The Beast In Us (The Beast And Me Book 3) Read online

  Although I feel as if I have lost something, I know that I am missing him. He makes me complete. He is the only one who can help me process my loss. And I can only imagine how he must feel.

  The emotional pain of missing him is so much worse than the physical pain of not being me anymore, of not being pregnant anymore. I can’t even remember feeling pregnant. They took that away from me.

  As Val asks me how I feel today, I told her that I miss Jay. That expression on her face, I wanted to claw it off, turn it into bloody shreds, and I wasn’t even scared of that impulse. The thought that her being dead would only worsen my situation was what held me back.

  Today I realized that I don’t care about Dr. Valerie Winters, although I should because she protected me from White when I was at my weakest. Then again, who would have known how I would have really felt pregnant? She stole that from me, regardless of her motives.

  What Jay has taught me with his diary, and what life in this hell hole taught me, is that I am on my own down here and that in the end I can only trust myself, and maybe Jay. I know that me not trusting him is a cruel thought. I know that he is tormenting himself because he is the reason I am here. But he is not. It is White’s fault.

  And that I am not completely trusting Jay is because of the beast in him. It’s acting irrational, unfocused and primal, while my beast...it seems to wait for my command. And somehow I am eager to give in. I’m eager to see it let loose.

  It frightens me, this violent side of me, this rage. I know that Jay wrote about what it feels like, but actually sensing it is something else entirely. I wouldn’t say that it’s actually bloodlust. But if I’m honest with myself, I don’t know how to actually call it any different from that. When I dig deeper than this artificial emotion, I begin to understand that its power, it’s my awareness of strength and superiority that I feel towards Val or White; and I guess that frightens me even more.

  That’s why I need Jay more than ever, because I know that he is the only one who can actually understand what I am feeling, what I am going through. Yet, it also scares me; I’m scared of how he might react to my different state. I know that he will blame himself first, but I can’t anticipate what will follow. Will he be incapable of wrapping his mind around this new situation? Will all he thinks about be how to turn me back? Will he be paralyzed by me having become the very thing he is?

  The thing is, I don’t feel that much different than before, but better, stronger, tougher. And I know that this is what I should be really scared about, that I’m not worried about what I have become.

  No one should ever read these words.

  XXX

  The time I have left for myself is running out. I know that. Val has to accept that. I can’t play the weakened, weary, and tired Meg for much longer – a few days maybe – but not more than that. I can feel the beast in me yearning, wanting to be let out, and I want to. How can I explain this feeling to anyone? I’m not sure if even Jay would understand. I need to find a way to let it out and there is only one way that comes into my mind that might hide my changed state for a bit longer. But it also means that I have to fake a miscarriage, and that I will be transferred back to White’s mercy.

  I know that Val isn’t ready for that.

  But it isn’t her choice to begin with. It’s mine. And I have never felt stronger and more prepared than now. I am not scared of him anymore; I am not terrified of the future anymore, or of the uncertainty. I want to meet it and rip it apart if I don’t like it.

  Yet, I know that I have to hide this new strength, this power, if I want to find a way to break free and to free everyone I care about. And that is the one thing I am uncertain about. I’m not sure if I can make it. I’m not sure if I can submit myself to White and play his little obedient slave, because I know that that’s what it’s going to take to beat him. I don’t want to.

  XXX

  Like every day, Val has come to visit me. I’m still uncertain if I can trust her, but I have told her what I need. I told her that I need to see Jay, in person, right in front of me, without restrains, without bars, without her or White in the same room with us. I told her that if I don’t get to see him that I am going to lose it big time; because right now I feel as if I am going to lose my mind. I feel as if that slumbering beast inside of me has woken up and started to claw its way out of me.

  I have come to realize that I have accepted it as a part of me, probably as I would have a child. Thinking about it somehow happens every day...what would have been...

  Maybe it’s the sorrow, my suppressed mourning that keeps the beast at bay. Maybe I don’t realize that I am deeply hurt and lost, and that there is a void inside me, maybe that’s why accepting this beast in my belly comes so easy to me, because it somehow overrules the loss I feel, the feeling of something growing in me.

  I doubt that any man can relate to that, and it makes me wonder if they have female soldiers among them. Still, they wouldn’t know. I know that I didn’t know, but I guess a part of me sensed it, felt it, was aware of it, just that a part of me knows it’s gone, is aware of this void that somehow is filled by this feral creature that somehow submits to me.

  I wonder if I will ever get pregnant again.

  It just makes me realize that I want children. And it makes me so incredibly sad, so sad that I need Jay around me even more. So sad that it makes me despise Val even more for telling me that I need to be patient.

  Be patient for what actually?

  Does she really expect me to keep waiting for her to find a cure? ...A cure that might not even work? No, I cannot wait for that.

  “You know that can only happen if you’ve officially lost the baby,” Valerie told me and I glared at her.

  “I am well aware of that,” I retorted, trying to suppress the vile cocktail of emotions that was swirling around in my insides.

  For a moment we exchanged nothing but a look, until I broke the silence: “It’s not really up to you, Valerie,” I said. “I made sure that you weren’t exposed, but the decision is mine now and it has been made.”

  She held her breath, expecting the inevitable.

  “You have until noon tomorrow,” I stated.

  Val said nothing in return, she stayed silent, and after she left I realized that her whole body had been tensed up, how her walk seems strange, rigid even. It took me a few moments to realize that her body language and her facial expression showed that she had been terrified. She had been terrified of me.

  Strangely enough it left me completely cold, impassive. Maybe there was a little hint of pride, but I didn’t feel bad. Somehow I know those times are over. And it’s scaring me just a little, because I still cannot relate how overwhelmed and powerless Jay must feel, while I feel invincible.

  Day 146

  Maybe that’s just the problem. I woke up and it was just me. No one checking up on me, no movements behind the window, all I hear are the cameras watching my every move. Maybe that’s the problem about having a beast inside of you; you feel so strong, so powerful, and so invincible that you lose focus. But why haven’t I turned yet? Why haven’t I lost control? Why do I feel as if the beast inside of me is nothing but a tame dog waiting for me to say “sic ‘em”?

  Why am I so different? What is different about me? Maybe I should hold back with my plans until Val can give me some answers. But then I am laying in my bed and the memory of feeling Jay’s arms around me and me wrapping myself around him came to me. I miss it so badly it physically hurts. I know I had only one normal day with him, and not even a full 24 hours, but it changed everything for me. That special day, I felt as if we could have something normal.

  I guess that was the point. Pretending to be generous and sympathetic giving us something we yearn for only to give it away. People always break down when the stress is over, because they’ve allowed themselves to relax and the body just shuts down. The mind works just the same.

  White gave us a break and it was the cruelest thing he could do to us, because
after that he took me away completely from Jay, took it all away. It would have been better for me if everything had stayed like it had been in the beginning. Like that it was a complete nightmare with one broken, shattered anti-hero to become the heroine for. Giving me a glance of how things could be...it made it all just so much more realistic.

  XXX

  Maybe I should be afraid of when my beast gets loose. Valerie sure is. She was very reserved and careful as she came in, explaining to me that she had to take my vitals. I could sense her fear and it is a despicable smell, which made me feel bad, somewhat.

  I feel as if I am losing myself. As if I am not realizing that this creature inside of me is slowly taking me over, infiltrating my cells without me realizing it.

  “What’s wrong with me, Val?” I could hear myself ask, and for the first time today she actually looked at me.

  “The infection has taken over your body,” she explained, locking her eyes to mine, worried. “There is no stopping it now, Meg, I’m sorry. The virus has changed you on a cellular level – your blood tests show it – and it hasn’t stopped yet.” She broke eye contact, and I could see in her expression that she felt guilty. “While you were in a coma I did everything I could to stop the progress, but since you have awakened, there is nothing I can do. We have to wait until the virus falls dormant.”

  “Can’t you do the same thing you did while I was in a coma?” I asked.

  “No,” she answered, shaking her head. “The virus has grown immune to all the anti-viruses I developed. I learned a lot, however, since you have woken up it seems as if the virus has learned to adapt to whatever step I could take; almost as if it has learned to anticipate my moves.”

  I didn’t share my thoughts, but for me the explanation was simple. The virus had woken up to its’ full potential because I was. It was improving because I was improving. It was growing stronger because I was growing stronger. What other explanation could there be? It was awake because I was?

  Was I really a potential threat?

  I still felt that if I finally saw Jay everything would fall into place. He would mend the ache I feel, soothe the pain, and make me whole again...but what if not?

  What if he hadn’t let his Beast out? What if he made things for me worse? What if he would wake up my beast like the time he had woken me up?

  All these questions make me doubt my initial plan. But I need to go through with it nonetheless. I need to see Jay and it is no one else’s choice than mine. Because I know for sure that if I don’t get to see and touch him soon, I’m going to lose it anyhow.

  Day 147

  Faking the pain was the hardest thing. I went to the toilet trying to remember the time when Jay had slashed me open as if my skin was nothing; I tried to combine it with that one-time my period was so painful that I wanted to crawl into a ball.

  Actually, I guess I did put up a good show. But the only reason why I had to go to the toilet was that I had stashed the test tube there. But also, I wanted to make sure that no one would look for a fetus. They should believe that I simply flushed it down. What really went down were the shards of the tube after I spilled my own blood over the parts of my body which made it believable that I just had a miscarriage.

  I didn’t clean my hands getting out of the room and as I opened the door the hardest thing was to actually cry. Any drama class teacher probably would have been very proud of me as I smeared the blood with one hand across the door frame before I let myself drop to the knees clutching my abdomen and letting my hair cover my dry face.

  Val was with me just seconds later, barking orders to her nurse, who instantly went into my bathroom, that I had prepared with blood drops and another handprint.

  Val wrapped her arms around me tightly and eventually pulled me into a hug, and I was lucky to bury my still tear-lacking face against her shoulder. But I didn’t really hear the exchange she had with the nurse.

  “It’s okay, Meghan.” Her attention was back on me, going with my act, yet the emotions in her voice were real.

  Grief and sorrow, but it was the guilt that got me.

  “It’s not your fault,” Val spoke quietly, it was almost a whisper. “Everything is going to be okay.” I could hear the doubt in those words. “It’s not your fault.”

  Hell, nothing of it was.

  What I felt in that moment was a different churning in my body, and this time it was a real one. It was my beast stirring, opening one eye again like a cat that had been bothered by a little disturbance. And that disturbance was anger. I was angry, angry at Val, for so many reasons that made no sense for me. Angry that she had tried to protect me, but kept me away from Jay, the only living being that needed me. And I was furious at everyone else. At Peter for betraying me, at me for buying it, at White for simply existing and believing what he did was right. At those two little beings that decided they didn’t want me as their mom.

  And that’s when the tears came. I didn’t realize that it was me at first: that strange sobbing, snorting sound, until I noticed that my face was hot and wet and something that felt like acid ran down my face. All of the sudden my whole body felt hot, melting. Instinctively I pushed Val away from me, the one who was confining my body, and a strange screeching sound filled my ears.

  I looked up, expecting Valerie to be only a few feet away from me, but I found her at the other end of the room, against the wall, gasping for air.

  That’s when a second gut-wrenching scream broke free from my throat and all strength escaped my body. I just slumped to the ground, embracing its coldness, while I could feel the beast oozing into my veins, giving me a strange, terrifying sensation of comfort.

  I still kept sobbing weakly and my tears streamed from my eyes, pouring all the pain I seemingly had stowed away somewhere deep inside of me, the very place where something new, warm, and powerful nestled down, licking my wounds from the inside.

  It was strong arms that lifted me up easily, and I think I heard a growl when it happened, but I was too out of it to listen carefully or open my eyes.

  There were no tears to be shed anymore and my body felt ice cold against the one that held me.

  I did roll into a ball when I realized that it was Jay and he was sitting down, no lying down, on my bed, holding me gently against him. He simply washed over me, cloaked me, and wrapped me into himself. That was what it felt like.

  It was a strange and yet so soothing a sensation to feel his skin against mine, his warmth against my cold, his scent of which I had never been that aware before, his breath breezing over my neck. And his heart beat against my ear. I couldn’t hear my own over his, or maybe our hearts were simply in sync.

  Soon after realizing that I even breathed the same as he did, feeling his chest rise and lower below my body that suddenly felt so small, I fell asleep.

  The first thing I thought when I came to was that it all had just been a dream, that I had just woken up and still had to carry out the plan, but then I realized the warmth radiating through my body and the even breath that brushed through my hair and down my neck. That scent which was wafting around me didn’t originate from any dream, it was real, just as the two arms around me that I knew so well.

  “Jay,” I whispered, almost inaudibly and he stirred beneath me.

  He had placed me on his lap with my leg pulled beneath me and somehow managed to cover me with a blanket.

  “I’m here,” he murmured against my hair, kissing the top of my head. “I got you.”

  Those two sentences almost made me bawl again, but I moved around just enough to look at him, and he loosened his grip on my body just enough so that I could. Jay pressed his lips against my forehead, almost as if he wasn’t able to bear my sight.

  I closed my eyes to his tender touch realizing that they were sore and swollen, but I didn’t want to give them any rest, I needed to see him. So I shifted around enough that I brought my legs next to his and could sit up.

  Jay took a deep breath while still looking down, until he c
arefully met my gaze, his eyes full of sorrow.

  At that moment I knew that he didn’t want to look at me because he didn’t want me to see his expression and be reminded of what I had lost. He obviously no idea that it didn’t just happen. Yet, my hands were still smeared with blood as I brought them up, wanting to hold his face.

  “Oh God,” it escaped me, his situation dawning on me.

  “I’m so sorry,” he whispered, his hands rubbing my shoulders and upper arms, obviously not knowing what else to do or say.

  I didn’t want to smear blood on his face or anywhere else for that matter, but I didn’t want to leave him either. And yet, if I did anything in that moment that showed that my body wasn’t wounded, White would see it on the cameras.

  “Can you...can you carry me to the bathroom?” I asked quietly and he nodded, moving around to get his feet on the ground, and me with him.

  We were alone in my hospital room and he was wearing a military outfit: a beige round neck t-shirt, those typical camouflage pants, and his boots, which were dirty.

  When we got into the bathroom he didn’t want to put me on my bare feet, but I placed one hand on the one that held my legs and he let go, gently, but kept his hands on my shoulders as I opened the faucet fully, knowing it would be noisy as I washed my hands.

  “The blood is a day old.” I barely moved my lips as I spoke tilting my head down so that the camera couldn’t see their movement. “I already lost it while I was in the coma. Val kept me here to keep me safe.”

  I got a cloth to clean my legs. He didn’t move or react.

  When I was finished I turned around to look at him and as our eyes met I could see that his had turned into this minty, corroded copper-y green.