The voices. They’re back. So I’m not dead after all. Or, maybe I am and this is what Hell is like at first. A load of weird scary shit to make you really think hard about what you did to land yourself a place here. That’s the thing. I don’t know.
I try to move; my arms and legs are tethered. I try to crack open my eyes, but still I see nothing but darkness. Yet…I feel movement. Hear whispers. Air brushes my cheek and I feel a presence close.
“Riley,” a deep, slightly accented voice says in my ear. “Can you hear me?”
I’m not sure if I’m who they think I am, but I try to respond. My mouth is frozen, lips won’t move. I try to scream. Nothing comes out.
“Shhh,
The surrounding noises infiltrate my brain, and I detect a low, constant humming. Almost a whistle at times. I stop fighting, stop trying to see, and just fall back into the shadows.
I awaken to a jerking motion. This time, even for only a few seconds, I can see. I’m riding in something. A car? A train? Feels more like a train, and I can hear that constant clack-clack of the tracks. Where the hell am I? I stretch my eyes open farther, and I can barely see out of the window next to me. It’s light outside. Foggy. And just as I look, we disappear into a tunnel bored straight into the mountain. Then, it’s dark again, exhaustion overwhelms me, and I drift back to sleep with the clack-clack of the train as a lullaby.
When next I awaken, I know nothing except pain. Pain and starvation. Why won’t someone feed me? I want to cry, and no tears will come. Fury overcomes me, and I gather what little energy I have to thrash against bonds still holding me prisoner. I don’t know how long I fight, but it feels like a long damn time. Hands hold me down. Then, a scent washes over me. Exotic. Sensual. Seductive. I feel the fight leave me in hopes of replacing it with whatever accompanies the intoxicating scent. Eventually, though, I tire. I give up. The scent disappears as fast as it came upon me.
More whispers. One voice in particular whispers close to my ear in a language I don’t understand. This one, whoever he is, is pulseless. And he never leaves my side. Always there, always touching. Then, as suddenly as I had awakened, I fall back into a deep, deep sleep.
“Jake, hold her steady,” the accented voice commands.
“Damn me, but I am,” someone responds. “She’s like a rabid fecking dog.”
“Eli, move over,” another male voice says. “I got this.”
“Hell no, Miles,” the accented voice says. “You keep that shit to yourself.”
Male laughter. “It’s either me or Victorian. Which do you prefer, Eli?”
“Neither,” he responds.
More male laughter.
“You boys mustn’t horse around so,” an elderly voice, also accented, commands. “That’s the only bit of Preacher’s herbs we have left.”
“Well, she needed more than I thought she would, Papa,” another replies.
“My father has called,” yet another voice offers. “He wishes us to gather in the library.”
“You don’t have a padded room or something?” another adds. “She’s going to go buck-fuck wild when we turn her loose.”
“We’ll see about that,” another says. “She can’t be all that strong.”
More male laughter.
Energy courses through me now, and I’m angry. Pissed. Three males, all pulseless, surround me in some room I don’t recognize. I’ve got to get out. Get away.
I lunge at the one closest to me and wrap my legs around his neck. We fall to the floor.
“Goddamn!” he mutters, and I twist around his body. In a half second I have him pinned, and just as I’m ready to strike, I’m knocked backward. I land on my feet, dazed for only a second. I lower, crouch, and eye my next target. He’s closest to the window.
I’ll go out of it if I have to.
“Eli, she’s going for the window,” one wisely notices.
I’m already moving. I fake left, bound off first a wooden bench, then the wall, use one male’s chest as leverage and I push off, landing square on the sill in a crouch. I turn, glaring at my captors, daring them to come near me. The one I just pushed off of is just now picking himself up off the floor. I’m barely out of breath. One is moving toward me slowly.
“Noah,” one says. “Watch your back. She’s ready to pounce.”
I seek him out. He grins. “I’m ready for it,” he says. Cocky bastard.
Oh, hell no, he isn’t. In one jerky motion I’m at him, legs wrapped around his waist, his neck in a choke hold.
“Fuck!” he yells, and tries to shake me off. I hold tighter. His arm reaches up to grab me, and I land two punches on his jaw. One more in his eye. All under three seconds. So fast he doesn’t have time to react until I’m already finished. I pull my strength and use his body to push off of. I’m back on the window sill, glaring.
“Look at her eyes,” another says. “Almost white.”
“Bad juju right there,” the grinning one says. “I mean
“She needs to be fed,” one replies, and his gaze hasn’t left mine the whole time. “Arcos? You taking care of that?”
“Already done,” he answers. “Hurry.”
I wait no longer. In the next breath I leap upward with all my strength, grasping one long rafter with my fingertips. It’s enough. I pull myself up, then crouch and ease to the far corner of the room, high above all the others.
“Oh, shit,” one says. “I told you this was a bad idea.”
“How the hell are we going to get her down?” another asks.
“We wait,” the one who constantly stares says. “She’ll tire. She’ll get hungry. She’ll come down.”
I peer at all of them from my corner rafter, high above the floor. I’m in the dark, swamped by shadows, but they all can see me perfectly clear. I grasp my beam and hold tight. I sit. I stare. I wait.
“Here. Sit up and drink this. You’ll feel better.”
My eyes crack open, and light pours in. Someone must have pulled me off the rafters. My body aches, and I feel beaten. I squint, blink rapidly, and allow the pulseless male to cradle my head. Something firm nudges my lips, the scent of nutrients stings my nostrils and I open my mouth like a baby bird awaiting a worm. Warm liquid drizzles down my throat. In seconds, I do feel better. No energy, but at least that roaring, fiery pain has disappeared. I drink for a while. Minutes. Finally finished, I drift. Again, I sleep.
“Wake her, Noah,” an elderly accented voice commands.
“All right,” he drawls. “Someone hold this for me.”
“I hate this,” a now familiar voice mutters.
I am awake. I’m just so drowsy I keep my eyes closed. I hear the voices around me. Suddenly, though, I get a whiff of…something. Then, it disappears. Then…an erotic feeling crashes over me and my eyes pop wide open. I stare into the painfully beautiful face of the same man whose ass I whipped the last time. Now, though, I don’t want to fight. I grasp him around the neck, pull his mouth to mine, and kiss him. Hard. He kisses me back, but I barely notice because my fingers are searching for an edge of cloth—his clothes—to yank off. I can’t get enough of him. I find skin. Stomach. Rigid muscles. I grope. He moans. I moan—
“Noah!” the familiar voice warns. I barely hear him, so engaged in disrobing whoever was driving me sexually insane. Just the feel of his tongue against mine nearly makes me orgasm.
