Mary searches her sister’s face before she nods once. Sealing my fate. In that moment I lose my humanity and become an object.
Margaret flings her arms around her sister. “Thank you. You know I’d help you out if you needed me. I promise, no one will be able to figure it out.”
Then the two crazy bitches hug it out again before they both turn to me. And what I see in their eyes reflecting back is terrifying. Everything happens at warp speed then.
I don’t get the chance to struggle when I get hauled out of the car. Mary between hugging her sister and opening the car door has embraced her psycho side. She’s unnecessarily rough, dragging me out the car with a fist full of hair before pressing the blade of the knife to my throat, marching me inside the old barn.
“Sit fucking down.” She shoves me in the chest, and I somehow land on an old wooden farm chair without falling off.
As soon as I sit, she changes her mind. “Stand up.”
Her changing her mind is not at all what happens. Mary grabs handfuls of my clothes and uses the knife to cut them off.
The instant she sees the fading hickeys, she slaps me across the face. My fear explodes, drowning out the pain. I don’t move an inch, I don’t say a word, but I do start praying she doesn’t notice the concealer covering my bonding scars. I do okay, allthings considered, until she slices my underwear and rips my bra and panties off, and then I start begging.
Fear makes me plead for my life, it also has my body locking up. I’m as stiff as a board, my arms or legs not bending. But I’m not doing it intentionally. A primal part of me fights desperately against being tied to the chair knowing how bad it will be.
Margaret slaps my face so fucking hard I see nothing but glittering stars in my eyes, but I still can’t move. She does it a second, third time and only stops when Mary steps in.
“Margaret, you said we weren’t allowed to bruise her. It would kill the deal, right? Come on, she’s shit scared and shaking like a fucking leaf. You do her legs and I’ll do her arms.”
They prod and poke my body to where they need it to be before they use rope to keep me bent into shape. I start to hyper-ventilate when the two of them work together to spread open my legs, using all the rope they have to make sure they stay open too.
The final humiliation, they turn me to face the door.
By the time they’re driving away, I can’t get any air in my lungs. Tears stream down my face.
I’m so fucking scared but no matter how hard I try to yell for help nothing comes out.
Chapter
Forty-Seven
STEEL
Our plan turns to shit even before we’re a day’s ride out from where we marked on the map. Of course it does. But it’s a thousand times worse because Rex calls, demanding I meet him back at the Riders’ compound.
We ride hard. We’ve got fucking miles to make up and not enough time to do it. The first day we must spend a solid nine hours gunning it back before we even pull over for a piss.
Swinging off my bike, my foot barely touches the ground and King’s angry as fuck. My phone starts up and seeing Tyson’s name instead of Mav’s has my stomach feeling like acid.
I take the call, and Tyson’s already talking. “You good?”
“As much as,” I answer carefully. Living in the compound we’ve had to come up with a code of some sort in case my phone is being bugged. The fact Tyson is using my burner phone has the feeling of dread picking up.
“You sure?”
“As fucking good as! What gives?” I snap impatiently, already fucking knowing he’s got bad shit to tell me.
“I’ve got a patient inbound to emergency. Car wreck, one male who’s unconscious but breathing. Supposedly stable,needing X-rays to confirm no internal bleeding. And a CT scan for possible head trauma.”
It feels like I can’t get air in my lungs. “Mav?” I slam my eyes shut hoping I ain’t hearing right. “And what about?”
“No sign.” Tyson’s clinical in how he speaks, but I know he’s also fucking relieved he took the locum position at the big hospital near The Fallen compound.
“How? They had eyes on them.”
“They did. But then they didn’t. I’ll call you as soon as I know what I’m working with.” My brother ends the call without another word, but it’s too risky to keep asking questions.
