Page 91 of The Ashes of Summer

Carter swears under his breath beside me, low, because he knows exactly what's happening in my head right now. He knows every scrap of control I own is already gone.

"Where's Vance?" Hayes asks, and his voice comes out strained.

Jackson's jaw ticks. Then his lips twitch, and it turns into a smile, and every man in this room understands what that means.

"Russell." He doesn't look away from me. "Bring in their friend, would you?"

One of them—scar running from the corner of his mouth to his ear—steps out, and the door hangs cracked behind him.

And I hear her.

Somewhere above us, far off and thin through concrete: my name. Screamed.

I go rigid. It could be the gas. It could be my own head giving me what I want to hear.

"She moans like a fucking goddess, Sheriff," Jackson says—and just like that I know it isn't in my head. Because he heard it too. He timed it. He said it over her voice on purpose.

I yank against the restraints until the skin tears across my wrists. Don't care. I'd take my own hands off at the joint to get to him.

He sees the blood run and smiles wider.

"There he is. The monster everyone calls Sheriff Jacob Darnell," he says, my name mocking in his mouth.

"Undo the restraints, Moore, and I'll show you."

Russell comes back in carrying an industrial bucket. Blood is running down the outside of it.

He reaches in and lifts out an arm.

I know it before I've finished looking. We all mocked him for that tattoo. Told him it was a bad idea putting a woman's name on your skin like that, permanent, no take-backs.

Charlotte.

He was talking last month about how he was going to ask her to marry him.

Someone behind me is throwing up—Hayes, by the sound of it.

"Boss." Carter's voice, low and urgent. "Don't let him win. Boss⁠—"

I barely hear him. All I can hear is Jackson's laugh.

I throw my whole weight sideways, trying to snap the frame, and all I do is put myself on the floor in a heap with the chair still bolted to me, in a worse position than I started in.

Jackson looks down at me and it's almost gentle.

"She's mine now. All of her belongs to me."

Hayes hits the floor beside me, his own chair going over as he lunges. "YOU FUCKING CUNT!"

Jackson doesn't even glance at him. His eyes stay on me.

"I think tomorrow I'll bring her down here." Cold slides straight through my chest. "Maybe I'll let you watch while I fuck her."

Groves loses whatever was left of him—roaring, thrashing hard enough that both guards bring their rifles up.

But Carter goes still.

Frighteningly still. Because Carter sees it. Jackson isn't wasting his time on the men who are screaming.