22 Olivia
Date Unknown
I had to be trained.
I had to be trained and the Delepski’s and all of those people who worked for them were so…happy for it.
I mean, they became happy after I lost every ounce of strength I had.
I managed to kill three of them. Since the day Mr. Alascer left, I managed to kill three of them. I couldn’t remember it, but I remembered the hose afterwards. I remembered feeling their dismembered cock’s in my hand and the beatings that came with killing them. I remembered sliding halfway into that black fog when the fourth man came in. A sacrificial lamb, I called them.
But they had ordered Phil to stop feeding me. Stop giving me water. Stop caring for my wounds. All until I behaved.
So when that fourth man came in, I was only able to gouge one eye out, scratch trenches into his skin, before he pinned me down.
All I could do as he shoved my face into that mattress and forced himself inside of me was stare at the crack in the wall where Merlin was hiding. Safe from all of this.
All I could do was plot as they tore my insides to shreds.
“Don’t cum in her pussy,”
Isaak had said when he brought the first lamb in to the slaughter. Morris was his name. “We can’t have her getting pregnant. Mr. Alascer will take care of that when he picks her up.”
Todd didn’t know about that rule, and Josh broke it before I killed him. But everyone else? They followed the rules. They never came inside of me. They fucked me all they wanted and came on top of me or finished it off in my ass.
And I continued to plot.
This book would be easy to write. Everyone dies in the end. Predictable to a point, I suppose. I haven’t decided if the main character would die too, but everyone else certainly would.
All of them.
Except for Phil and Merlin.
I whistled a short, low little tune, just a few notes, and a few seconds later, the mouse came scurrying out from his crack and ran across the puddle riddled damp floor towards my bed. Puddles of diluted blood. The smell was worse, I suppose. They only came in here and cleaned up my shit and piss once a week, although, I didn’t shit hardly at all anymore.
It didn’t matter, once I escaped this place, I would never smell this scent again.
I would never close the door again.
I would never come to the woods again.
Merlin climbed up the scraps of clothes I had tied to one side, and jotted over, his little black eyes welcoming and filled with love.
I stroked his little head with my finger, watching him rub down the length of it before circling under my palm.
I twisted my hand over, palm up, and pulled him close, staring at him as he cleaned himself, as he breathed, as he lived.
My wounds were long since healed. All of them angry and dark, permanent. Phil said that there were creams for that, but he also still believed that he was going to get me out of here, and he wouldn’t listen when I tried to tell him that it wasn’t going to happen. He would have to live with the fact that he aided in selling me to a sex trafficking ring, and I was going to have to live with the fact that while I escaped, whether by gunfire or running, he would never get that kind of relief.
I did have to hand it to him though. He did his best to take care of me despite what they did to me. He never touched me once, not unless I said so, and on the days I didn’t want him coming anywhere near me, he remained on the other side of the room, talked me through how to clean the wound around my ankle from the shackle, and then told me stories of his home life.
His kid was named Peter. His wife Tanya. Beautiful little family. They lived in the suburbs too, and Tanya was pregnant with their second kid. A girl, he found out just a couple of weeks ago.
I almost hated him for that.
“Olivia.”
“I am Olivia Kingsmen, I am a writer, I am unbreakable, I am Claimed.”
I continued to pet Merlin’s head gently. I was going to make his life the best I could. I would. Whatever it took. Mice, after all, didn’t need much. A warm place to rest, some food. That was all. Their love was easily bought.
“We have to get you cleaned up. Mr. Alascer is on his way today. Right now.”
My eyes lifted to Phil’s, finding him standing just yards away, next to my table where he had managed to set up cleaning things without alerting me.
My thoughts were too loud to hear anything now, I think that had to be it.
Careful of Merlin, I pushed myself to a sit, swinging my legs over the edge of the bed, the shackle weighing on my ankle. I held up Merlin, showing him to Phil. My heart was calm, my motions smooth. It was easy to become a savage when you had nothing else to do but work at it. I wondered if this was what happened to Everett. I wondered if this was how he became who he was. ‘They’ had kept him somewhere deep in the woods, tortured him, and he had become a little monster, the perfect little monster for Malachi to mold.
Phil dipped a rag into a bowl of warm water, ringing it out. “I don’t think you can bring him,”
he answered my unasked question quietly.
That’s okay, I would bring him anyway. I didn’t need anyone’s permission, he was mine.
The only way to convince these people that I wasn’t a threat was to do as Azrael had suggested. Manipulate them. All I had were my stories now, and this story was the story of a girl whose mind had cracked.
She was insane, friend’s with a mouse. She was compliant, happy to do what they said without question. She never smiled, never laughed, she just took what they gave her and bode her time.
After all, she had killed four people in this tiny little room. All on her own. She could kill more. She could kill them all.
Now Mr. Alascer was finally coming, and she could finally make her escape. Nobody would expect it. Not one person. Not even Merlin.
I would always keep Merlin safe. I would always keep my word.
Phil walked over to me, the rag in his hand, and I found myself studying his hand for several seconds before I stood.
He started at my feet and worked his way up, respectful but thorough. Phil was always respectful. That’s why he would get to live when I came back and killed them all.
He rinsed the rag out several times during the cleaning process before he was done with it. Then he brought over a toothbrush and brushed my teeth, cleaning out all of the bologna and carrots from my teeth.
He brushed my hair next, and I think I hated that part about the process more than anything. I hated it more than the nasty toothbrush and the taste of bologna. I hated it more than I hated blacking out. More than I hated the pain when I walked across the room.
I hated it because Everett was the only one in this world, besides me, who had ever brushed my hair.
He had touched my hair last, and then they erased that. They had erased all of him. Every single piece of him except for the tattoo and the carving in my thigh. Mr. Alascer would take those though, and there would be nothing left of who I was. Not a single shred.
Just me. Just Merlin.
“I’m going to bring you out, okay, Olivia?”
he asked when he was finished brushing my hair.
I nodded, sitting back down on my bed. I figured as much.
Of course, I was excited. How could I not be? I’d been here for a lifetime, and I hadn’t seen the daylight in a very long time, just the yellow bulb. Nothing but the yellow bulb.
It never went off either, it never went out. Just yellow all the time.
“He’s bringing a van to put you in, listen to me very carefully,”
Phil said, grabbing my chin only to release it a second later at the shift in my eyes. “Listen. I’m going to take you to the van. It’s going to be parked away from the buildings, away from the main compound where Alexei is. I’m going to put you in that van and then I’m going to shoot everyone inside. When I tell you to duck, you duck. Get down under the seats, okay? Leave the rest up to me, I’ll get you out of here, I promise.”
No, he wouldn’t. No, I wouldn’t. I was already shaking my head at him. It was a terrible plan.
His eyes furrowed in confusion, and he crouched down in front of me. “What are you saying, Liv? I’m getting you out of here. We have to get you out of here.”
Phil was a good man, and I had decided that I wanted him to survive this. I wanted his family to survive this, and that meant that he couldn’t get involved.
I shook my head again, cradling Merlin in one hand while I reached out with the other and touched his cheek, allowing myself to speak for the first time in a very long time. My voice was my only power. “You have Tanya and Peter. It’s okay,”
I whispered, his eyes filling with tears. “I won’t let you take that risk.”
I could see he had thought about it. I could see he had considered the risks, the outcome, what could happen if he failed, what would happen if he succeeded, but I had done some thinking as well.
A lot of it.
It’s all I could do.
Plot out the last chapters of my story, and him doing this wasn’t apart of it.
“Olivia, you’re going to be sold into sex trafficking,”
he stressed. “Or something pretty damn close to it. You’re going to lose yourself. You’re going to die cold and alone, and Everett will never find you.”
Yes, I knew that, and I had long since come to terms with it. With everything. As much as I could come to terms with it.
I had Merlin.
I had my mind, my safe place.
“I love it when you lie.”
Those words had been whispering through me since I first got here. So, I lied. I lied to them, I lied to myself, I lied to Merlin. I had to. It was the only way to survive.
Lying.
And I got pretty damn good at it too.
Pretty damn good.
“I’ll be okay,”
I assured him. “I’ll be okay.”
Everything was going to be fine.
I would be fine.
Phil searched my eyes before finally resigning himself and straightening. “Get yourself ready, kid,”
he instructed, turning for the table.
I could see clearly that while he hated this decision, my decision, he was also relieved because he knew as much as I did that had he even tried to save me, his wife and son would have been the next two people in this room, only they wouldn’t have Merlin. They would have been completely alone.
No Merlin.
No Everett.
Just pain.
Just a cracked mind.
Phil gathered the cleaning supplies and left the room, and I felt my shoulders fall as soon as the door shut behind him.
So, there it was then.
Once I left here, Everett would never find me. Even if he was still searching, he would never find me. I would never see Phil again, the only thing left in this world that I would have would be Merlin, my letter, and my tattoo.
I clutched him in both hands, petting him with one thumb. “It’s going to be okay,”
I assured him. “No matter what happens to me, you’ll be free. Just remember to avoid big open areas and anything flying in the sky. Oh, and big tabby cats. As fuzzy as they look, they are not your friends.”
Merlin squeaked softly as if he could read my mind just like Everett could.
I whistled that little tune back to him before kissing his head and placing him on my shoulder.
He promptly scuttled up into my hair, tickling me uncomfortably as he made himself comfortable. He would be safe there.
My job when I was taken from this room would be to figure out if escaping now, between here and the van, would be the most advantageous thing I could do.
If I was truly in the woods like I thought I was, I could disappear with ease, but I could also get lost. Very lost. And while I was strong, I didn’t have as much energy as I used to. I wouldn’t be able to run far, and I’d starve without my bologna and carrot.
So maybe I would wait. Wait until I got to where I was going, and then I would run. If it was a city, I could sprint down the street, yelling ‘fire!’. There was no way people would ignore me then. People always looked when someone yelled fire.
I closed my eyes, and I focused. Focused my breathing, my reliable mind. I stretched all my fingers and toes, my neck, my arms, and my legs.
I wasn’t sure what would happen once I got out there, but I knew I would have to think fast. I knew that if this was the best opportunity, I would have to steal a weapon, sorry Phil, and I knew that there was a chance I would die before I managed to do anything noteworthy, but I still had to try.
I had to be smart too. I had to consider all the options. If I had even a single ounce of doubt, I would wait. Wait until they pulled me out of that van.
So many variables.
What would Everett do?
He wouldn’t be caught dead without having something as a weapon.
But I had tried.
I had tried to find a piece on the bed they wouldn’t notice, that I could sharpen, but the entire bed frame was welded together, and the springs in the mattress were too thin, even wrapped together. I had tried stealing things from the men I killed too, but every time I came out of that black fog, Phil was already in the room, and sometimes other people were there too. Not a good opportunity to steal a weapon.
All I had were my hands and teeth.
All I had was my speed.
Whatever happened though, I had to protect Merlin at all costs. He was my mouse. I wouldn’t let him die because I was being careless. I couldn’t be careless. This was the catalyst of my story. The woman would find her strength, she would escape with her pet mouse and come back with weapons. It was all written out, I couldn’t stray from the plot.
The door opened however long later, and I opened my eyes to see Phil walking in with some old clothes slung over his arm. “It’s time to get dressed.”
I eyed the clothes and then found his hazel eyes. They’re giving me clothes now? That was different.
He nodded as he walked over, his cheeks red with anger. “Isaak doesn’t want his men being distracted when I walk you out.”
They did get very distracted when I was around, but clothes weren’t a variable I had considered. Especially not jeans. I had always hated jeans. Sometimes I wore them, but I never liked how restricting they were.
This would be a problem.
I wouldn’t be able to move how I practiced, so if I did escape, I would have to adapt.
I glanced to my ankle and back.
He nodded, setting the clothes on the bed and kneeling down beside me. “It’s time to go,”
he told me, sliding the key into the lock and releasing the shackle.
I had gotten so used to that weight, it almost felt like I was going to float away without it. I didn’t have a tether keeping me on this world any longer.
I suppose I did have something. Something without a name living in my chest. A little hum of a current that kept my feet on the ground, otherwise I certainly would float away, and that wasn’t a part of the plot.
I stood slowly, testing out how I felt without it. Interesting, that would take some getting used to.
I picked up the pants and carefully pulled them on, buckling them around my waist, the motion unfamiliar to me now.
“They’re your size.”
It didn’t matter, I had lost enough weight that they barely hung onto my hips. They would fall when I tried to run. Just something else I had to adapt to.
I tested the weight of them before my eyes fell to Merlin’s little cloth rope that I had made for him. Perfect.
I untied it and quickly looped it through all of the belt loops, tying it tightly, pulling on my pants to make sure they would remain on.
The pants were wide-legged. Boy pants, I would guess.
“Here,”
Phil said when I was sure the pants wouldn’t fall.
I looked up, taking in the boy shirt he was holding out to me. A regular old shirt. It was a size too small, and it was made of a white that was practically see-through.
My eyes lifted to his.
Phil nodded, his eyes going dark. “They wanted to make sure they were still able to…to see the merchandise,”
he answered coldly.
Of course, they did. I didn’t care, it’s not like it was something they hadn’t seen before. I took the shirt and pulled it on, finding the feeling of clothes a little overwhelming now.
But I could adapt.
“I am Olivia Kingsmen,”
I thought as Phil inspected me. “I am a writer, I am unbreakable, I am Claimed.”
“I never asked you,”
he said, crouching down to roll up the cuffs of the pants twice. “You used to chant this thing before you went completely silent. You said it like it was a title. ‘I am Olivia Rose, I am a writer, I am unbreakable, I am Claimed’,”
he quoted.
“Because it is,”
I answered, watching that door, wondering if he could read minds too. “I am Claimed. I am owned. I like being owned but only by him.”
I had thought long and hard about the words I had said to him and the ones I hadn’t. The ones I may never get the chance to.
Even before I realized it, there had always been a sense of security with him. A sense of safety. In the teasing and arguing, I had never felt truly scared. There had never been a true shred of fear engrained in me like there had been here.
Some part of me, however deep, knew that he would never actually harm me, and I think some part of him felt the same way, that he never had it in him to treat me like the others in my position. The other women he fucked for a night. The other women he kidnapped and tortured because their boyfriends and husbands didn’t pay their debts.
I was never one of them. Not even for a second. Not even for a breath.
“Everett?”
Phil asked, standing.
I nodded. “It’s the only thing I’m ever sure of anymore,”
I told him. “I am his Claim. It’s a code in their world. When they find someone special enough, good enough, worthy enough, they lay their claim, branding that person as their own.”
“And do you do the same? Are you allowed?”
I wasn’t sure why he was asking these questions now after spending so many hours with him, but part of me was glad he was. It was helping me focus. It was something important I could use my power for too. Maybe, if I did die today, or if I disappeared into oblivion, maybe he would find Everett and tell him that I still believed in the Claim, even at the very end. That I never betrayed him. Not willingly. I was faithful. I was a good Claim. “I don’t know if I’m allowed, but I did it.”
His eyes searched mine. “You claimed him? Branded him?”
“Yes,”
I answered. “Because he is mine.”
Phil’s shoulders fell an inch, so much pain in his eyes. “Olivia, I hope for your sake, that you two are reunited one day. I pray that you are.”
I didn’t allow myself to feel anything but the anger. The strength of it was the only thing keeping me going. Everett would survive without me. He would be fine. But me? I wasn’t even the same person now. I wasn’t Olivia Rose or Olivia Lemont or Abigail Ross, I was something else.
Olivia Kingsmen.
Maybe nobody else in this world would ever know, but I would. They took everything else from me. Erased him from my skin, and they were going to cut off that tattoo and mark as soon as they got the chance, so I would create something they could never steal from me.
I was Olivia Kingsmen. Everett Kingsmen’s Claim, a member of the most powerful family in the world, even if I never really got a taste of it before I died.
At least I had that.
“Are you ready?”
I nodded, my eyes returning to that door.
I was ready. Ready to do whatever it took to get out of here. Either now or at the end of the drive.
I did one last check of my pants, and then reached up, touching the chunk of hair Merlin was hiding under, before straightening my shoulders and gesturing for the door.
This was the beginning of the last chapters of my story. I had to make it memorable.
Phil watched me for a few seconds longer, as if contemplating his next moves, before he headed for the door, me at his heels.
He opened it and I stepped into the doorway, looking up at the stone steps, my heart as calm as ever. The walls were made of the same packed soil that was in my room, the steps cracked and old.
I took my first step, shivering at the feeling of the cold stone under my bare feet, only slightly colder than the earth.
Phil stayed right behind me as I walked up those steps. They were steep, long, and at the top of them was a wooden door.
Phil joined me in that tight spot, sliding a key into the lock and flipping it over. He leaned back without a word.
I could see the light shining through the cracks in the wood. I wondered what the day would be like. Shining and bright, hot maybe, for a July day. I hoped the sun was shining. I hoped I would be able to feel it on my skin.
With a steady hand, I pushed open that door, a blast of fresh air whooshing over me as my hand flew to shield my face from the brightness of it.
It wasn’t even that bright. I think it was a cloudy day, I could smell the rain. I could feel it in the air, a fine mis, but my eyes were still sensitive after all that time in the room. It took me more than I liked to admit to force my hand down and take in my surroundings as quickly as I could before I lost the chance.
We were in the woods, just like I thought.
I could see the trees not far from me, the grass bright green all around us, covered in dew.
There were thin dirt trails cut through it, leading to different buildings that were scattered about haphazardly, it felt like, and there was a pair that led right to the center where cars drove.
There was no van though. No cars anywhere.
“Olivia.”
Right, I had to focus.
I took a step onto the grass, releasing a breath at the feeling of something soft beneath my toes. But I couldn’t revel, I couldn’t afford to revel.
I needed to focus.
I recentered myself and took a few steps forward, Phil joining me, standing just to the right and behind me.
I looked around as we walked towards those car ruts. Seven buildings, I think, several people with guns walking about, watching us carefully. Everything seemed so aimless, but those trees. My eyes shifted back to the trees in front of me. I could see them in the large gap between two buildings. Large and beautiful and looking exactly like how I imagined freedom to look like.
There were too many people wandering. Phil had two guns, one on his hip and one on his ankle. If I could get ahold of both of them, I had a good chance at making it to the trees. After that, I could just run. Run and run and run until my legs wouldn’t carry me anymore, and then I would crawl. I would crawl for as long as my hands and knees allowed, and then I would hide.
I would hide and wait. Wait until I thought the coast was clear before trying to find a road that would lead me back to the city. Back to a place where I could get guns and a car, and then I would return and kill them all.
“That’s strange,”
Phil said, his hand grazing my arm, gesturing for me to slow and then finally stop. “The van was right there,”
he gestured to those ruts.
I looked around again, my muscles tensing, readying myself to move. The people had started turning, talking into their earpieces, and my gut hummed in warning. “Do you have an earpiece?”
I asked quietly.
“No, only the guards do.”
What the fuck kind of system was that?
People were starting to react, and I felt my heart skip a beat. “Phil,”
I said carefully, watching people start to lift up their guns, “you need to get on your knees.”
“What?” he asked.
I turned on him, my skin suddenly itching for the escape, for running, for something. “Someone is here. I’m the prisoner. They won’t shoot me. They will shoot you, so get on your fucking knees.”
He looked around, his hand already on his gun. “It’s Alascer, he doesn’t want to pay.”
“Great, get on your knees,”
I stressed. What was so goddamn hard about following that order?
“They’ll kill you if you have a gun.”
“They might kill me. They will kill you.”
But still, he hesitated. “You’re just a writer,”
he rationalized. “You don’t know anything about this world. Nothing real.”
I snarled, grabbed his right wrist, and slammed my foot into his knee, ripping his hand away from his gun.
He fell to his knee with a grunt.
I leaned in. “Real enough. Put your hands up if you want to live,”
I told him as gun fire erupted through the clearing.
One thing I had learned since coming here; how to control my panic really well.
Don’t blink, just think. Don’t flinch, just focus.
And right now, my priority was making sure he had the best chances of surviving.
He gave me a warning look but did as he was asked, settling on both knees. “They’re going to kill us both. Have you even used a gun?”
I pulled his gun from his holster and loaded it. A 9mm. Not great, but good enough. “Yes.”
I crouched down at his leg, glancing around the clearing quickly as I ripped the smaller gun out and loaded it. A little revolver. Even worse, but fine. Beggers can’t be choosers and all that shit.
I cocked the hammer back and stood, stepping up behind him, my heart racing as I looked around frantically. “I’m going to put this gun to your head.”
“What?”
he said through his teeth.
I placed the revolver to his temple, pointing the other gun up, the gunfire only getting worse. “Don’t worry, this always works.”
“In the fucking movies,”
he snarled. “You’ve lost your shit, Olivia.”
No, it works everywhere. It had to. I had written this plot out carefully in my head, among a dozen other scenarios. This had to work, it would work. We were either both getting out of here alive or neither of us were.
Alascer could kill all the Russians he wanted, but he wasn’t going to kill Phil. He would never kill Phil.
“Where is Isaak?”
I asked carefully. “Where is his brother?”
“In the main building to our right.”
I looked back that way, several men running for that exact building, shouting. I only heard shouting in Russian. “Why does nobody care about us?”
“Because it doesn’t matter if you live or die,”
he answered. “You became useless when you stopped giving us information.”
“I gave you The Club,”
I said, looking at the back of his head. “That didn’t lead you anywhere?”
I hoped to God it didn’t lead them anywhere.
“No,”
he said, wincing away from the revolver. “You were beat for that, remember?”
I was beat for a lot of things, it was hard to keep track at this point.
His hand flexed when I didn’t respond. “There were a few people there, all dead ends, a couple of Isaak’s men died, but it led nowhere.”
A few…
My eyes widened and, involuntarily, I pressed that gun deeper into his temple. “They fucking killed Jake?”
I asked through my teeth. “Did they kill Jake?”
I hadn’t thought about it. Jake hadn’t even crossed my mind. Not even once. Was he dead? Was he dead!
“I don’t know,”
Phil bit back. “Ease up on the gun, will you?”
“Jake was my friend,”
I snarled.
“It’s the game, Liv,”
he snapped. “You know that. Isaak wasn’t going to stop until you gave him something. How many times did you die for that information? How many times after that did he kill you for nothing?”
Seven times after that day. He had to stop because it started having side effects. I didn’t know what kind. All I remembered was not thinking for days. When I finally regained full consciousness, that’s when the killings started. That’s when he switched to just the beatings. Just the water hose. Just the—everything else.
A gunshot sounded just to my right, and my gun swiveled to that sound and pulled the trigger on instinct, the high that always came with shooting a gun filling me completely.
The man’s head whipped back, his body following.
Several guns rose towards me—
“Don’t shoot!”
I heard a voice snarl.
Another gunshot went off, a sharp pain ripping through my shoulder, Phil flinching when the gun jerked away from his temple.
I snarled through my teeth, and found the culprit, pulling the trigger. My bullet hit him just as another did, slamming into him in two different directions.
“Don’t shoot!”
the command came again. A threat this time.
I was panting through my teeth, trying to ignore the sharp pain, the warmth of the blood seeping down my skin. That’s when I realized that I was pinned.
“Olivia!”
I took in the dozens of people around me, all of them wearing suits, but only ten of them were wearing masks, and they had a dog.
A white dog.
My gun swung to the man who had said my name, his mask of smooth black that dripped down his face reflecting in the dim light of the day, that white dog, covered in blood, standing right beside him, ears up, eyes deadly.
His gun was pointed at me, all of their guns. Every single one of them.
I could fix this. I would fix this. Phil would live.
“Put down the gun,”
he instructed.
I adjusted my hands, pressing the gun back against Phil’s temple as I looked between the masks again, quickly. Cracked porcelain, a skull, a rabbit, masks that only covered the top half of their faces or the bottom half. All of them dressed like they were going to a fucking meeting or something.
Attack of the lawyers.
My gun swung back to the male who said my name, my eyes hardening. Drop my gun? Not on my life.
“Phil and I are leaving,”
I told them. “We’re leaving.”
One of them stepped closer, the woman with the cropped dark blonde hair.
I whipped that revolver back, pressing it against my own temple. “Stay back!”
I snarled, finding her eyes. “Stay back. He said no more scars. No more damage. If he wants me in one piece, then stay fucking back.”
“I see a new species of rose blooming in the woods,”
I heard a devilish voice hum, pulling my eyes over.
The man with the Devil blue eyes and cracked porcelain mask was watching me with a creepy yet oddly comforting sharp smile. He wasn’t carrying a gun, but it looked like he had the most blood covering him. As if he had enjoyed the killing, the carnage. As if he had gotten off on the smell of it.
My brows pulled together, strange thoughts sliding through the cracks in my broken mind.
I shook my head, pressing the gun hard into my temple. “Stop that, stop it,”
I said, trying to force the thoughts away, trying to focus. I had to focus.
“I am Olivia Kingsmen, I am a writer, I am unbreakable, I am Claimed,”
I thought to myself, trying to recenter. I had to recenter.
“Holy shit,”
I heard Phil say under his breath. “Holy shit,”
he said again. “Listen to me,”
he shouted, my eyes finding his before they lifted back to the group. “They killed her and brought her back to life 10 times. Ten times, they stopped her heart, okay? Her mind is broken, she can’t remember things the right way. You have to show her your faces. You have to put some pieces back.”
Confusion filled me, my head spinning. “Shut up, Phil, fuck. I’m trying to think.”
“You have to stop,”
he said, looking back. “Olivia, it’s Everett. He found you. He kept his word. It’s Everett.”
My gun was still pointed at the man in the glossy mask, my eyes finding his. No, no, it wasn’t. It wasn’t. Everett couldn’t find me, so I had to grow up. I had to become stronger. I had to become this. Everett moved on.
Those icy blue eyes watched mine unblinkingly. Fierce and chilling to the bone, sending fire skittering across my skin. “Guns down,”
he ordered his people.
And as if they had rehearsed it, every single one of them lowered their weapons at the exact same time.
I readjusted my grip, keeping it pointed at his head and the revolver on mine.
I watched, my heart slamming as he shoved his gun away. “Stop it,”
I ordered.
He reached up.
“I said stop,”
I snarled.
“You think you can order me around, pup?”
he asked, pulling his mask off.
My breath caught, my mind sparking in confusing thoughts and images as I took in his face. The scar across his eye, the set of his jaw, those tattoos.
“It means Hades, Conqueror of All.”
I shook my head, my eyes filling. “No,”
I said through my teeth, my lip curling. “No, that’s…it’s a lie. That’s a lie.”
“Hello, pup,”
he greeted, taking a step forward.
“No,”
I shouted, pulling the trigger, the bullet hitting the ground at his feet, forcing him to stop. “No, you couldn’t find me. This is a trick. It’s a trick. You’re lying. I know when people are lying, I can see it. I can feel it like sticky honey. You’re lying. It’s a lie.”
A hand wrapped around my wrist, and I instinctively slammed a foot back just as Phil stood. He spun around, grabbing my other wrist and ripping the gun from my grip, tossing it to the ground.
I went silent, focusing, the panic falling to the back of my mind. I twisted my leg back, catching it behind my attacker’s, and jerked it forward, forcing his knee to bend. I used the weight of my body to shove him back, feeling him stumble, but then his arms wrapped tightly around me as he regained his footing.
“You can’t fight me,”
the Devil purred as Everett came running. “Tell me his name, little razor-lined rose.”
My eyes widened, my focus faltering. I knew that voice. I had heard it whispering in my ear before. Whispering and taunting and singing songs of bravery, and strength.
“Prove me wrong,”
he had said.
Azrael.
The name was like a beacon of death in my mind.
Azrael.
He dropped me to the ground as if my touch burned him. Once it shifted from a fight to a conversation, he was forced to let go.
I collapsed into the wet grass, spinning around to stare at him. He stood above me like some sort of all-powerful fallen god.
My heart was beating out of my chest, but I knew what he wanted. “Alascer,”
I whispered, reality and fiction crashing down all around me like waves breaking against each other as two storms erupted.
His smile widened, something so dark flashing in his eyes, I almost wanted to ask him to take me with him. Wherever he was going, whatever mission he was about to go on, I wanted to go. I needed to go. “Keep them sharp, you’ll need them again. Very soon, it seems. Oh, and yes, this is all real, you should say hello to your dog, she’s been quite the blood-thirsty little addition to my family.”
And just as he went to turn away, something unbelievably soft drifted across my skin.
I gasped, jerking away from her, my head whipping around just as she stopped, her ears back, her body low to the ground. She whined and whimpered, barking at me, her tail wagging hesitantly.
My eyebrows pulled together as I took her in, trying to filter through the memories. I had a dog, didn’t I? A beautiful, snow-white dog who loved her. This dog was lathered in blood, and she had a few scars I didn’t remember her having before, but those eyes were the same. What was her name?
Oh, that’s right. “Lucy?”
I whispered. She was alive.
She was alive and thriving.
Her ears perked, her entire body going still before she erupted. Her body started shaking, her tongue rolling, barks leaving her lips as she jumped and whined and sang, but never came within a foot of me, as if she were still afraid. Still worried.
A second later, Everett hit his knees in front of me, pulling my attention from the dog to him. I jerked my legs to my body, taking him in, my heart racing. He was wearing his familiar suit, his dark tattoos could be seen around the collar, on his face, just passed his cuffs. I recognized the way his lips curved, and all of those stories forever imprinted in those icy blue eyes of his.
So many stories. So dark and tragic and real.
I felt something inside of me shatter. “You came,”
I whispered, my voice cracking.
Everett lunged for me, pulling me tightly into his arms as he fell back on his knees, clinging to me.
I dug my nails into his shirt, wrapping my legs tightly around his hips, pulling him as close as I possibly could, inhaling him with everything I was as the sobs shook through me.
He came. After all this time, he hadn’t forgotten about me. He had brought an army to get me. He had brought everyone.
He had come.
“I gave you my word,”
he told me, his own voice thick. “I gave you my word, Olivia, and my word is everything.”