“I… I don’t understand,” I manage.
“Then your brother hasn’t done a very good job educating you in the ways of The Society. I’ll be sure to remedy that.” He shifts his gaze over me. “Dex.”
“Let’s go,” Dex says.
“But… Carlton?” I ask as I stumble toward the door.
Carlton glances at me then back down at the sheet as if I haven’t spoken at all. As if these men kidnapping me, and let’s be clear that is exactly what they’re doing, is totally normal. Acceptable.
“Dex,” my devil calls out and we stop. “If she gives you any trouble, keep her in the dark.”
Dark? Where the hell does he plan on taking me?
Dex nods and we’re out the door, his grip painful around my arm. When he closes the door behind us, I hear Carlton’s angry tone, his out-of-control tone. The one that tells me he won’t be getting his way, not tonight. Not against these men.
I look around as Dex leads me to the foyer. My heels clicking loudly on the onyx-veined white and gray marble. I think he’s going to take me up the marble staircase, but we pass it and the farther we move from the double front doors, the more urgent my fight becomes.
“You’re hurting me!”
He doesn’t bother to reply, just drags me toward a dimly lit corridor.
“Where are we going?” I ask, trying to pry his fingers from my arm as panic sends adrenaline through my veins.
He turns to me and I find myself leaning back. “Keep your voice down,” he says calmly. He unlocks and opens a steel door at the very end of the corridor.
I peer around him as he switches on the lights, but I don’t have to see anything to know we’re going into a basement. I smell the cool, earthy scent of an underground space. He keeps hold of me as we descend and I clutch my free hand around the uneven railing nailed into the stone wall.
“Where are you taking me?” I try again, counting my steps, looking in either direction once we’re at the bottom. A light blinks at the far end of the corridor to my left like the bulb is about to burn out. The other to my right is better lit and I see it’s lined by a row of old doors.
“Catacombs.”
I freeze. “What?”
He grins when he gets a look at my face. I’m sure I’ve gone white as a ghost.
“Catacombs?”
“Just kidding. We won’t go that deep.”
Kidding? I struggle against him, but he carries on, dragging me to the right. I’m grateful for that at least as I crane my neck to look behind me. I watch that bulb flicker once more then go out, plunging that other corridor into darkness.
When we reach the last door, he opens it, reaching in to switch on the light. A single light bulb brightens the room. It hangs naked from a wire at the center of the ceiling in this windowless room. A small bed is pushed against one wall, beside it, a nightstand with worn legs and a drawer that hangs askew. On it sits a shadeless lamp without a bulb inside. On the floor is a threadbare rug.
I turn to Dex who is watching me.
“What is this?”
“Old servant’s quarters. Not in use anymore, obviously. This is the half you want to be in, trust me.”
Trust him?
I look at the opposite corridor, the darker of the two, then back at him.
He gestures for me to enter.
I shake my head. “I need to talk to my brother. I need—”
“I can take the bulb away. I promise you, you do not want that. Pitch black is pitch black down here.”