“Our jobs will never touch you, because we don’t go by our real names for our less than legal work,” she explains. “Henri is going to drive us home, where the guys will be waiting in the basement.”
Basement?!
Winter and I hold hands pensively, not wanting to talk in front of a stranger while he drives us back to the house. Henri opens the door for us as we get out, and Cassidy walks us to a black door below the stairs to the front door. Pulling out her house keys, she opens it, leading us into the basement from the street access.
I walked past this door earlier, and had no idea where it led to since the first floor has a full flight of stairs to get to it.
Winter squeezes my hand as Cassidy closes the door behind us and locks it.
“You home?” she calls out.
“In the back,” Abbott calls out. “You’re just in time for the fun.”
Oh shit. What are we in for?
Chapter
Twelve
WINTER
My skin feelsclammy as I clutch Bellamy’s hand. I didn’t think I’d hear the name Summer again, and I especially didn’t think I’d see one of my rapists so soon after leaving The Hug Project.
“Coming!” Cassidy says to Abbott urgently. “Okay. I don’t want to leave you two alone right now. Abbott isn’t going to allow that man to ever hurt you again. His existence will be scrubbed from the world in the most painful way possible. It’s not going to be pretty.”
“Good,” I growl fiercely. I don’t typically growl, but I feel very strongly about this. The memories are foggy, but the pain is very real.
It’s always going to be very odd how my mind will protect me from some things, but light up others in neon lights.
“It’s up to you if you want to come watch,” she finishes, her gorgeous green eyes on me.
“Yes,” Bellamy replies for the both of us, feeling my resolve. “We want to stay.”
I nod, knowing she wants my response as well.
“Okay then,” she says. “Welcome to the shit show.”
We follow behind Cassidy as she walks, and my eyes bounce around the basement. There’s a gym exactly as she told us when she was giving us the house tour, but not much else until she passes through a wide door where beautiful finished wood floors give way to cement.
There’s a rolling cart that reminds me of something I used to use in my bathroom in another life, and it’s loaded up with pliers, tools, knives, etc. I’m not sure what half of the items are, but I suppose I don’t need to.
The man who frequented the darker side of The Hug Project is suspended in the air from leather straps that are wrapped around his arms. His clothing is being cut off his body, and I stare at the lone loafer on the ground. Bellamy kisses my temple before he leaves me to pick up the shoe.
The man is struggling despite his bonds, but there’s no way in hell he’s going to get out of them. He even attempts to kick Shiloh, who calmly karate chops the man’s thighs, deadening the muscles from working properly. Now, all he can do is hang limply until the feeling comes back.
Bell lobs the thing at the man’s head, who gasps as his head snaps back. Bellamy’s not interested in sports, but that was a freakishly accurate throw.
“Good one,” Shiloh says. “Why do I get the feeling that shoe committed a crime outside of being pretentious as fuck?”
“Bad memories,” I reply, wrapping my arms around my body. I don’t enjoy reliving the things that have happened to me, and I don’t know these men.
Despite the way they care for Bellamy and I, they're still strangers.
“Winter,” Abbott says, his heavy footsteps taking him to me. Glancing at his shoes, I see they’re also leather, but they’re laced up and black. They almost remind me of a boot. My eyesmove up his body, finding he never brought his jacket. Glancing behind me, I catch a glimpse of it tossed over the picnic basket Cassidy left at the entrance to the room.
My mind is a jumbled mess, and I massage my temple where Bellamy kissed me earlier before I turn back to Abbott. My head aches from the adrenaline dump when I realized who the alpha calling Bellamy and I whores really was.
“Yeah?” I ask, the word barely heard.
