I wait with bated breath for Vlad to walk through the door. The air whooshes from my lungs the moment he walks in. My jaw unhinges and my eyes widen in shock—what the hell is he doing here?
“You look surprised to see me, baby.” His voice is firm but the anger that laces it gives me pause. His brown eyes burn unfiltered hate as he runs his gaze over me. He flicks his gaze to the guard that stands closest to him nodding toward the Russian that is chained beside me.
Oh my god!
They arehismen. I’m not in Russia, I’m Knight’s fucking prisoner!
“There it is!” My gaze flickers to him of its own accord, a cruel smile stretches across his face. “You finally realized you’re not being held by your father.” I feel the Russian’s gaze on me as he is dragged to Knight and pushed to his knees. I fight the gag that wants to break free when I spot the trail of literal shit that followed him. Knight keeps his gaze on me as he asks my cellmate a question.
“You know her?”
“Da,” the traitor answers. Knight’s eyes darken with anger but I keep my face blank. He has drawn the wrong conclusion and I will not be the one to right it. How could he fucking do this to me? I mentally berate myself as soon as I think that. I have given him no reason to trust me, or even disclosed who I really am. I guess I asked for this in a way.
“Who is she?” he demands whilst still keeping his gaze trained on me. I brace myself for the pussy to rat me out and tell Knight exactly who I am, but he doesn’t. Instead he throws his head back and laughs like a maniac.
“You fool, you have invited a snake into the lion’s den and don’t even know it.” His Russian accent is thick. I didn’t think it possible, but I am actually grateful to the punk for not snitching and trying to save his own ass. Knight grips the guy’s hair and yanks his head back. Thanks to the cuffs, the guy can’t even fight against him. Knight opens his free hand out to the side and within a few seconds one of the guards places a large hunting knife in his hand. Everyone in this room knows what is about to begin. I don’t show weakness, keeping my gaze on Knight as he lifts the blade and begins to scalp the fucker. Two guards rush forward and keep the screaming Russian as still as they can while their leader goes about his business.
* * *
I thought the music was bad, don’t get me wrong it was fucking horrific, but listening to the screams of this fucker is driving me insane. Blood is everywhere—splattered on the white walls, on the ground, some is even on me. Each time I’ve drifted to sleep, Knight has ordered one of the guards to slap me awake. After the third time, I mouthed off promising to kill the fucker. Knight stormed over to me and rammed his thumb in the bullet hold in my shoulder. I screamed so fucking loud, I couldn’t stop the tears from falling. Being the sick fuck that he is, Knight smiled down at me and licked the tears from my face.
“What do you want done with… him?” The sound of one of the guard’s voices pulls me from my haze. I snort drawing their attention. There is nohimleft, the guy is in fucking pieces, fingers, toes, hands, feet, scalp and even his fucking nipples are littered around the room. Every time he passed out from the pain, he would be given a shot of adrenaline to wake his ass up. Knight wanted him awake to feel every ounce of his rage.
“Clear it, every piece.” None of them speak as they roll out a plastic sheet and place a blue tarp on top of it. The six of them begin placing pieces of the guy on the tarp. Once he isall together,they roll it up and duct tape it closed before carrying him out without backward glance. I slowly turn back to Knight when it is just him and me left, sweat coats every part of my body, my breaths are coming rapid pants, I’m burning up. I know for a fact after Knight shoved his finger in my wound that I have an infection. I hope it kills me before he does. He lost his brother and he doesn’t need to be the one to kill me. He already got fucked over once from the mother to his brother’s daughter, he doesn’t need to carry the burden of my death on top of that.
“Just do it,” I rasp out, then begin to cough. His upper lip twitches as he runs his gaze over me. I must look like shit but I don’t care.
“I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction of ending things so easily. By the time I am done with you, not even your father will be able to recognize you.”
It’s not his words that cause me pain, it’s the look in his eyes. He has retreated so far inside his own mind that I don’t know if anyone will be able to bring him back. Which tells me one thing, Rook didn’t make it.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“No, but you will be.”
“I’m not sorry for what’s about to come, I’m only sorry for your loss.” That has him standing straight. His eyes hold my own without so much as blinking for the longest time. He moves so fast I don’t even have time to tense before his hand is around my throat squeezing the life from me. I gasp for air, fighting against my restraints to no avail. The pain in my shoulder doesn’t even register as the fight for my life ensues. Black spots dance in the corners of my eyes, my movements become jerky. I’m about to pass out. Before I can black out completely, he releases me with a hard shove. The chair doesn’t move an inch, which tells me it’s bolted to the floor. I splutter and cough, gasping for air. My throat is dry and coarse from no water. My whole fucking body aches and protests in pain.
“You don’t ever get to mention him!” His angry voice reverberates around the room. I turn to the side and dry heave. I have nothing in my stomach to bring up, all that does is hurt my throat further. I take some deep breaths, gaining my composure as much as I can, before slowly turning back to face him. He stands a few feet away, vibrating with rage. His hands are clenched into fists at his sides. I search his eyes and can see how broken he is no matter how hard he tries to hide it. If he needs to hurt me in order to save himself from the darkness inside, then I’ll take whatever he has to dish out because I care enough about him to allow that.
“Do whatever you need to do, I won’t fight you, Knight.”
“Who the fuck are you?” he shouts. I smile sadly at him and decide to give him a small amount of truth.
“I’m just a girl who was born into the wrong family, and never got to choose the path she wanted.” He says nothing as he turns and leaves, locking the door behind him. I’ve never wished to be someone else more than I do in this moment.
Knight
I reach the top of the bunker and find Ronnie, Mike, Luka, King and Allison standing up here waiting for me. I ignore them as I turn to Mike.
“Get her something small to eat, enough to keep her alive and a bottle of water. Take two others with you when you deliver it. Unbind her but be ready, she’ll attack you.” He nods and heads off to do as I asked with Ronnie tailing after him. I look to the other three and cock a brow, waiting for them to say whatever it is that they came here to say.
“Bishop needs you to hack into the database and find intel on her brother.” That is one thing I do respect about Luka, he doesn’t fuck around or mince words. He gets straight to it. I know that must have been hard for him to say considering I am the one who blocked him. “One of these days, you’re going to tell me how the fuck you used my own program against me, you little shit.” I grin at the fucker and he shoulders past me toward the house.
“I can take over if this is too much.” King’s quietly spoken words have the grin falling from my face. I crowd my brother getting in his face, Ally pushes between the both of us shoving me back a step.
“He’s only trying to help you!” I cut my gaze to her.
“I’ll deal with her however I see fit. He is my fucking twin––”