4. Amorette #2
I tried to remain calm, if only to save myself some pain. Shit. I couldn’t do it. “Who the hell are you?”
My mother always said I was a tenacious little Chihuahua, always fighting for what I wanted and never backing down. It just wasn’t in my nature.
He shrugged as he stretched his arms along the chair, bending one hand to touch his fingers to his temple and letting the fingers of the other hand graze his thigh.
“I’m just a bastard. No one important.” His lips twisted into a bitter semblance of a smile. “What is fascinating, is how someone like you came to be here.”
The hand touching his face had the slightest tremble I would have missed if I wasn’t trying to memorize every detail of this man.
“I blacked out, and you apparently brought me here. Shouldn’t you be answering this question?” I retorted.
Fuck, Amorette. Shut the fuck up.
I curled my fists as I silently berated myself for my idiocy.
“Drink the water, Amorette,” he said, only slightly stumbling over my name.
Whether it was because it was unique in the US or he wasn’t used to addressing their captives by name, I’d never know.
“If I wanted to drug you, I could have done it already. I also could force you to take a drug if I chose to and no one would be able to do anything about it. So drink it.”
“That’s all true and not particularly reassuring,” I murmured, but drank the water anyway. The water was cold as it hit my lips, and I greedily sucked down several gulps. If he wanted to hurt me, he could in any number of ways and I wouldn’t have been able to stop him, nor would anyone else.
Hell, they’d probably be pissed that they missed the show.
“Why are you fighting them so hard?”
The question caught me off guard. Was he one of these men? Why would he use them instead of us ?
Images of the women crying, complying, doing everything the men forced on them, played like a movie reel in my mind. I gasped from the horrors I’d witnessed, apparently allowing myself to process it in a way I couldn’t when in the middle of the atrocities.
“These monsters will hurt me regardless. Why would I give them what they want?”
“To save yourself whatever pain you can. To live as long as possible.”
The blue of his eyes turned steely as he glared at me. As if he were angry with me for fighting back.
Well, fuck you . The missing adrenaline sprung out of nowhere. The urge to sling myself out of the bed and get as many hits on him as possible was almost too strong. I forced it down. It would do me no good here.
I remained silent, because anything that came out of my mouth was sure to set him off.
“What’s your history? How old are you?”
“Fuck. You.” I had multiple personality disorder. That was the only explanation for why I couldn’t keep my fucking mouth shut.
He gave one sharp shake of his head. “Sorry, I like my women willing. And not battered to hell.”
I canted my head. For a second…
No, there was no way he wasn’t like the rest. Not if he was here in this place. He was a beautiful man, to be sure, so the tiny slip of naivety in my brain wanted to believe he wasn’t an evil asshole, but the logical part of my brain said that was ridiculous.
A knock came at the door, then one of the boys—men—stuck his head in.
“Sir, Randall’s livid. Said you took his girl.”
The hand touching his temple curled into a white-knuckled fist. “Is she his or the Institution’s? I didn’t think Randall was so important to have girls for himself.”
The kid gulped and shot a nervous glance at his feet. He shuffled from one foot to the other, not even trying to hide the fear wafting off of him. Like this guy knew what real fear was.
“He said I’m to take her to him right now.”
I caught the sinister smirk that crawled over the man’s face before he turned his head toward the door. “And what was the punishment if you failed to deliver?”
The kid’s face paled, and he pressed his lips together. Then the heart I’d tried to harden against all men while being in this hellhole cracked at the tears forming in the corners of his eyes. “That he’d put a bullet in my sister’s brain after taking her to the room .”
I knew exactly what room he was talking about.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
Why was he doing this? This kid who could barely be more than eighteen was evil. He was a man. I saw the way they were training the newbies. Without even realizing it, he was destroying my carefully crafted hatred against everyone here with that unbidden show of emotion.
He added a splash of gray to the black-and-white rules I’d applied to this place. It was literally the worst thing he could have done. I was a sucker for people forced into the system. I couldn’t help it.
Whoever this guy was, whatever he’d done or would do, fuck, whoever he grew to be, one thing was very, very clear. He loved his sister, and he was trying to protect her.
The man in the chair had just opened his mouth to no doubt respond in an acerbic tone, but I chose that time to push myself up out of bed.
It was hard, and I fell over the mattress as soon as my feet hit the ground. The sudden movement caused a loud pounding in my head that had my stomach heaving. Except I was determined. I couldn’t have that girl, woman, or whoever she was on my conscience.
I was a hero. Or a fool. That had been my one dream my entire life. To make a fucking difference.
This was actually something I could do. I could go with this kid and his sister wouldn’t be taken because of me. Randall would find another way to abduct her, I was sure. But it wouldn’t be because of me.
Brutal hands gripped my hips, and I gasped from the sharp pain clanging around my torso from where he touched the day-old bruises. Fabric slid along my sides and I glanced down to see I was wearing a T-shirt.
Nothing else, though it was more than I’d been allowed to have since they threw us in cages.
“Sorry,” the man murmured.
“Let me go,” I snapped as I wrenched myself from his hands and tripped toward the guy at the door. He really was young. Horror was painted over his expression as he caught my body.
I wanted to mourn the man he could have been. He seemed too innocent to be here, but there was nothing I could do about that.
“You’re going with him? Really? All because of a sister he might or might not have?” the man behind me yelled, disbelief and confusion strong in his words.
He was right, this kid could have made it all up, although I didn’t believe he had. There was too much raw emotion on his face when he’d answered to have faked it. So I took the only option I knew how to take. I went with him to save his sister.
“Fuck off,” I tossed over my shoulder as the door shut behind us.