ARIA

For the millionth time that night, I tapped my travel tablet. The blueish glow of the screen bounced off of the pale planes of my face and I squinted through the darkness of the room as my pupils adjusted. But – inevitably – the bright surface still read the same thing that I knew it would.

10:48 PM it read, underneath which a bold, bright red symbol indicated that Free Period was long over.

This time, I was able to keep from checking the time for precisely five minutes. That was definitely a record, but it was hard to celebrate the small victory when every little corner of my brain was occupied with something much bigger.

It had almost been forty-eight hours since they took Thad.

All of my life, I'd been raised underneath the careful eye of The Elders – bred to believe and follow them unconditionally. Being one of their most important possessions was a privilege that yielded both a strange sense of comfort that existed directly alongside a heavy responsibility to set an example of the 'perfect society member' who followed every rule with blind obedience.

But no matter how deep my belief in the Elders' righteousness ran, I simply couldn't stop my overstimulated brain from conjuring up the wildest postulations about what they could be doing to Thad right now.

Even my little Instructional sweethearts sensed that something was off over the past two days, some resorting to pulling adorable pranks like hiding my pencils behind their backs in an effort to make me smile. It took a lot of concentration to make the overwhelmingly worried part of my brain cooperate long enough to conjure up even a weak grin, but somehow I still managed it. After all, none of this was their fault.

But here – in the darkness of my room, where no one else could see the way my eyes filled to the brim with salty fluid – I had broken down countless times.

After sending her a comm just like Thad had told me to do, Andrea came to hold and distract me whenever she could, but even she was not above Society rules. Once Free Period was over, my best friend was always faced with no choice but to leave me on my own, curled up underneath the grey, standard-issue blanket that draped atop my bed.

'I promise I'll be back for you.'

Thad's voice echoed around in my skull, and a quiet sound of discomfort traveled up from the back of my throat as I turned my head, burying it deep into my pillow as if smothering my vision could make the entire world disappear right along with it.

It was honestly ridiculous how much I was thinking about him. Thaddeus was the embodiment of an abrasive personality, and most of his actions were motivated by selfishness above anything. But regardless of the fact that I knew this, flashes of him going out of his way to deliver my travel tablet, of the chicken soup he made for me... Of the way he touched me as he stared down at my body with eyes filled with fire...

I quickly tapped the dimmed screen of my Travel Tablet once again, desperate to steer my rapidly devolving thoughts elsewhere.

10:50 PM.

Dang it! How had only two minutes passed?!

I flopped over on the bed, kicking my restless legs out from underneath the cover until I laid – spread eagle – on top of it. However, just as I began to sink into the covers, the familiar 'woosh' of a door sliding open caught my attention.

My entire body shot to attention as I bolted upright, and before I knew it I was smashing my hand against the control panel to open the door of my bedroom and rushing into the hallway, only to see...

"Thad!" I practically screamed, rushing over to the front foyer of our Housing Pod as fast as my short legs could carry me.

Tears pricked at the corners of my eyes upon first sight of him.

... It was horrible.

"Augh..." Thaddeus groaned in pain as I crashed down to my knees beside him, and my hands began to frantically wave all over the place, as if afraid to touch.

Because I was afraid to touch.

Thaddeus was nothing but a lump of flesh as he lay on the ground in front of me, unable to move from the same position that those butthead enforcers had so carelessly thrown him into. He was covered in way too many bruises to count – especially considering the fact that most were obscured by crusty spots of blood that had long since dried – and his jumpsuit was in tatters, hanging off of his body like nothing more than discarded rags.

It was a magnificently gruesome display – a reminder – of the amount of power the Elders held over all of us; of how far they were willing to go to protect the world that they so meticulously built. And as tears slipped from my cheeks and moistened a crusted-over part of his arm, for the very first time in my entire life, I felt something new.

I wanted to hurt someone.

Just as fast as that thought came, so did an instantaneous, reflex-like reaction that had me shaking my head, blinking fast to will that despicable thought away.

No. The Elders were here to help us. They would always care for us. They loved us.

But this wasn't a debate for right now. At the moment, the priority was getting Thad out of the landing of our Housing Pod and into a more comfortable position to care for his wounds.

Terror still maintained its vice-like grip on me when I finally reached out, cupping his battered face and swiveling it up to face me. But a newfound conviction overshadowed that fear, seeing as to how if I had any hope of moving his giant body anywhere at all, I was definitely going to need to ask for his help.

I tapped his cheek. "Thad, can you hear me?" I questioned, leaning in close. "If you can hear me, try to blink your eyelids."

I watched intensely for a long moment, scouring his features for movement to indicate that he had indeed heard me. But in the typical Thad fashion, the man just had to disobey the rules and forge his own way of doing things.

"Bug..." Thad's lips barely moved as he said it, and the word sounded like it was squeezed through a million pieces of glass on its way out of his dry throat. But no matter, the stupid nickname falling from his tongue was the best sound I'd ever heard. "I'm sor–"

Whatever he was about to say was abruptly interrupted by a coughing fit, one that left little speckles of red on the floor adjacent to his lips.

"Don't talk!" I instantly instructed, wrangling my eyes away from the sight of his blood splattered across the floor when it made my head begin to feel a little woozy, "Everything is going to be just fine. I'm right here now, okay?" I surprised myself with the confidence that was laced throughout my tone despite the fact that on the inside, I was screaming like a wild banshee.

But, in yet another bold display that came from someplace unknown, I reached over to thread my thin fingers through his, hoping that it might provide even a little bit of comfort among the level four hurricane that must be raging inside his head.

Butterflies erupted in my stomach when he delivered a barely-there squeeze back against my fingers.

I squirmed a little, trying to fend off that funny feeling in my tummy as I continued with my quest. "Thad... I need to move you. Do you think that you can help me?"

A second squeeze against my trembling fingers triggered yet another flock of butterflies, moths, and birds burst from their nests in my belly. But this time I breathed through it, leaning down to drape Thad's free arm over my shoulder.

"Okay..." I wheezed, the weight of the thick extremity already testing the limits of my somewhat pitiful muscle strength. "I'm going to count to three and when I get there, I need you to push up on your legs the best you can, okay?"

Squeeze.

"Okay..." I repeated the word to stall a little bit as I desperately searched for just a little bit of composure. "One..." I secured my hold, "Two..." I took a deep breath, summoning what little physical strength I possessed, "Three!"

The moan of pain that tore out of Thaddeus as he struggled to push himself up and onto battered feet burned itself into the depths of my memory, my own legs wobbling with the weight of the heavy emotion that came along with it.

"I– I know it hurts, but you're doing so good!" I encouraged him as we shuffled along the concrete floor toward the bedroom, my lungs already burning with the effort that it took to support his two-hundred-plus-pound form. "Almost there!" I continued, blinking hard to see the floor in front of us when familiar wetness began to saturate the wells of my eyes.

His hand clutched my fingers hard enough to crush now, and when his left leg faltered and gave out under his weight, I could tell that he was at his limits. But I wasn't going to give up that easily, so with a small grunt, I hoisted his body up a little higher, gathering up every ounce of my leftover strength to drag him the last few meters to our destination.

A squeak pressed through my vocal cords along with a huff of air once I finally was able to haul his limp form onto the bed, and I totally didn't have to take a few seconds of bracing my hands on my thighs and breathing heavily once his weight was fully transferred onto the steel frame of the bed. But once my lungs were finally able to take in an adequate amount of oxygen again, I positioned his limbs to lay a little more comfortably with the gentlest of touches.

My chest hurt, throbbing violently as I witnessed him there, so helpless and in pain. I had to quickly think up an excuse to leave the room and find a quiet, dark closet to close myself up in before I very embarrassingly broke down right in front of him.

"I'm just gonna go grab some..." I wavered, taking a step back as I chewed my lip to smithereens, "... some towels to clean you up. So just stay put and I'll be right bACK!"

A yelp of surprise obliterated the last word as – all of a sudden – thick fingers wrapped around my wrist, yanking me onto the bed and squishing my body against a warm, firm, and sinfully delicious-smelling chest.

"... Stay."

My eyes went wide, entire body freezing up as stiff as a board at the completely unexpected display of affection. Brain whirring at a million miles per hour, I tried to rationalize what the heck this could possibly be motivated by.

'He's just scared right now. He's just using you like a comfort pillow in a time of need, this doesn't mean anything at all.'

I repeated those words in my head like a mantra, but apparently, my brain wasn't buying it seeing as how the space between my cheeks immediately began to moisten at the briefest whiff of Thad's distinctly masculine scent.

"U-uhh..." I stuttered, my nervous brain forgetting all mechanisms of conversation. My momentary lack of function was only made worse when Thad hissed out in pain and leaned a few inches forward, shoving his nose into the same side of my neck where his bite mark was still healing. Apparently, even a few broken bones and a million bruises weren't enough to stop him from doing whatever it is that he wanted to do.

"They... hurt me." He finally whispered after a long moment of sniffing at my neck like a man gone wild, the tone of his words one of someone in disbelief. "...Aria, they hurt me."

My name coming from his bloodied lips was all that it took for my bottom lip to wobble, my eyes to give in, and a sob to spill over like a dam released.

"I know," I said through sharp, watery breaths, arms wrapping around Thad's middle section and squeezing just hard enough to make him feel me but – hopefully – not hard enough to hurt. "I know."

His arm carefully shifted, the long appendage wrapping in a full circle around my waist and tugging my body closer as if close would never be close enough.

"They said... they said..."

"I know that, too." I soothed, sliding one hand up to rest it against the curvature of his neck. His pulse raced there. "Four weeks."

"... Four weeks." Thad repeated, voice but a whisper.

Thaddeus was hard to swallow at the best of times, but I'd choose that Thad a million times over the one who was in front of me now; a Thaddeus that was so fragile in my arms as he tried to conceal the wetness of his own eyes in the safe cavern of my throat.

I swallowed. "We don't... we can find a way... maybe my parents can..." I babbled, fruitlessly attempting to convince myself that there must be some way out of this situation. But as if he read my mind, Thad was quick to rebuttal the offer.

"No." His voice was as firm as it had ever been since he'd been tossed back into our Pod, and I jumped a little at its fullness. "...It's no use. They won't stop."

"But what if we–" I tried to argue back, but I could barely begin before Thad silenced me once more.

"I said no." His voice was lower and particularly raspy now, and I clenched my legs to tame the totally inappropriate tingles that it triggered. "They won't stop until they get what they want. And... and I won't let them do to you what they did to me." His arms somehow tightened even further, muscles flexing dangerously as they pressed into me. They almost cut off my oxygen supply, but I didn't dare complain. Not right now.

"... Because nobody fucks with you," His voice was a purr, and a gasp tumbled from my lips just as he shifted his head, sinking his teeth into the soft flesh of my earlobe. "Nobody... but me."

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Hello my loves!

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EVERYONE who joins the Soulmates Tier in the month of November (2022) will be receiving TWO exclusive Torn and Claimed bookmarks! ALSO, everyone who joins the Soulmates Tier be put in a drawing to receive one of two PHYSICAL, PAPERBACK PRINTS of Torn 2.0!

Link to my Patreon is in my bio and bookmark / book cover designs are below! 🥰

I'm so excited for this month! 😍 Happy holidays and see you there!

Xoxo, Alex ❤️