Chapter 57
Ayla
Guards on rotation.
I can hear the shuffle of their boots clearly now. Left alone long enough—pissing in a corner, mouth dry, stomach cramping, body stiff from too much concrete and not enough food, your brain starts narrowing in on whatever it can still control.
So I hear them.
Three of them.
Boot Stomper, Foot Shuffler, and Ballerina.
Ballerina barely makes a sound. I only know he’s the one by the door because he clears his throat every fifty-three seconds.
I counted.
Boot Stomper is the biggest. I know that because every time he passes, the strip of light under the door goes darker. Wider. Like he takes up more of it.
Foot Shuffler is interested.
Curious.
Stupid.
He’s popped his head in here twice now, lingering like he expects me to do something entertaining if he stares long enough.
I keep my head down when he does.
Let him think I’m weaker than I am.
Let him think the dark has made me small.
It hasn’t.
It’s made me patient.
I hear the latch shift before the door opens.
Not Arsen. Too light-footed.
A rectangle of weak yellow cuts into the dark and Foot Shuffler fills it, pausing just inside like he’s deciding whether I’m worth the effort.
I keep my head bowed, shoulders loose, one hand around my middle like I’m trying not to come apart.
It isn’t all performance. My stomach really does hurt. My head really is splitting. But weakness sells best when you let truth do half the work.
He takes a few steps in. I count them by sound.
One.
Two.
Three.
Close enough now that if the bars weren’t between us, I could probably smell him.
“Still alive?” he asks.
His accent is Armenian. Younger than Arsen. Rougher around the edges. The kind of man who mistakes sarcasm for personality.
I let a beat pass, like answering costs me something.
“Disappointed?”
He snorts and turns on the light.
Good. That means he wants to play.
“Got a mouth on you,” he says.
I lift my head slowly and blink at him, my eyes sensitive to the dim light. “You all keep telling me that.”
He shifts his weight. Keys jingle softly at his hip.
There you are.
My pulse picks up, but only once. I let my gaze drift toward the water bottle in his hand.
Cold plastic. Half full.
I hate how badly I want it.
He notices. Of course.
His mouth curls slightly. “Thirsty?”
I stare at the bottle, then at him. “What gave it away?”
He walks closer to the cage, stopping just outside arm’s reach. “You want some?”
I almost smile.
Got him.
The trade he wants to feel in control of. The power. The choice.
I drag myself to my feet slower than necessary and make my way to the bars. Not too close. Just enough. The dim light catches the dried blood in my hair and the shadows under my eyes. I know what I look like.
Worse, I know what men think when they look at women like me in moments like this.
Soft enough to handle. Pretty enough to keep looking at.
Desperate enough to bargain.
“Yes,” I say quietly.
His eyes drag over my face, then lower, lingering just long enough to make my skin crawl.
“Please,” I add, hating the word but letting it sit there anyway.
He takes another step. Close enough now that I can see the smug satisfaction settling over his face.
“Beg for it.”
My jaw tightens reflexively before I force it to relax again.
Of course. Of course that’s what he wants.
Men like him always want the same thing—proof that they matter. Proof that they can make someone smaller than they are bend.
I lower my gaze like I’m considering it. Like the humiliation of it costs me something real.
It does.
Just not in the way he thinks.
“Please,” I say again, softer this time. “I need water.”
He tips his head, eyes glittering in the weak light. “Not good enough.”
My fingers curl around the bars.
“Please,” I whisper. “I’m begging you.”
That does it.
His mouth curves into something uglier than a smile. He unscrews the cap slowly, deliberately, letting me watch. Then he steps right up to the cage.
“Open your mouth.”
I hesitate just long enough to sell it. Press myself against the bars of the cage and open my mouth.
He lifts the bottle and tips it forward. Water splashes against my tongue—cold, sharp, perfect—and I force myself not to gulp it down like an animal. Just enough to wet my mouth. Just enough to make him think I’m grateful.
He pulls the bottle back before I get more than a few drops.
“Good girl,” he murmurs.
My stomach turns.
But I keep my eyes on his. Steady. Waiting.
He leans in closer, one hand bracing against the bar near my face. “Want more?”
“Yes.”
He tips the bottle again. This time I let my hand drift upward along the bar, slow and subtle, like I’m just trying to steady myself.
His eyes track the movement but don’t stop it. Another few drops hit my tongue.
My fingers brush the edge of his belt.
He notices that. His grin widens. “Careful.”
“Sorry,” I whisper.
But my hand doesn’t move away.
It drifts lower instead, fingertips grazing the keys at his hip.
He doesn’t pull back. Too busy watching my mouth. Too busy enjoying this.
Idiot.
My fingers close around something metal. Not the keys.
Something else.
A handle.
Knife.
My pulse steadies.
I meet his eyes one more time. Let him see exactly what he wants to see—submission, need, desperation.
Then I grab the knife, yank it free from its sheath, and drive it straight into his side.
He gasps, eyes going wide with shock.
I twist the blade hard before ripping it out.
Blood sprays hot across my hand, my wrist, the bars between us.
He stumbles backward, hand flying to the wound, mouth opening to scream.
I lunge for the keys still hanging at his belt.
My fingers close around the ring just as he jerks away, gasping, stumbling to the ground.
No.
I reach through the bars as far as I can, straining against the metal, but he’s already moving—too fast, too far, instinct overriding the pain long enough to get him out of reach.
“Fuck,” I spit.
He hits the wall near the door, blood soaking through his shirt, face white with shock and rage.
For one second, we just stare at each other.
Him bleeding. Me gripping a knife through the bars.
Then his hand goes to his side again and comes away red.
His eyes narrow.
“You fucking—”
He lunges for the cage door. My heart slams into my throat.
He’s going to open it.
He’s going to come in here and—The latch clicks.
The door swings wide.
I scramble backward, knife up, pulse hammering so hard I can feel it in my teeth.
He steps inside, one hand clamped over his side, blood pouring through his fingers, the other fumbling at his back.
A gun.
Damn it.
His face is paler now. Eyes wild. Not in control anymore. Just hurt enough to be dangerous.
“Drop it,” he rasps.
I don’t.
His hand closes around the grip and yanks his gun free, arm shaking as he levels it at me.
For one brutal second, the world narrows to the black hole of the barrel pointed at my chest.
Then shouting erupts somewhere outside the container.
Boots. Voices. Metal clanging.
His head jerks toward the sound.
I move.
I throw myself at him before he can think, before he can aim, before he can do anything but react. We hit each other hard enough to slam him back into the wall of the cage, his wounded side smashing against the metal with a grunt torn out of him.
The gun goes off.
The sound is so loud in the enclosed space it doesn’t even feel like sound. It feels physical. Like the air itself punches me.
Something slams hard into my middle. A blunt, brutal hit that steals my breath for half a second.
My ears ring.
He curses. The gun jerks in his hand.
I don’t think.
I catch his wrist with one hand and shove it up, sideways, anywhere but at me.
With the other, I keep the knife tight in my grip.
He’s bigger, but he’s bleeding and off-balance and I’m past fear now, somewhere meaner, hotter, all adrenaline and instinct and the ugly certainty that if I stop moving, I die here.
He snarls and tries to wrench the gun free. I drive the knife into his throat.
It isn’t clean.
The blade catches wrong, tears, then punches through.
Hot blood bursts over my hand, my wrist, the front of my shirt.
His mouth opens on a wet choking sound. The gun slips. I rip the knife out and stab again, lower this time, savage and fast and blind with the need to make sure he stays down.
He collapses to his knees.
The gun clatters from his hand.
I shove him hard.
He topples sideways, hits the floor of the cage, twitching, choking on his own blood.
I don’t wait for him to finish dying.
I snatch up the gun, nearly dropping it because my hands are shaking so hard.
Move.
The word cracks through my skull like an order.
I stumble over him, shoulder clipping the cage door hard enough to make it rattle, and lunge out into the container, breath tearing in and out of me, knife in one hand, gun in the other, heart trying to punch through my ribs.
The voices outside are louder now. Closer.
I run for the container door.
The light outside hits me like a blow after so long in the dark, bright enough to make me flinch. My vision swims for half a second before a hand wraps around my wrist.