Still on my knees,I stared at the man tied to a chair. Blood covered him, smeared across his skin, soaking his clothes, and dripping slowly from his fingers to the floor.
It wasn’t until he raised his head that I realized who he was.
The guy from the library who’d warned me about the Night Sons.
A single spotlight shone above him, revealing his every injury, like he was on display in some morbid museum.
His eyes were swollen shut, bruised and purple. Dried blood streaked across his face, cracked in the cuts carved into his skin. Fresh blood trickled from his crooked nose onto his shirt.
The white button-up he’d worn earlier was torn and stained with blood and dirt. It looked like they’d brought him here the same way they brought me, except they didn’t give him the dignity of walking.
Instead, they haddraggedhim.
As if my appearance lit a fuse inside him, he fought against his restraints. His screams were muffled beneath the tape stretched across his lips. He threw his weight around, trying to tip the chair, but it didn’t move. The metal legs were bolted to the concrete floor.
A rancid taste filled my mouth.
I’d been so wrong about the Night Sons.
They weren’t some entitled frat boys who hazed, bullied, and committed petty crimes to pass their time. They were darker than that. Crueler than that.
They inflicted pain not for their survival but because it made them feel alive. Because watching suffering made them feel powerful.
And worst of all, they knew no one could stop them.
With their stature and money, they were untouchable.
The windowless room’s air was damp and reeked of blood and sweat. We hadn’t walked far enough to leave campus, but this place wasn’t on the map in Arisono’s welcome packet. That was the kind of information they should include.
Not curfews or dress codes.
But places where you could be taken hostage.
Since we walkeddownsteps, not up, my guess was that we were underground.
Breaking my gaze away from the chair, I desperately scanned my surroundings. A metal table stood beside the chair, with a variety of instruments—pliers, knives, hammers—meant for tearing into flesh and causing pain.
Rusted nails littered the floor, some of them nicking my feet.
I fought back the tears stinging my eyes when my gaze landed on something a few inches from the table.
Is that a … finger?
It was most definitely a finger.
Severed clean at the knuckle with the nail still intact.
My heart spasmed, exhausted from tonight’s endless plot twists.
I gulped as Enzo appeared at my side like death itself.
The urge to swat him away like a gnat swept through me. He loomed over me, like a guillotine ready to fall. I lifted my chin, glowering at him in defiance.
Irefused to beg or plead.
I’d rather choose decapitation.
Lower the guillotine, asshole.
