“No. We’d just gotten done…never mind.”
“Gotten done doing what?”
“Nothing!”
“If we look around the area, I don’t suppose we’ll see any tortured bodies. That guy named Brett you mentioned, perhaps?”
I snap my eyes to his, my mouth gaping before I fully grasp the severity of the situation I’m in.
The look he gives me tells me he knows.
“Where’s Hunter?” I ask, desperate.
“Consider him gone.”
It feels like my entire world is crashing in on itself.
Gone. What does that even mean? The woman said he was in the holding.
But he’s the one with authority.
Tears well in my eyes, but I refuse to give in to the chaotic emotions roiling my insides.
I can’t go on. Not without Hunter.
But what choice do I have?
“I want to go.”
“Not gonna happen.”
“What are you going to do to me?”
“First, we’re going to fix you up.” His voice has the texture of coarse sandpaper. “Can’t say what will happen after that.”
“I hate you!”
“I’m used to that. My name is Cole, by the way. I run the place that saved your fucking life.”
“Well, maybe I’d rather be dead!”
“Christine will get you fixed up and fed.”
I look over at the angry woman in the lab coat. She must be Christine.
“We will talk again soon. And I expect you’ll tell me what I want to hear. The Vultures have been a pain in my ass for far too long, and it’s about time I take care of business.”
I turn away as he gets up and leaves, angry because I can’t make sense of anything.
Deep down, my heart aches in a way I hadn’t thought possible. Somehow, despite everything I’ve been through, despite men treating me like utter filth, I fell in love.
With a monster. Someone so dark, the ugliness inside him spread to me.
And it was beautiful.
I loved him.
And all of his flaws.
