There is one thing I can do, to make sure my friends are found.
I can make a hell of a scene, enough noise that someone will be forced to come out and check what’s going on and will hopefully find them before anything bad can happen. Leaving them here, passed out on the stone-cold ground, late at night, is the worst thing I can possibly think of, but taking them with us is even harder. I have to make a choice right now, and I know what that choice is going to be.
Mind spinning, I lash out with my fist, hitting Mick so hard in the balls that he releases me with a bellow. I then raise my knee and hit him so hard he stumbles backward, roaring a curse as Sharleen steps up to me, raising the gun. I don’t think, I just swing my fist, hitting her in the side of the face before she has the chance to shoot. I want her to shoot, I want someone to hear, I just don’t want the shot to be in my direction.
“You fucking bitch,” she screeches, pressing a hand to her face, gun still outstretched in front of her.
I swing again, this time she ducks out of the way and the gun fires, missing me by a matter of inches. My head is pounding, and my vision is blurring, but I’m not letting these mother fuckers take me without a fight. I lunge at Sharleen, clawing at her face as we both fall backward, but before I can take another step, Mick’s arm is around my waist and he’s shoving me down onto the ground, pressing my face into the sidewalk.
I scream in frustration but stop when I feel the cold steel of the gun against the back of my head. Face burning as it scratches against the rough cement, my entire world freezes as Mick’s vicious voice comes sliding through the night. “I have no problem blowing your little fucking brains all over this parking lot. You try one more thing, I’ll kill you. I will destroy you. Do you hear me?”
I don’t answer—a tear rolls out and soaks the rough surface below me.
He slams the gun over the back of my head, and I cry out in agony.
“I said, do you fucking hear me?”
“He’ll kill you,” I breathe. “He’ll fucking kill you.”
“He can try, now get up.”
He reaches down and hauls me up, and then before I can so much as say another word, his arm comes around and that cloth touches my face, sending me slowly into oblivion.
In moments, my world is black.
I tried.
I really tried.
I JERK AWAKE, NOT COMING out of my haze slowly. One minute I’m in darkness, the next I’m wide awake and staring into a pit of nothingness. I can’t see anything, I can’t hear anything except the rapid pounding of my heart. I don’t know where I am, I don’t even know how long I’ve been out, but I know I’m in deep, deep trouble. I struggle to move, only to find that I’m bound. My arms are behind my back and my feet are tied together so tightly my ankles throb.
I cry out when I try to wiggle, and the binds cut angrily into my skin. I growl in frustration and blink rapidly to try and adjust my eyes in the darkness. I relive my last moments, and I remember Mick and Sharleen. They must have been following us. Watching us. There is no other way they could have possibly found us without having been watching our every move. All along Sharleen was working with Jagger’s father. All along she was betraying him. We should have known; how could we have been so naïve? I wiggle again, but the pain is just too much.
Footsteps outside the door alert me that someone is coming, and a few seconds later it opens, and the light is flicked on. God, Deja vu flashes over me as I recall having been here before. I clamp my eyes shut at the blinding light. When I finally manage to crack my eyelids, I see Mick standing at the door with Sharleen. They’re both looking down at me, and while Mick’s expression is thoughtful, Sharleen’s is just sadistic.
She’s loving every second of this.
Every single second.
“You’re up.” Mick smiles. “How are you feeling, Willow, my dear?”
“Hopefully as bad as your balls are feeling,” I mutter. “Hope you and Sharleen weren’t planning on having any kids, because I made sure you won’t.”
Remembering the way he bellowed when I kicked him earlier is the only highlight in this moment.
“Now, now, don’t go getting mouthy with me. I’m not going to hurt you.”
“Bullshit,” I spit. “You’re a liar and a coward!”
Mick’s jaw clenches and his eyes flash. He doesn’t like being called names, it’s the only time his composure truly slips.