Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The morning doves coo, sounding the alarm clock for the sleeping mountain forest. I groan, cringing at the pounding in my head.
I’m still in last night’s clothes, which reek of bonfire smoke and spilled liquor.
I lug myself up, rubbing the sleep from my eyes.
A deep snore sounds from the tent over, sending my head into a blinding pain.
Bear insisted he sleep next to me for protection since my friend’s paid us a visit after my… oh God.
I pull the sleeping bag over my eyes as the memory floods in.
No. No. No. Why? The last thing I fully remember is something about a dad.
Images of my outburst flash into my brain.
Shame washes over me, the tent suddenly feeling too tight.
I painfully sit up and quietly unzip the tent.
The morning sun faintly glows behind the mountain as crickets sing in the dew.
Everyone’s tents are still zipped, I pull on my hiking boots not bothering with the laces and stumble to my feet, careful not to step on the empty cans.
My mouth tastes disgusting— I need water pronto.
I round the simmering fire, smoke still flowing faintly into the brisk air, and carefully pull the van door open, crawling in on my knees to look for the case of water.
I fumble with tent cases, shoving them aside as I go.
A crinkle of plastic sounds under a discarded jacket.
Bingo. I lift the bottle, stripping the cap off desperately.
The cool liquid eases down my parched throat, and I pause, gasping for breath, before gulping the rest down.
I sink back onto my heels to catch my breath, just as a can crunches behind me. “I hope I didn’t wake you,” I breathe. “I just needed some water and I was going to start picking up the litter, if you want to hel?—”
A soaked cloth slips around my face and I mistakenly gasp, inhaling the chemical. I panic, clawing at the stranger’s arms, but it’s useless as the van before me fades to black.
The trees compact us on both sides, branches screaming against metal, long dragging shrieks that scrape across my ears like fingernails across a chalk board.
The world is black outside of the windows, thicker than night, swallowing the headlights until they look like the light from two weak candles pushing into a grave.
The truck slows in the thick of the woods, wedging tightly between two close sitting oaks.
I can’t open the door. I shove my shoulder into it anyway, but it doesn’t move.
“Devin? Devin what are you doing?”
I look around the cabin of the truck, searching for any exit.
“I thought you just wanted to talk about closure?” My voice comes out more ragged than I want.
Devin just ignores me. My breathing turns sharp and shallow while he reaches inch by inch into the driver’s side door, his hand finally latching onto an object.
“Florence.” His voice is dark, but calm. One hand casually rests on the steering wheel, the other on his lap over the item he retrieved. A gun. The black pistol sits there heavy and quiet.
I stop breathing.
“Give me your phone,” he demands.
My fingers don’t move, they’re numb and disconnected from me.
My mind scrambles for any words that can deter him.
Devin’s looking at me, waiting. He’s not angry, or yelling, and that’s always so much worse.
My hands shake as I hand it over. I have nothing to hide; we’ve been broken up for a week.
My friends were supposed to take me out tonight for a senior party, until he called me, begging to talk for closure.
He promised… he promised he would be nice.
The bark presses against the glass, inches from my face. There’s no escape. He scrolls intently and then dials. I hear my friend’s voice faintly through the speaker and my stomach drops out from under me. Isaiah and Cici.
“If you ever call her again,” he says evenly, “I’ll put a bullet through your head.”
Isaiah’s voice instantly vanishes. Even though the phone isn’t on speaker, I can still hear Cici cursing.
My throat closes. I try to speak, yet nothing comes out but a broken breath. “Please,” I whisper. “Please stop.”
He hangs up and dials another number. Another threat. Another promise. Another name.
My nails dig into my palms until they hurt.
I don’t realize I’m crying until my vision blurs, and the dashboard lights smear into red-and-gold streaks.
Devin hurls my phone into the floorboard, turning the ignition roughly.
The engine roars as the truck jerks backward violently.
The trees scrape along both sides, screaming against the metal as he forces us out.
The sound is unbearable, metal tearing, branches snapping, the forest refusing to let us go.
He laughs as we hit the road.
“Devin please stop; I’ll be with you I promise! We can be together— please just leave them alone.”
The speedometer climbs. Seventy. Seventy-one. Seventy-two. The truck begins to death rattle around us and the darkness outside turns into a solid wall. The headlights barely keep up. My hands grip the seat, knuckles aching, my body braced for an impact that never comes.
“Please slow down,” I sob. “Please, please—” He doesn’t. One hundred. The world is flying now, every curve feeling as if it’s the last one we’ll ever take. My heart is beating so hard it hurts. I know we’re going to die, and he isn’t afraid of it.
Chills race over my body as I realize it. He doesn’t care if we live.
The truck skids sideways and stops in front of a house I recognize through tears.
Before I can move, his door opens. He steps out, the night pausing with his arrival.
Gunfire explodes. The sound shatters everything.
One shot after another into the open sky above.
I curl myself into the passenger seat, screaming his name, any name, for it to stop.
But it doesn’t. It echoes through the trees, the forest giving the sound right back to me over and over until I can’t tell if the shots are still happening or if they’re inside my head.
I can’t breathe. I can’t move. I can’t?—
Cold bites into my cheek. I try to move, but the world tilts, my shoulders and hips burning against the solid floor.
My head throbs distantly, like it doesn’t belong to me.
My eyes rip apart like Velcro as a rumble vibrates my brain.
It’s me. I’m groaning. Staticky spots dance in my vision while an all too familiar ring soars through my ear drums. The air smells stagnant, filled with metal and…
wet dog? I fight to focus on my surroundings.
My vision strains onto steel bars that loom around me, thick and solid. Great. Another cage.
My limbs feel wrong. Heavy. Slow. A tingling sensation that somehow hurts.
I’ve been drugged. Concrete walls stretch out in the distance, with steel beams crossing the ceiling, and skylights lining the center of the ceiling.
A warehouse. Boxes sit stacked just outside the cage, neat and untouched, like I’m just another thing stored here.
Sealed away. I peer down at my feet, wiggling my toes.
One boot is still attached; the laces of it remain untied.
My chest tightens with my breath— I don’t remember how I got here.
A loud crash sends me scrambling against the solid wall.
I pinch my eyes together at the throb of my body, blinking rapidly as I notice the large figure snarling against the fence.
You’ve got to be kidding me. The wolf paces, its tongue darting between its canines as foam drips to the floor.
Standing at Torin’s height, it watches me, muted gold eyes pale and unblinking. Great, another timber wolf.
It’s fur lays thick and dense, layered in rough bands of gray and dark brown.
The coat looks rugged, built to hold the cold back, but no coat is ever built to endure abuse.
Scars cross its back; fur embedding into what looks like whip marks.
I pull my knees to my chest, burying my face into my hands.
“Well, well, well. She’s awake.” Vincent strolls across the floor, a long silver cane clanking against the concrete with each step. A ruby wolf is carved at the top, its mouth open in mid-snarl.
“So, you have to drug a woman to get her to come home with you nowadays?” I cough, my throat painfully dry.
Vincent clicks his tongue, pulling his fur coat closer to his waist.
The wolf lunges forward, biting rapidly at the cage as he approaches, blood trickling into the hair around its muzzle. I peer at its underbelly, noting that it’s a female. They really have signed my death warrant.
“Florence, I would never get my hands dirty with such, filth.” His lip curls at the sight of me. “It wasn’t my idea to drug you.”
I spit dryly onto the concrete. “Too scared?”
The roll of a chained door echoes across the warehouse.
Greer struts in, fully clothed in her T.A.L.O.N gear.
“It was my idea,” she chirps, flipping through the pages of a large file in her hand.
“Let’s see here… tsk, tsk, tsk.” Her eyes zig- zag across the paper.
“Florence Belcher, thirty-five, blood type O negative, single mother to Ellie and Todd Belcher. Originally from Hogback Mountain, father owns a small farm. Ummm, deceased brother and mother. Oof. You’ve got some issues.
Abusive baby daddy, anxiety, CPTSD, mandated therapy with Ana before missions?—”
She trails off, snapping the file shut. “My, my. You do have some baggage, Flossie. And a threat level ten, impressive.”
My head rolls back against the thick wall as I stare out into the sky light. Vincent smacks his cane against the wolf’s bars, only fueling her rage. “You were given lead, Greer. What more do you want from me?” My lips twitch as the words come out bitter, like acid.