Chapter 15
Chapter
Fifteen
If food fell on the floor in the Markos’ dining room, the idea of picking it up and eating it would be scandalous. Uncivilized. Here, hunger had made me do just that at breakfast. Even beat up, I was about to cut an asshole for toast.
All I got was a half-eaten slice of bread and lukewarm coffee, but it was a win in my book. Rodriguez, recently off his victory, took most of the food for himself and his fellow shape-shifting group.
“You want to talk about it?” Tad took a sip of his coffee, his slice of toast sitting in front of him, untouched.
Nibbling on mine, I sucked down coffee to soften the dry bread sticking in my throat. I needed nutrients, but it tasted like shit, and my stomach was dicey at best. Though the food here was utterly tasteless and too bland to upset anyone’s stomach.
“Not really.” I shifted on the stool uncomfortably, every muscle and nerve crying out for painkillers.
“Will you retaliate?”
“Yes.” I snarled. That bitch stole my blankie.
I used to have trunks stuffed with blankets.
Faux fur, silk, cashmere—all of them so soft you melted into them.
I never thought twice about the mounds of comforters, pillows, and blankets piled on my bed.
Now the possessiveness I felt for a scratchy, smelly blanket should have frightened me.
When you had nothing, those items you did have were treasures, and someone stealing them from you was the ultimate crime.
Tess and her gang would find out soon what a bad idea it had been to take stuff from me.
“You look like hell.”
“So I’ve been told.” I chewed down the rest of my meal. “You two are making me feel so good about myself.”
“Two?”
“Kek.” I rubbed my head, a deeper pounding thumping at my skull.
At Tad’s silence, I looked up at him.
“What?”
“Just be careful.” His lips pressed together, his gaze drifting over to the demon table where I knew she sat. Three words and he validated my suspicion about why a demon had latched on to me. And not for sexual favors or a prison pet.
“I am.” I brushed my hands free of crumbs and pushed myself up to stand, though it took a couple tries.
“You sound like me.” Tad chuckled as I keened and hissed getting to my feet, wrapping my arm around my torso. “Moaning and groaning over there.”
“At least I will heal, old man.”
“Keep that fire, girl. You will need it here.” He winked at me, laughing.
Biting my lip, I grabbed my empty coffee cup. I knew it would take me longer than usual to get to the laundry room and did not want to chance being late.
“Here.” He shoved his toast to me. “You need it more than me.”
“No.” I shook my head. “You need to eat. You’re old and decrepit, remember?”
“Exactly. It’s wasted on me.” The youthful glint in his eyes suggested he was far from his deathbed. “Just take it. Someday I might need kindness from you.” He dipped his head at the bread. “Take it.”
Cautious, I took his offering, giving him a nod of thanks. Then I limped across the cafeteria and dumped my cup in the bin.
Something changed in the room, like fog rolling over a mountain, licking your skin with its presence. My arms prickled with the sensation, the hairs standing on end. It was also when I noticed the early morning murmur had gone quiet. The room was holding its breath.
My heart thumped at a rabbit’s pulse. Slower than normal, I twisted around, my body shrieking in response. But just as fast as the pain struck my nerves, it vanished. As if the figure before me was emanating a sedative, taking away all my discomfort.
I was eye level with a black shirt, the chest underneath massive, forcing me to crane back to look up at the beast of the man. My throat strangled the air in my lungs.
Holy shit. Warwick Farkas.
To be this close to a legend. An icon. My brain struggled to recognize that he was real.
He stood less than five inches away, staring down at me, his intense aqua eyes even more unnerving this close. His weighty gaze rolled over me with curiosity as his head slanted to the side, a touch of disgust creased his brow.
He probably saw me as no more than a bug pinned to a board.
I didn’t back away, holding my chin up, swallowing audibly.
His attention trailed down the lash mark on my face, the swollen eye, and halted on my broken lip.
Flames flared down my back in a burst, licking my skin with perspiration.
I swiped my tongue nervously over my lower lip.
A crease appeared between his eyebrows before he journeyed down to the dried bloodstain on my uniform, how I still cradled my wound, and the bruises and cuts over my exposed skin.
Then without warning or verdict of his findings, he brushed past me, his arm grazing my skin, sending an electric shock through my body. I gasped for breath I hadn’t even realized I’d been holding. Shivering, my shoulders relaxed as if his gaze had been a palpable weight on me.
What the fuck was that?
I surveyed the room, seeing if the encounter held their focus. Every pair of eyes were on me. They were slack-jawed and silent. Assessing and curious. But also angry, as if me getting his attention affronted them somehow.
Feeling the impact of their wonder, I swiveled around, ignoring my pain, which had returned with a vengeance, and hobbled out of the room as fast as I could.
Not far from the laundry room, I heard a soft voice, “What did I say?” Lynx stepped out of the shadows, and I jolted with her appearance.
“Fuck, Lynx.” I cringed, everything in me revolting at the sudden movement. “Warn a girl.”
“Why?” Her black eyes didn’t blink. “I want to disappear into the shadows. Not be seen until it’s too late.”
“Good job then.”
“I warned you. Danger and violence like you,” she said softly, melancholy weaving through her words like a song. “I fear there is no going back now.”
“What are you talking about?” I resumed walking, the laundry facility in sight. “Don’t tell me you’re clairvoyant or something. Do those powers still work in here?”
“No. Nothing like that.” She matched my slow steps. “It’s not hard to see you just invited the worst sort of trouble in. His attention on you is not good for you.”
Warwick.
“I didn’t really have a choice. He was kind of there. In my way.”
“He’s never done that. No one has ever drawn any bit of his notice. Not even the ones he kills.”
Her statement wrapped around my throat like a noose. “Again, not something I could control.” I brushed it off with a shrug.
“True or not, you have opened the door for trouble. Good or bad, he put a bullseye on your back without saying a word, and you can’t die,” she said nonchalantly, strolling into the room and to her workstation.
Confused by her last statement, I rubbed my forehead. She was right about one thing. By looking at me, Warwick had marked me. Many would try to figure out what had captured his interest in me, even as brief as it was.
This kind of attention was not a good thing. The others would want to find out what had caused the notorious Warwick Farkas to pause.
And then they would try to destroy it.
Over the next week, fellow inmates circled me like sharks trying to figure out the piece of meat in the water. I felt eyes on me from every angle.
Except his.
Warwick had gone back to acting as if I didn’t exist, which I thought would ebb the curiosity. It didn’t.
The first full week of my incarceration had been hell. By day I pretended I wasn’t terrified, homesick, and utterly hopeless. By night I curled up in a ball, crying silently on the cold hard ground.
Daily assaults tore at my psyche: the smell of the relieving hole only steps from where I laid my head, sleeping on packed earth like some animal, and being left in the same bloody, grimy clothes. I knew I smelled bad, but mine was a drop in the sea of stench.
Torture and terror stripped away at my sense of self.
I felt primal. My mind slipped from reality and what I used to understand as normal.
I had lost weight from stress and the lack of food.
Even in sleep, my body never fully let go of the tension, and constant screams and guttural sobs woke me throughout the night, as well as my own nightmares.
I looked forward to sleep, though, because it brought dreams of Caden—feeling warm and restful.
Though it hurt like a bitch when I woke up realizing where I was and that I would never see him again.
Most likely, he thought I was dead. The “what ifs” of our story were punishment enough, but everything here was set to break you, even your own mind.
There were times death sounded like a dream. One you were glad to not wake from.
“Level 13!” A deep female voice boomed right as the door to my cell slid open, jolting my head up. “Shower day.”
Movement stirred on my level as sleepy prisoners in all colors of uniforms strolled by. Pushing myself up, I joined the zombie train, stumbling toward the washroom.
I’d accepted my lack of privacy to some degree, but showering in front of all these people was another slash at my comfort. At my sense of safety. How arrogantly I had acted at HDF, thinking I was so bold and comfortable with my body around others. I had been with my small safe group of friends.
“Come on,” the same guard yelled. “You know the drill. Undress. Clean. And get out for the next. No funny business.”
A few guards were stationed around the room, not hiding their glee at watching the prisoners disrobe.
A giant laundry cart sat near the open showers along the wall, ones I’d be washing and mending later.
A table was set up with clean uniforms, underwear, and towels with your number on display on the top of the pile.
Grabbing my kit, I watched as veteran prisoners leaped at the chance to be first. Some shared a showerhead.
“Come on, fish.” A guard came up behind me, tugging at my soiled top. His nasal voice sounded vaguely familiar, reminding me of the night Tess and her group beat me up. “Can’t be shy or modest here. Strip!”