olivia look into his eyes. "I needed a fucking reality check and Levi gave it to me. He forced me to look at what I did to you earlier in the kitchen. And then he showed Rueben and me another video of you and...." For the first time in years, I see Tyson tear up. "What have I done, Olivia? What have Rueben and I done?"

She puts her palms on either side of Tyson's face and kisses him. Looking into his eyes, she says three words that cut deep even into my soul. "You destroyed everything."

And then she cries. The way she fucking cries shatters me. Tyson holds her tight while I look at them hopeless because I have no clue what to do.

She cries for hours and I stand there looking at her while I feel all her pain. And it breaks me. My demon claws at my soul and I let him. I hope he fucking consumes me. It would set me free.

Suddenly, Olivia stands up and comes to me. "You are a fucking coward!" she yells at me while hitting my chest with her tiny fists. "Coward!" she continues to yell before falling to her knees. Tyson rushes to her. "Why couldn't you kill me in the forest!? I shot Camila right in her chest while staring into her eyes and I never once felt bad about it." What the fuck? "Kill me already!"

Tyson lifts her up in his arms and she fights him before suddenly passing out. Probably from exhaustion. "We need to talk to the Elders and find out if my assumptions about our heads being fucked with are true."

I go over to the sofa and pull it out, turning it into a bed. "Ansel is more than against going to the Elders. He even broke the table when he slammed his hands on it." Tyson is quiet, so I look over at him. He sits at his desk, cradling Olivia at his chest. He looks... lost. I take the pillows and the blankets from where Tyson keeps them and throw them on the sofa bed. "We'll get to the bottom of this," I finally give in because I have already experienced Tyson moping around. Once was one time too many.

"It doesn't matter anymore. Olivia will never forgive us."

I sit. "Are you sure then? About her, I mean."

"I keep seeing the video Levi showed us in my head over and over again. I try to stop the images, but it's impossible. Levi spent a lot of time with Camila and Olivia. If there's one person who knows Olivia better than we do, then that person is Levi. My mind might scream that Olivia is a whore and I shouldn't trust a word coming out of her mouth, but I chose to trust Levi when it comes to Olivia."