“Yes. Here. Now.” I press my lips to his, fingers tangling in his shaggy hair. He kisses me back with such fervor, I feel it down to my toes. “I love you, Dax. I don’t know how we get out of this. But you have to know. I love you.”
With a guttural roar, his entire body strains, the muscles of his arms cording, and a sharp snap echoes in the dim room as he breaks free from the zip tie. Then…his arms are around me, holding me tight.
“I love you,” he whispers, over and over like a mantra. “I love you. I love you.”
33
Evianna
When Dax lets me go, the coppery scent of blood clings to me, and I scan his body. “Oh shit. Your wrists.”
“I’ve had worse,” he mutters, and bends his knees to feel for the zip tie around his ankles. “I need something for leverage if I want to snap these. Look around, darlin’. Tell me what you see. Where are we?”
“I don’t know.” My eyes don’t want to focus for more than a minute at a time, and I grab onto his arm as the room spins for a few seconds. “Noah…he did something to me. I’m…dizzy.”
“Evianna, take a slow, deep breath in. Focus on a point on the wall. Just one point. Release the breath for a count of six. One, two…”
By the time Dax reaches six, my heart has stopped hammering against my chest and we’re no longer on a tilt-a-whirl. “I’m okay. How’d you do that?”
He traces patterns on the back of my neck, and the slow, rhythmic motion calms me even more. “Training. Now what do you see?”
“It’s not a big room. Maybe…fifteen by fifteen. Low ceiling. There’s a stack of pallets in the back corner. The wooden ones. With slats. Flattened cardboard boxes behind them. Empty. It’s some kind of storeroom, I think.”
“Any of those pallets broken? Can you get me a piece of wood?”
“Maybe.” I crawl across the room, not trusting myself to stand yet. But all of the pallets are intact. I kick at them, thinking maybe I can break one of the planks, but then realize I’m only wearing one shoe.
Shoe.
“Dax, will the heel of my shoe work?”
“Maybe?” He rubs his temples, wincing. “Worth a try.”
By the time I reach his side again, I feel like I’ve run a marathon. “There’s nothing else in here. No water. No food. They can’t keep us here forever…can they?”
Dax caresses my thigh, skimming his hand down my calf until he finds my black pump and eases it off my foot. When he speaks, he keeps his voice low. “They tied me up, but not you. Which tells me they don’t want to put any marks on you. So they’re planning on using you for something—going somewhere, making a public statement. But me…they’re probably keeping me alive as leverage.”
“Leverage?”
I flinch as he wedges the heel between his ankles and yanks, hard. The zip tie snaps, and he stretches his legs out with a groan. “Leverage, darlin’. To get you to do whatever they need you to do.”
“How do we get out of here?” I say, my voice cracking on the last word.
“Get me to the door?” He tries to climb to his feet and ends up on his hands and knees.
“Together,” I say, wrapping my arm around his waist. After three tries, we’re upright, and I lead him, my legs trembling, to the rusty door. “There’s no handle. It’s…folded over on itself or something.” Taking his hand, I rest his fingers against the mangled metal.
“Fuck. Look up. Vents. Cameras. Anything we can use. Anything at all.”
I take my time, scanning the entire room, floor to ceiling, one wall after another. “There’s an air vent. Opposite side of the room from the pallets—almost in the corner. But…that’s it.”
A loud thud sounds from outside the door, and I yelp. “Dax? What do we do?”
“Across the room, darlin’. Stand in the corner. Look scared. Try to distract them.”
I stumble, almost crash to the ground, but I make it to the pallets as the door opens. Broad shoulders, a solid gut, and the ugly version of Johnny Depp’s face fill the narrow opening, and I don’t have to act scared. I’m terrified.
“Don’t…please,” I beg, trying to wedge myself behind the pallets.
