There’s a set of stairs leading down into a basement, and without hesitation, they shove me straight down them. As I fall, my body slams into each step on my way to the ground, crying out in agony. My chest hits the corner of a step. My hip. My waist. My thigh. Until I come to a stop at the bottom.
I shove my hand beneath me, trying to push up from the dirty ground, when I find a set of black boots standing right in front of me. “Oh, I’m gonna enjoy this,” the man rumbles as the other two come down the stairs.
“No,” I cry, devastation ripping through me.
He bends down and grabs me, dragging me through the basement as I try to fight free, quickly realizing this is so much more than just a basement. It’s a prison. There are cells lining either side of the room. Chains. Weapons. Men broken and bruised in bloodied heaps on the ground.
What the fuck is this place? The answer comes before the question has even finished forming in my head. It’s a torture chamber. Somewhere for these assholes to conduct their bullshit without getting caught, and Stone and I have somehow fallen straight into it.
We come to a stop, and as I hastily try to find my bearings, I’m thrown down in front of a cell, my face slamming against the metal bars.
I cry out, but the agony turns to horror as I look up and see Stone laying on the ground. “No,” I breathe, my chest heaving. Why isn’t he moving? “Stone?”
Fuck. No. He can’t be dead. “STONE!”
I pull against the bars, shoving my arm through the gap and frantically trying to reach for him. Thick sobs catch in my throat. “No, no, no.”
This can’t be happening. He can’t be gone. I need him.
“Stone.”
Heavy wails tear from my chest, and as my fingers try to grasp his arm, a hand locks around my ankle and drags me back across the ground. “NO,” I scream, terror gripping me in a chokehold as a heavy chain is wrapped around my ankle. “NO!”
I desperately thrash against their hold as a large hook is lowered from the ceiling, but I’m held down. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.
Terror, grief, and agony rip through me, and as my heavy sobs mix with my horrified screams, the chains at my ankles are pushed over the massive meat hook. Someone starts pulling on a lever, and the chains tighten against the hook before pulling me up. Their hands release me, letting the hook hoist me up off the ground, dangling me like a goddamn fish. A loud gasp echoes through the cells.
“Fuck,” Stone grunts, and I whip my head toward his cell, finding him on the ground, grasping at his ribs as he drags a hand down his face.
Relief pounds through my veins, realizing he was only unconscious. “STONE,” I scream.
His head snaps up as though reality is only just coming back to him, and despite the pain he must be in, he launches to his feet, grasping the bars so hard they shake. His eyes are on mine, wide and filled with the kind of fear I’ve never seen from him, not when we were escaping the prison, not when we were beingchased by the police, not even when he dropped to his knees outside the warehouse and submitted to these assholes.
“Stone,” I cry, terrified of what’s about to come. The blood quickly rushes to my head as I’m hung upside down.
He looks between me and the man who met me at the bottom of the stairs. “Let her go,” he growls, his tone filled with a bone-chilling venom.
The man walks right up to the bars of Stone’s cell, a slow grin stretching across his lips. “Well, look at that,” he rumbles, excitement brimming in his wicked tone. “Not quite as untouchable as you thought. Now, buckle in and enjoy the show. This is about to get messy.”
And with that, one of his henchmen steps up to me, holding a metal bar before swinging it hard and slamming it right into my chest.
27
STONE
Pain surges through my broken ribs as I grasp the metal bars, watching in horror as Nico takes the crowbar and smashes it against Aria’s side, the bar already tearing into her delicate skin and bringing blood to the surface, seeping through her clothes.
“I’LL FUCKING KILL YOU FOR THIS,” I roar, white-knuckling the bars as Aria cries out in pain, the sound slaughtering something deep inside me. It’s the same sound that had me turn into the man I am today, the sound that pushed me to slaughter six men, one of them being my kid brother. There’s nothing that I wouldn’t do, no extreme I wouldn’t take, no life I wouldn’t end, in order to keep from hearing that agony.
Talon spares a glance at me, the cocky smirk resting on his lips. “I’d like to see you try.” And with that, he nods at his men to keep going.
Collaroy doesn’t hold back, hitting her again and again, and with every mark he leaves on her precious skin, a piece of me dies. It fucking kills me, and as I shake the bars, listening to her agonized screams and whimpers, there’s not a goddamn thing I can do but endure it.
They taunt her, laughing as they mark her body, and as she hangs upside down, doing what she can to protect her face with her arms, all she can do is stare back at me and take the abuse. “I’m sorry,” I whisper, hoping she truly knows just how fucking sorry I am. This is on me.
“Stone,” she cries, the tears springing from her beautiful eyes.
It crushes me, and I shake my head, having no fucking idea how to make it stop. “Please,” I beg. “I’ll do anything. Just stop hurting her. You have my word. I’ll—”
